#carbon monoxide

New efficient, low-temperature catalyst for hydrogen production

Scientists have developed a new low-temperature catalyst for producing high-purity hydrogen gas while simultaneously using up carbon monoxide (CO). The discovery-described in a paper set to publish online in the journal Science on Thursday, June 22, 2017-could improve the performance of fuel cells that run on hydrogen fuel but can be poisoned by CO.

“Thiscatalyst produces a purer form of hydrogen to feed into the fuel cell,” said José Rodriguez, a chemist at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Brookhaven National Laboratory. Rodriguez and colleagues in Brookhaven’s Chemistry Division-Ping Liu and Wenqian Xu-were among the team of scientists who helped to characterize the structural and mechanistic details of the catalyst, which was synthesized and tested by collaborators at Peking University in an effort led by Chemistry Professor Ding Ma.

Because the catalyst operates at low temperature and low pressure to convert water (H2O) and carbon monoxide (CO) to hydrogen gas (H2) and carbon dioxide (CO2), it could also lower the cost of running this so-called “water gas shift” reaction.

“With low temperature and pressure, the energy consumption will be lower and the experimental setup will be less expensive and easier to use in small settings, like fuel cells for cars,” Rodriguez said.

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My Childhood: Carbon Monoxide

My aunt lived several states away with her own family, and we would visit each other a few times a year. In 1999 I was 8 years old and they visited us for a week. That particular day we went out in the evening to eat at a German restaurant that started a fart war between my dad and uncle. I laughed a lot. But when we got home, I noticed a smell I had never smelled before.

It was like sweet gasoline mixed with rusty pennies. Very potent, but no one else in the house smelled it. I am so grateful for my mom, who remembered that I am special, and while the men were making fun of our concern, mom forced everyone out of the house and called the fire department, thinking it may be a natural gas leak. They found high levels of carbon monoxide in the home due to a malfunctioning heater, and said if we had stayed in the house that night we all would have died.

People like to remind me that it is impossible to smell CO, but I don’t listen to them. This was only the FIRST time I saved my family’s lives with this ability to smell CO, so if I ever smell that sweet sticky scent, I pitch a fit until the problem is found. It has ALWAYS been carbon monoxide.