Ammonia Fuel Cell -By Ajinkya Godse
Fuel cells are alternate technologies for conventional internal combustion engines that work on fossil fuels. In a traditional fuel cell, Hydrogen and oxygen react to produce electricity. The only waste product is water. However, it is challenging to produce pure Hydrogen and store it in a suitable form. Furthermore, it is explosive. What if we could use some other chemical as fuel instead of Hydrogen? That’s exactly what researchers around the world are trying to achieve… An Ammonia-based fuel cell!
Air contains 78% N2, and thus producing pure nitrogen gas is relatively easier than producing Hydrogen. Ammonia is more suitable to store and convenient to transport. In terms of energy carrying capacity, it fares better than Hydrogen as it has more than twice the energy/mass and huge energy/volume (comparable to that of Ethanol, although lesser than gasoline.) But there is no free lunch. Ammonia fuel cells cannot use traditional proton-electron membranes. They require Hydroxide exchange membranes. Also, the oxidation of Ammonia is slow at low temperatures, and it tends to poison some catalysts.
Researchers at the University of Delaware have succeeded in making a high-temperature fuel cell to hasten Ammonia’s oxidation. Another usage of Ammonia is a buffer in energy production and consumption. Solar and wind are considerably established renewable energy technologies. However, they are intermittent. i.e. they cannot supply constant power to the grid. So a better option is to use the generated electricity to produce fuels like NH3, transport it wherever required (just like LPG cylinders).
Thank you, Ajinkya Godse (2nd yr UG, DESE) for the amazing article.
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