MIT Professor: Power Your House With 5 Liters of Water Per Day
At the Aspen Environment Forum today, MIT professor Dan Nocera gave a revolutionary picture of the new energy economy with an assertion that our homes will be our power plants and our fuel stations, powered by sunlight and water. And it’s not science fiction.
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Nocera stated that even if we put all available acreage into fuel crops, all available acreage in wind power, and build a new nuclear power plant every 1.5 days, and we save 100% of our current energy use (yes, you read that correctly), we will still come up short by 2050. His estimate is that we will need 16 TW of energy production by then, and with our current methods, we won’t get there.
But there is a solution. And we don’t need to invent anything new to get from here to there.
Nocera said that MIT will announce its patent next week of a cheap, efficient, manufacturable electrolyzer made from cobalt and potassium phosphate. This technology, powered by a 6 meter by 5 meter photovoltaic array on the roof, is capable of powering an entire house’s power needs plus a fuel cell good for 500 km of travel, with just 5 liters of water.
The new electrolyzer works at room temperature (”It would work in this water glass right here”) to efficiently produce hydrogen and oxygen gases from water in a simple manner, which will enable a return to using sunlight for our primary energy source.
This technology will decentralize power production and provide true energy independence. The details of implementation still need to be worked out, but Nocera says that fears of hydrogen technology (safety) are unfounded, as companies that work with these gases have the capability to safely store and use them. “It’s safer than natural gas. You burn that in your house with an open flame. Now that’s dangerous.”
Image: emrank at Flickr under Creative Commons
what kind of generator can i hook to my dryer vent to trap all this waste heat energy and convert it to electricity??
It amazes me how people like Paul can read a reprocessed press release and instantly conclude that the MIT professor is a fraud, who either can’t add or is deliberately trying to pull the wool over the eyes of gullible (i.e., non-Paul) funders…
Paul, whoever you are (and I’m sure you’ll maintain your obscurity as well as your anonymity), I salute you.
These claims sound an awful lot like what Stan Meyer claimed to have done decades ago. If you don’t know who he was I suggest doing some research…
If you read his wiki they make him out to be a hoaxer but his tech was verifiably purchased by the DoD. His wiki claims perpetual motion machine. I don’t see where there is a difference between what Stan was doing and what MIT is claiming.
Astounding negative comments! If: separation of water into O2 and H2 is done and fed to fuel cell yielding more power than PV cells charging batteries yield, you have a game changing advantage. If the array doing the trick does it for less cash outlay than the equivalent P.V. array, you beat Solar photo voltaic - but by what margins? Electrolysis is hard on current. Is this new method more efficient? by what factor? A factor of X 2 would mean a scientific revolution and the end of nuclear power plants in the U.S.A.! Plus, for “overnight ” power, we can easily store H2 and O2! And, for Peak Power, same applies - and we are using conventional technologies save for the “Miracle Cell” that must, yield high levels of O2 and H2 for a given input of sun! Now, just what does MIT have? Can they get more efficiency out of a solar driven gas producing array, connected to a fuel cell to consume the same, and get more juice out of it than say Photo voltaic or even solar/thermal plants? If so, they have a winner and will change the face of Solar energy - if you happen to own a desert of parts of South Western U.S.A. but nothing changes for northern countries, they still await a parallel, Wind miracle, and in the mean time look to nuclear to save their radiant energy deficient asses. I suppose only the MIT patents will allow a real evaluation here.
If it does become a reality I hope they decide to distribute the technology free so that trees will stop being cut for fuel and the world can become a better place to live in
I studied the publication from Sciene and the podcast that Nocera was interviewed in. The oxygen separating electrode is distinct from the hydrogen electrode. According to Nocera this year they will be publishing another efficient electrode for the hydrogen side of the electrolytic cell. Normally platinum is used, obviously this is impractical for wide scale use. The current tech works with neutral pH water but is also being actively designed to work in the higher saline environment of ocean water. This will allow people to pipe ocean water in to a city, split the water in the cell, recombine it in a fuel cell to make drinkable water. This would kill a lot of birds with one stone.
If you are worried about storage and transfer of hydrogen, simply read the latest news on this at Science Daily news.com Its happening.
There Dan goes again! Crazy hype that got him in trouble last time. I know he needs more funding but come on Dan!
Fact is, we already can do what he is claiming. You can even go to YouTube and check out the house.
The problem is the cost. Cost Dan! It’s just as important as the technology because there are going to be competitors. Maybe PV and batteries will cost less, be quick-charge capable, be safer and lighter (overall system).
Thus, just go down to the store and by some PV panels, order up an elecrolyzer, buy some storage tanks and a few fuel cells and you can have a system up and running in a month or so, depending how handy you are with tools.
The ONLY thing Dan is claiming is that he found a way to improve the efficiency of the electrolyzer. He over hyped it before and said maybe we will see it operational in 10 years. Wow! Thanks.
So, How about we just say, “Sure Dan, just show me it working and tell me what it will cost.”
Sorry Dan but you have lost major credibility by shooting your mouth off. How about constrain a bit and just show us. Talk is cheap, unless it’s just to get more funding. If you don’t deliver on your word even the fools wise up eventually.
I think this sounds like a great idea, but we still ought to look at multiple power sources rather than put all our eggs into one basket.
Should, for example, something happen like a huge volcanic eruption, and the sun is blotted out for months or years, similar to Krakatoa, solar power would mostly fail, but there would still be wind power or tidal power, plus the conventional means.
You know, non-elitist people have been claiming to do this for years and years, but the mainstream scientific communities have laughed them to scorn.
Why is it that when an MIT professor merely “copy cats” what has been done repeatedly by so many others (with less glowing credentials), people fawn all over him? Stop rewarding (and worshipping) elitists for stealing non-elitists ideas!
Here is one thing about fuel-cell :- using hydrogen as a fuel will be good enough .But Hydrogen have a much less escape velocity ….that is why it rarely can be found in environment in our planet. And there will always be leakage during handling of the gas how little the amount ma be .And that will result hydrogen less world.!!!!!!!!