High-temperature electrolysis of copper chloride using hybrid proton exchange membrane for hydrogen production

Comprehensive utilisation of green hydrogen energy is an excellent pathway to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and simultaneously eliminate the carbon footprint released into the atmosphere. Meanwhile, hydrogen production via CuCl thermochemical cycle is an attractive process due to moderate-/lowt...

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Main Author: Ahmad Kamaroddin, Mohd Fadhzir
Format: Thesis
Language:English
Published: 2022
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Online Access:http://psasir.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/103839/1/FK%202022%2080%20IR.pdf
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spelling my-upm-ir.1038392023-06-14T08:04:57Z High-temperature electrolysis of copper chloride using hybrid proton exchange membrane for hydrogen production 2022-01 Ahmad Kamaroddin, Mohd Fadhzir Comprehensive utilisation of green hydrogen energy is an excellent pathway to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and simultaneously eliminate the carbon footprint released into the atmosphere. Meanwhile, hydrogen production via CuCl thermochemical cycle is an attractive process due to moderate-/lowtemperature requirements and high efficiency. Therefore, there is a huge potential for producing hydrogen from the copper chloride (CuCl) thermochemical cycle by utilising the power plant's excess heat. Currently, the CuCl hydrogen electrolytic process is part of the CuCl thermochemical cycle. It produces hydrogen at low temperatures utilising the expensive Nafion and Nafion-based membranes. A high-temperature CuCl hydrogen electrolytic process using a hybrid membrane as the alternative membrane to Nafion for hydrogen production was performed in this study. A polybenzimidazole/zirconium phosphate (PBI/ZrP) hybrid membrane was synthesized using the solution mixing method followed by phosphoric acid (PA) doping. It was then validated for water uptake, tensile strength, thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), copper (Cu) diffusion and ionic exchange capacity (IEC). The PBI/ZrP hybrid membrane was developed after the screening process of PBI and sulphated poly (ether ether ketone) (SPEEK) membrane with the advantage of having high tensile strength (85.17 MPa), high ionic exchange capacity (3.2 × 10−3 mol g−1), low copper diffusion (7.87 × 10−7 cm2 s−1), sufficient water uptake (40 – 50 wt.%), a four-fold increase in proton conductivity compared to pristine PBI. The scanning electron microscope (SEM) was executed to evaluate the surface morphology of the membrane while SEMEDX detected the membrane’s composition. For the parametric study, the CuCl hydrogen electrolytic system with PBI/ZrP (0.5 A cm−2, 115 °C) produced 3.27 cm3 cm−1 hydrogen (highest). At a higher CuCl flowrate, the PBI/ZrP showed a significant increment of 66% (up to 3.27 cm3 min−1) when the applied current density was changed from 0.1 to 0.5 A cm−2. The CuCl hydrogen electrolytic process at 0.05 M CuCl concentration produced 2.69 cm3 min−1 and 2.15 cm3 min−1 hydrogen for PBI/ZrP and Nafion 117, respectively. The operating temperature (p = 0.026) and current density (p = 0.000) were found statistically significant based on the p-value < 0.05. The CuCl hydrogen electrolytic process parameters were optimised using a response surface method (RSM) with a central composite design (CCD). The optimised parameter settings were temperature at 116 °C, current density at 0.773 A cm−2 and CuCl concentration at 0.075 M to get the optimum hydrogen yield of 0.7167 cm3 min−1. The actual hydrogen yield from the optimized parameter settings was 0.7709 cm3 min−1 with a discrepancy of 7.56% from the predicted value. The high-temperature CuCl hydrogen electrolytic process using a PBI/ZrP hybrid membrane for hydrogen has been performed and proven a good alternative to Nafion. At the same time, able to yield maximum hydrogen output with optimum operating parameters, thus minimizing the associated cost in the hydrogen production. Copper compounds Electrolysis Proton exchange membrane fuel cells 2022-01 Thesis http://psasir.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/103839/ http://psasir.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/103839/1/FK%202022%2080%20IR.pdf text en public doctoral Universiti Putra Malaysia Copper compounds Electrolysis Proton exchange membrane fuel cells Sabli, Nordin
institution Universiti Putra Malaysia
collection PSAS Institutional Repository
