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Tech to Share in $350 Million Hydrogen Research Initiative
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(April 30, 2004)--A team led by Michigan Tech researcher Jim Hwang is slated to receive a $1.7 million grant from the Department of Energy as part of President George W. Bush's Hydrogen Research Initiative.
Through the initiative, a total of $350 million in funding for science and research projects will be awarded nationwide this year to establish a hydrogen economy.
Hwang, the director of the Institute of Materials Processing and an associate professor of materials science and engineering, will focus his efforts on a novel class of materials known as metal perhydrides. The co-principal investigators on the project are Assistant Reserch Engineer Shangzhao Shi (IMP), Associate Professor Douglas Swenson and Professor Stephen Hackney (MSE)
The goal is to develop substances that can safely and cheaply store hydrogen chemically and then release it-also safely and cheaply-as fuel.
Hydrides are a type of compound that contains hydrogen. Perhydrides would be super-hydrides, bulked up with an extra dose of hydrogen.
"This is beyond existing chemistry," Hwang said. "No existing compounds can give up enough hydrogen to use in an engine. That's why the DOE gave the challenge to think outside the box."
To visualize how a metal perhydride would work, think of hydrogen peroxide, which is water with an extra oxygen atom. "Add water to it and it gets foamy; it's releasing oxygen," Hwang said. Similarly, a perhydride would release hydrogen gas.
A major stumbling block in the development of hydrogen-powered vehicles has been storage. You can't just pull up to a hydrogen pump, fill up your tank and drive away.
"You can have a tank of hydrogen gas, but you'd need a lot of hydrogen and it would be a really heavy tank," Hwang said. "And hydrogen is explosive, so potentially it could be quite dangerous." A metal perhydride, on the other hand, would be solid and stable, hold its extra hydrogen, and then release it efficiently as it was needed for fuel.
Bush's $350 million Hydrogen Research Initiative represents nearly one-third of the administration's $1.2 billion commitment in research funding to bring hydrogen and fuel cell technology from the laboratory to the showroom.
Selected through a merit-reviewed, competitive process, the projects involve 30 lead organizations and include over 100 partners. Michigan Tech and the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor are the only two universities in the state to receive funding under the program.
Bush has proposed a multi-year research funding effort to develop clean, hydrogen-powered automobiles that would free the U.S. from dependence on foreign petroleum.
"President Bush's administration recognizes that a hydrogen economy has the long-term potential to deliver greater energy independence by reducing America's dependence on foreign sources of energy," said Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham, in announcing the grant package April 27.
"It offers immense environmental benefits that current energy technologies cannot meet. This multi-million dollar commitment to research is a down payment on a more energy and environmentally secure future." |
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