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Projects: Projects for Investigator
Reference Number EP/F056168/1
Title Nanocrystalline Photodiodes: Novel Devices for Water Splitting
Status Completed
Energy Categories Renewable Energy Sources(Solar Energy, Photovoltaics) 75%;
Hydrogen and Fuel Cells(Hydrogen, Hydrogen production) 25%;
Research Types Basic and strategic applied research 100%
Science and Technology Fields PHYSICAL SCIENCES AND MATHEMATICS (Chemistry) 100%
UKERC Cross Cutting Characterisation Not Cross-cutting 100%
Principal Investigator Professor IP Parkin
No email address given
Chemistry
University College London
Award Type Standard
Funding Source EPSRC
Start Date 01 May 2008
End Date 30 April 2011
Duration 36 months
Total Grant Value £471,972
Industrial Sectors Electronics
Region London
Programme Nanoscience through engineering to application
 
Investigators Principal Investigator Professor IP Parkin , Chemistry, University College London (99.999%)
  Other Investigator Dr J Darr , Chemistry, University College London (0.001%)
Web Site
Objectives Linked to grant EP/F056230/1
Abstract The fossil fuel reserves of the world are rapidly diminishing and are also the prime cause for global warming. Solar energy represents a major, largely untapped energy source which could easily satisfy current and future global energy demands. Any solar energy conversion device must be inexpensive per m2, efficient and long-lasting. In this programme, novel, inorganic water-splitting systems, called macro-photocatalytic diode cells, MPCDs, utilising a range of new and established visible-light absorbing photocatalyst materials, will be developed for splitting water using sunlight in separate compartments. The latter feature is important as it will minimise, if not eliminate, the various efficiency-lowering recombination reactions associated with mixed product generation. The work programme involves a number of novel aspects including: the preparation of new nanoparticulate, crystalline photocatalyst materials, fabricating them into different novel photodiode formats and the synthesis and utilisation of new redox catalysts. The use of nanoparticulate semiconductor photocatalysts, made via continuous hydrothermal flow synthesis, CHFS, in conjunction with gel casting for robust porous supports, is a particularly important and novel advance, as too is the proposed combinatorial approach to the preparation of photocatalyst films by CVD. The project will develop a significant amount of the underpinning science required for the fabrication of the final, optimised, efficient MPCDs and include a study of the underlying reaction mechanisms, using time-resolved transient absorption spectroscopy. The proposal offers a route to achieving a step change in efficiency for energy capture from the sun and aims to deliver efficient, scalable demonstrators of the MPCD technology, suitable for development into pilot plant systems in the second phase of funding
Publications (none)
Final Report (none)
Added to Database 28/04/08