A full electrolyzer prototype is now being developed by NewHydrogen to demonstrate their cutting-edge, high-performance, low-cost catalyst technology.
The prototype will be used as a base for future NewHydrogen developments of additional electrolyzer component advancements.
The University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) is the site of NewHydrogen-sponsored research that aims to systematically cut the cost of green hydrogen while improving the performance of vital hydrogen generator components. These electrolyzers now rely on scarce materials like iridium and platinum, which make up a significant amount of the cost, to split water into oxygen and hydrogen.
Researchers at UCLA who were supported by NewHydrogen in 2021 dramatically enhanced the efficiency of PEM electrolyzers by creating a low-cost oxygen catalyst that does not require pricey iridium. Hydrogen catalysts that use far less platinum or none at all were also produced.
The Company is currently in the process of building a complete prototype electrolyzer using its innovative oxygen and hydrogen catalysts. This prototype will act as a foundation for incorporating additional component improvements relating to the gas diffusion layer, ion exchange membrane, and catalyst layer as the company broadens its technology focus beyond catalysts. The ultimate objective of the company is to create a low-cost, high-performance electrolyzer made up of numerous ground-breaking parts.
Using commercial platinum and iridium-based catalysts, the researchers will first undertake systematic acidic water splitting in order to establish a standard testing procedure and assess the benchmark performance of the present commercial catalysts. The performance of the Company’s new catalysts will next be assessed in the prototype electrolyzer, including the activity transition into the electrolytic cell, long-term stability, rate of hydrogen production, specific energy consumption, and predicted overall costs of new catalysts.
