Seawater electrolysis for hydrogen production: Technological advancements and future perspectives

Abstract

Hydrogen energy is widely acknowledged as a renewable and inexhaustible source of energy that can help combat the current energy crises and mitigate the environmental impact caused by the extensive use of fossil fuels. Hence contemporary techniques for hydrogen production such as natural seawater (NSW) electrolysis is emerging. Seawater is an abundant (>96 % of total water reservoir) but almost useless source of water (till now). This review presents an extensive discussion of experimental investigations aimed at identifying the most effective pathway to achieve the highest performance of seawater electrolysis (SWE) through recently introduced catalysts, membrane and electrolyzer. The fundamental experimental parameters such as electrolyte pH (alkaline, acidic, or neutral seawater as electrolyte), applied potential, current density, overpotential, Tafel slope, stability, and faradic efficiency (FE) have been studied for oxygen evolution reaction (OER) and hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) electrocatalysts. To gain a better understanding of the current shortcomings of SWE, the most effective methods for achieving stable, long-lasting SWE have been studied to figure out how reliable SWE is when it comes to producing green hydrogen fuel for real-world applications.