The Effect of Voltage and Electrode Types on Hydrogen Production from The Seawater Electrolysis Process

Abstract

Besides the limited supply, turns out the fossil fuels also causes carbon dioxide (CO2) pollution in the atmosphere and causing global warming. Therefore, renewable energy that environmentally friendly are needed, which is hydrogen gas considered capable of being an alternative to replace fossil fuels. One of many simple ways and effective to produce hydrogen gas is by electrolysis. Seawater was chosen in this research because of its abundant availability, have high efficiency and low cost to produce hydrogen gas. By varying the voltage from 1.5 volts to 24 volts with an increase of 1.5 volts, this research was conducted to determine the effect of the difference in voltage and type of electrode on the volume and rate of hydrogen production through electrolysis of seawater with constant time 10 minutes each. The type of electrode that used in this research are copper and graphite. The result showed that the productivity coefficient of copper electrodes was 0.41 ml with determination coefficient of 0.97; while, productivity coefficient of graphite electrodes was 0.32 ml with determination coefficient of 0.93. This research also shows that a maximum of volume hydrogen gas of 8.5 ml was produced through the electrolysis of seawater using copper electrodes at a voltage of 21 volts. This result is much greater than using the graphite electrodes that only produced a maximum volume of hydrogen gas of 7.1 ml at a voltage of 22.5 volts.