language English
advisor Sabli, Nordin
topic Copper compounds
Electrolysis
Proton exchange membrane fuel cells
spellingShingle Copper compounds
Electrolysis
Proton exchange membrane fuel cells
Ahmad Kamaroddin, Mohd Fadhzir
High-temperature electrolysis of copper chloride using hybrid proton exchange membrane for hydrogen production
description Comprehensive utilisation of green hydrogen energy is an excellent pathway to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and simultaneously eliminate the carbon footprint released into the atmosphere. Meanwhile, hydrogen production via CuCl thermochemical cycle is an attractive process due to moderate-/lowtemperature requirements and high efficiency. Therefore, there is a huge potential for producing hydrogen from the copper chloride (CuCl) thermochemical cycle by utilising the power plant's excess heat. Currently, the CuCl hydrogen electrolytic process is part of the CuCl thermochemical cycle. It produces hydrogen at low temperatures utilising the expensive Nafion and Nafion-based membranes. A high-temperature CuCl hydrogen electrolytic process using a hybrid membrane as the alternative membrane to Nafion for hydrogen production was performed in this study. A polybenzimidazole/zirconium phosphate (PBI/ZrP) hybrid membrane was synthesized using the solution mixing method followed by phosphoric acid (PA) doping. It was then validated for water uptake, tensile strength, thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), copper (Cu) diffusion and ionic exchange capacity (IEC). The PBI/ZrP hybrid membrane was developed after the screening process of PBI and sulphated poly (ether ether ketone) (SPEEK) membrane with the advantage of having high tensile strength (85.17 MPa), high ionic exchange capacity (3.2 × 10−3 mol g−1), low copper diffusion (7.87 × 10−7 cm2 s−1), sufficient water uptake (40 – 50 wt.%), a four-fold increase in proton conductivity compared to pristine PBI. The scanning electron microscope (SEM) was executed to evaluate the surface morphology of the membrane while SEMEDX detected the membrane’s composition. For the parametric study, the CuCl hydrogen electrolytic system with PBI/ZrP (0.5 A cm−2, 115 °C) produced 3.27 cm3 cm−1 hydrogen (highest). At a higher CuCl flowrate, the PBI/ZrP showed a significant increment of 66% (up to 3.27 cm3 min−1) when the applied current density was changed from 0.1 to 0.5 A cm−2. The CuCl hydrogen electrolytic process at 0.05 M CuCl concentration produced 2.69 cm3 min−1 and 2.15 cm3 min−1 hydrogen for PBI/ZrP and Nafion 117, respectively. The operating temperature (p = 0.026) and current density (p = 0.000) were found statistically significant based on the p-value < 0.05. The CuCl hydrogen electrolytic process parameters were optimised using a response surface method (RSM) with a central composite design (CCD). The optimised parameter settings were temperature at 116 °C, current density at 0.773 A cm−2 and CuCl concentration at 0.075 M to get the optimum hydrogen yield of 0.7167 cm3 min−1. The actual hydrogen yield from the optimized parameter settings was 0.7709 cm3 min−1 with a discrepancy of 7.56% from the predicted value. The high-temperature CuCl hydrogen electrolytic process using a PBI/ZrP hybrid membrane for hydrogen has been performed and proven a good alternative to Nafion. At the same time, able to yield maximum hydrogen output with optimum operating parameters, thus minimizing the associated cost in the hydrogen production.
format Thesis
qualification_level Doctorate
author Ahmad Kamaroddin, Mohd Fadhzir
author_facet Ahmad Kamaroddin, Mohd Fadhzir
author_sort Ahmad Kamaroddin, Mohd Fadhzir
title High-temperature electrolysis of copper chloride using hybrid proton exchange membrane for hydrogen production
title_short High-temperature electrolysis of copper chloride using hybrid proton exchange membrane for hydrogen production
title_full High-temperature electrolysis of copper chloride using hybrid proton exchange membrane for hydrogen production
title_fullStr High-temperature electrolysis of copper chloride using hybrid proton exchange membrane for hydrogen production
title_full_unstemmed High-temperature electrolysis of copper chloride using hybrid proton exchange membrane for hydrogen production
title_sort high-temperature electrolysis of copper chloride using hybrid proton exchange membrane for hydrogen production
granting_institution Universiti Putra Malaysia
publishDate 2022
url http://psasir.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/103839/1/FK%202022%2080%20IR.pdf
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