Types of Hydrogen and How to Make it
As a clean energy source, the types and production methods of hydrogen have an important impact on the environmental impact and application areas. According to the production source and carbon emissions of hydrogen, we can mainly divide it into three types: gray hydrogen, blue hydrogen and green hydrogen.
Gray hydrogen: As the name suggests, it comes from fossil energy such as coal, natural gas and oil that have not taken carbon reduction measures. Although these traditional hydrogen production methods are mature and low-cost, they have extremely high carbon emission intensity and impose a heavy burden on the environment.
Blue hydrogen: It represents an improvement. It significantly reduces carbon emissions in the process of hydrogen production from fossil energy by adopting carbon capture, utilization and storage (CCUS) technology. The application of this technology makes the production process of hydrogen more environmentally friendly. Although the cost is relatively high, it provides a feasible transitional solution for achieving low-carbon goals.
Green hydrogen: The production process produces almost no greenhouse gas emissions. It mainly produces hydrogen by electrolyzing water using renewable energy such as wind power and solar energy, and is a truly clean energy. The promotion and application of green hydrogen is the key to achieving energy transformation and responding to climate change.
In terms of hydrogen production technology, there are currently three main technical routes for large-scale application. The first is fossil energy hydrogen production based on coal and natural gas. This technical route is still the dominant way for industrial hydrogen production due to its high maturity and low raw material cost. However, it will produce a large amount of carbon dioxide and other pollutants during the production process, and the environmental cost cannot be ignored.
The second is industrial by-product hydrogen, which mainly uses by-product hydrogen produced in the production process of chemical, metallurgical and other industries. For example, although the scale of hydrogen production from coke oven gas is large, the purity of hydrogen is low; while the by-product hydrogen production from chlor-alkali has the advantages of low purification cost and high purity, showing good hydrogen production potential. However, the output of by-product hydrogen is small and the production capacity is dispersed, which limits its large-scale application.
The last is water electrolysis hydrogen production, which is a carbon-free and pollution-free technology that can produce high-purity hydrogen with few impurities and is suitable for a variety of applications. Although water electrolysis hydrogen production consumes a lot of electricity and has a high cost, with the reduction of renewable energy costs and technological progress, green hydrogen produced by renewable energy electricity is expected to become the mainstream direction of hydrogen production in the future. In addition to the above three main technologies, there are other hydrogen production processes, such as biomass hydrogen production, solar photolysis of water hydrogen production, etc. Although these technologies have not yet been applied on a large scale, they represent a new direction for the development of hydrogen energy technology and have great potential and application prospects.
In addition, ammonia and methanol can also be used as storage and transportation media for hydrogen. Although they are not directly used as raw materials for hydrogen production in these scenarios, they play an important role in the storage and transportation of hydrogen energy.
With the global attention to reducing greenhouse gas emissions and achieving sustainable development, the production and application of green hydrogen will become an important trend in the future development of hydrogen energy. Through technological innovation and policy support, hydrogen energy is expected to play a more important role in the transformation of energy structure.
Hydrogen production by electrolysis of water is the most advantageous method for producing hydrogen. Utrasonic coating systems are ideal for spraying carbon-based catalyst inks onto electrolyte membranes used for hydrogen generation. This technology can improve the stability and conversion efficiency of the diaphragm in the electrolytic water hydrogen production device. Cheersonic has extensive expertise coating proton exchange membrane electrolyzers, creating uniform, effective coatings possible for electrolysis applications.
Cheersonic ultrasonic coating systems are used in a number of electrolysis coating applications. The high uniformity of catalyst layers and even dispersion of suspended particles results in very high efficiency electrolyzer coatings, either single or double sided.
About Cheersonic
Cheersonic is the leading developer and manufacturer of ultrasonic coating systems for applying precise, thin film coatings to protect, strengthen or smooth surfaces on parts and components for the microelectronics/electronics, alternative energy, medical and industrial markets, including specialized glass applications in construction and automotive.
Our coating solutions are environmentally-friendly, efficient and highly reliable, and enable dramatic reductions in overspray, savings in raw material, water and energy usage and provide improved process repeatability, transfer efficiency, high uniformity and reduced emissions.
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