Exclusive:Solar fules

Perspectives on artificial photosynthesis for solar fuels production

  • LI Rengui ,
  • LI Can
Expand
  • Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, State Key Laboratory of Catalysis, Dalian National Laboratory for Clean Energy, Dalian 116023, China

Received date: 2020-09-15

  Revised date: 2020-10-27

  Online published: 2021-01-14

Abstract

Artificial photosynthesis for solar fuels production is considered to be an energy disruptive technology in the future, which can fundamentally change the current situation of excessive utilization on fossil fuels. In addition, artificial photosynthesis is an interdisciplinary science involving many fields such as chemistry, physics, materials and biology, and is also a key scientific problem in fundamental science that attracts increasing worldwide interest. In this paper we briefly introduce the concept and key reactions of artificial photosynthesis and focus on the discussion of scalable solutions to solar hydrogen production via water splitting and corresponding technical feasibility analysis. Then we present an introduction and technique routes of liquid solar fuels (e. g. methanol), as well as their potential applications. Finally, we propose a feasible solution to mimick natural artificial process via the coupling of ‘light reaction’ and ‘dark reaction’ for large-scale solar fuels production.

Cite this article

LI Rengui , LI Can . Perspectives on artificial photosynthesis for solar fuels production[J]. Science & Technology Review, 2020 , 38(23) : 105 -112 . DOI: 10.3981/j.issn.1000-7857.2020.23.011

References

[1] Pinaud B A, Benck J D, Seitz L C, et al. Technical and economic feasibility of centralized facilities for solar hydrogen production via photocatalysis and photoelectrochemistry[J]. Energy & Environmental Science, 2013, 6(7):1983-2002.
[2] Wang Q, Hisatomi T, Jia Q X, et al. Scalable water splitting on particulate photocatalyst sheets with a solar-tohydrogen energy conversion efficiency exceeding 1%[J]. Nature Materials, 2016, 15(6):611-615.
[3] 李灿, 李仁贵, 赵越, 等. 一种规模化太阳能光催化-光电催化分解水制氢的方法:CN107012474A[P]. 2017-08-04.
[4] Zhao Y, Ding C M, Zhu J, et al. A hydrogen farm strategy for scalable solar hydrogen production with particulate photocatalysts[J]. Angewandte Chemie International Edition, 2020, 132(24):9740-9745.
[5] Kim T W, Choi K S. Nanoporous BiVO4 photoanodes with dual-layer oxygen evolution catalysts for solar water splitting[J]. Science, 2014, 343(6174):990-994.
[6] Liu G J, Ye S, Yan P L, et al. Enabling an integrated tantalum nitride photoanode to approach the theoretical photocurrent limit for solar water splitting[J]. Energy & Environmental Science, 2016, 9(4):1327-1334.
[7] Liu B, Feng S J, Yang L F, et al. Bifacial passivation of n-silicon metal-insulator-semiconductor photoelectrodes for efficient oxygen and hydrogen evolution reactions[J]. Energy & Environmental Science, 2020, 13:221-228.
[8] Cheng W H, Richter M H, May M M, et al. Monolithic photoelectrochemical device for direct water splitting with 19% efficiency[J]. ACS Energy Letters, 2018, 3(8):1795-1800.
[9] Bonke S A, Wiechen M, MacFarlane D R, et al. Renewable fuels from concentrated solar power:Towards practical artificial photosynthesis[J]. Energy & Environmental Science, 2015, 8(9):2791-2796.
[10] Jia J Y, Seitz L C, Benck J D, et al. Solar water splitting by photovoltaic-electrolysis with a solar-to-hydrogen efficiency over 30%[J]. Nature Communications, 2016, 7:13237.
[11] Hisatomi T, Takanabe K, Domen K. Photocatalytic water-splitting reaction from catalytic and kinetic perspectives[J]. Catalysis Letters, 2015, 145(1):95-108.
[12] Goto Y, Hisatomi T, Wang Q, et al. A particulate photocatalyst water-splitting panel for large-scale solar hydrogen generation[J]. Joule, 2018, 2(3):509-520.
[13] 治A. 奥拉, 阿兰·戈佩特, G. K. 苏耶·普拉卡西. 跨越油气时代:甲醇经济[M]. 胡金波, 译. 北京:化学工业出版社, 2007.
[14] Wang J, Li G, Li Z, et al. A highly selective and stable ZnO-ZrO 2 solid solution catalyst for CO2 hydrogenation to methanol[J]. Science Advances, 2017, 3(10):e1701290.
Outlines

/