Hydrogen economy, energy, and liquid organic carriers for its mobility

Abstract

The World hydrogen economy refers to the structure of hydrogen production and its utilization as a primary energy carrier. One of the major keys for the development of hydrogen economy is safe, economical, and compact hydrogen storage. The traditional liquid state hydrogen storage poses several challenges such as safety and cost for on-board energy carrier. Hence, they failed to meet future energy challenges. Liquid organic hydrogen carriers (LOHCs) provide a pliable route to storage and transportation of hydrogen energy. This transport relies on two steps i.e. hydrogenation and dehydrogenation. In hydrogen storage chemistry, hydrogen undergoes covalent bonding with respective LOHC. LOHCs at ambient conditions are very much similar to the traditional fuels like diesel and gasoline, hence it can be easily transported and stored. Following the same, systems like Dodecahydro-N-ethylcarbazole and 1,2-dihydro-1,2-azaborine represents potential properties with capacities of 5.8 and 7.1 wt% hydrogen uptake. Apart from this, circular hydrogen carrier like methanol i.e. synthesized from atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) is also a potential candidate for hydrogen storage. The present review highlights the above-mentioned systems based on their operating temperature, economical aspects, toxicity, and other factors that are highly considerate for their mobile applications.