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Grass could become an affordable source of clean, renewable energy, according to a team of researchers from Cardiff University.
A recently published study states that significant amounts of hydrogen could be extracted from grass with the help of sunlight and a cheap catalyst.
This from Cardiff University:
It is the first time that this method has been demonstrated and could potentially lead to a sustainable way of producing hydrogen, which has enormous potential in the renewable energy industry due to its high energy content and the fact that it does not release toxic or greenhouse gases when it is burnt.
“Hydrogen is seen as an important future energy carrier as the world moves from fossil fuels to renewable feedstocks,” says Michael Bowker, co-author of the study, “and our research has shown that even garden grass could be a good way of getting hold of it.”
Hydrogen could be derived from cellulose, which is a key component of plants. For their study, the team demonstrated the transformation of cellulose into hydrogen using just sunlight and simple catalyst. The process – known as photocatalysis – activates a catalyst through sunlight to convert the cellulose and water into hydrogen.
“Up until recently, the production of hydrogen from cellulose by means of photocatalysis has not been extensively studied,” Bowker says. “Our results show that significant amounts of hydrogen can be produced using this method with the help of a bit of sunlight and a cheap catalyst.”
