IIT-Guwahati develops catalyst to release hydrogen gas from wood alcohol

GUWAHATI: Researchers at the Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati (IIT-G) have developed a catalyst that can release hydrogen gas from wood alcohol with no side production of carbon dioxide. With the world moving towards finding alternatives to fossil fuels, hydrogen gas continues to be the best source of clean energy generation.
Hydrogen is being produced from bio-derived chemicals such as alcohol, typically produced from methyl alcohol (commonly called wood alcohol) using a catalyst, in a process called methanol reforming. But scientists had been confronting two major problems with the catalytic production of hydrogen from wood alcohol. First, the process involves high temperatures in the range of 300 degree C and at high pressures (20 atmosphere) and secondly, the reaction co-produces carbon dioxide, which is a greenhouse gas. The IIT-G researchers’ team, led by Akshai Kumar AS, associate professor of chemistry department, has found a solution here.
“The catalytic systems that were reported earlier for methanol reforming act like a ‘bramhastra’ and result in the complete destruction of methanol to Co2 (carbon dioxide) while resulting in clean burning hydrogen. However, by clever design of strategy, the current catalytic system reported by our group result in selective transformation of methanol to high value formic acid and clean-burning hydrogen,” said Akshai Kumar.
The IIT-Guwahati team developed a special form of catalyst which contains a central metal and a few specific organic ligands. Because of this special arrangement, the catalyst becomes very specific and selective. Thus, Kumar said, as wood alcohol is broken into hydrogen, formic acid is generated instead of carbon dioxide.
ChemDist Group of Companies is the industry collaborator on the project. Speaking on the industrial potential of the research Sunil Dhole, director, ChemDist Group of Companies, said, “Commercially speaking, the exciting fact about this work is that an abundantly available and cheaper organic chemical like methanol can be converted to hydrogen using a cheaper catalyst, at lower temperatures and without carbon dioxide emission.”