Articolo in rivista, 2023, ENG, 10.1016/j.joule.2023.01.002

Stepwise photoassisted decomposition of carbohydrates to H2

Puning Ren, Zhuyan Gao, Tiziano Montini, Zhitong Zhao, Na Ta, Yike Huang, Nengchao Luo, Emiliano Fonda, Paolo Fornasiero, and Feng Wang

State Key Laboratory of Catalysis, Dalian National Laboratory for Clean Energy, Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Dalian 116023, China University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China Department of Chemical and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Center for Energy, Environment and Transport Giacomo Ciamiciam, INSTM Trieste Research Unit and ICCOM-CNR Trieste Research Unit, University of Trieste, Via Licio Giorgieri 1, Trieste 34127, Italy College of Chemical Engineering and Technology, Taiyuan University of Technology, Taiyuan, Shanxi 030024, China State Key Laboratory of Catalysis, Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Dalian 116023, China Laboratory of Catalysts and New Materials, Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Dalian 116023, China Synchrotron SOLEIL, L'Orme des Merisiers, Saint Aubin BP48, 91192 Gif sur Yvette Cedex, France

Hydrogen (H2), as an indispensable clean energy vector, has been well demonstrated to be produced via biomass photoreforming powered by solar light. For future biomass refining, biomass photoreforming deserves a high decomposition extent of biomass to maximize H2 production, as the greenhouse gas emissions from biomass acquisition and pretreatment will minimize per mass of H2. The main obstacle to high H2 yield is the far insufficient C-C bond breaking to convert biomass carbons into CO2 with maximization of H2 production. Here, we emphasize C-C bond breaking instead of direct H2 production. Such a "C-C bond first" strategy realizes conversion of carbohydrates into C1 liquid hydrogen carriers (LHCs, consisting of HCOOH and HCHO) over Ta-CeO2 photocatalyst and is demonstrated in a flow apparatus powered solely by solar energy. The LHCs can release H2 on-site where needed by either photocatalysis or thermocatalysis. This work provides a new perspective for H2 production by photocatalysis.

Joule (Cambridge, MA. Online) 7 (12), pp. 333–349

Keywords

biomass, photocatalysis, C-C bond cleavage, formic acid generation, H2 generation

CNR authors

Fornasiero Paolo, Montini Tiziano

CNR institutes

ICCOM – Istituto di chimica dei composti organo metallici