Photo-Electrochemical Water Splitting with III-V Semiconductors: Research Challenges at the Cell and Module Level
Event details
| Date | 01.03.2018 |
| Hour | 11:15 › 12:15 |
| Speaker | Dr. Todd Deutsch, NREL, Golden, Colorado Bio: Todd Deutsch is a Senior Scientist in the Chemistry & Nanoscience Center at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory(NREL) in Golden, Colorado. He has been studying photoelectrochemical water splitting since interning in Dr. John A. Turner’s lab at NREL in 1999 and 2000. He performed his graduate studies on III-V-nitride semiconductor water-splitting systems under the joint guidance of Dr. Turner and Prof. Carl A. Koval in the Chemistry department at the University of Colorado-Boulder. Todd officially joined NREL as a postdoctoral scholar in August 2006 and became a staff scientist two years later. He works on identifying and characterizing appropriate materials for generating hydrogen fuel from water using sunlight as the only energy input. Recently, his work has focused on inverted metamorphic multijunction III-V semiconductors and corrosion remediation strategies for high-efficiency water-splitting photoelectrodes. |
| Location | |
| Category | Conferences - Seminars |
Abstract:
In order to economically generate renewable hydrogen fuel from solar energy using semiconductor-based devices, the U.S. Department of Energy Fuel Cell Technologies Office has established technical targets of over 20% solar-to-hydrogen (STH) efficiency with several thousand hours of stability under operating conditions. First, I will describe our approach to engineering the solid-state structure and surface of multi-junction III-V semiconductors to achieve STH efficiencies approaching this aggressive 20% target. In the second part of this talk, I will identify the challenges and elaborate on solutions for successfully scaling the absorber area of III-V cells from ~0.15 cm2 up to 16 cm2 and incorporating them in a photoreactor module capable of generating 3 standard liters of hydrogen in 8 hours under natural sunlight.
In order to economically generate renewable hydrogen fuel from solar energy using semiconductor-based devices, the U.S. Department of Energy Fuel Cell Technologies Office has established technical targets of over 20% solar-to-hydrogen (STH) efficiency with several thousand hours of stability under operating conditions. First, I will describe our approach to engineering the solid-state structure and surface of multi-junction III-V semiconductors to achieve STH efficiencies approaching this aggressive 20% target. In the second part of this talk, I will identify the challenges and elaborate on solutions for successfully scaling the absorber area of III-V cells from ~0.15 cm2 up to 16 cm2 and incorporating them in a photoreactor module capable of generating 3 standard liters of hydrogen in 8 hours under natural sunlight.
Practical information
- Informed public
- Free
Organizer
Contact
- Prof. Sophia Haussener