Garden grass could become a source of cheap and clean renewable energy, scientists at Cardiff University, UK, have claimed. They have shown that significant amounts of hydrogen can be unlocked from fescue grass with the help of sunlight and a cheap catalyst; hydrogen is contained in enormous quantities all over in the world in water, hydrocarbons and other organic matter and there is a serious need to release hydrogen from these sources in a cheap, efficient and sustainable way. This process is called photoreforming or photocatalysis and involves the sunlight activating the catalyst (metal based: palladium, gold and nickel) which then gets to work on converting cellulose and water into hydrogen− their “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”.
[1] Caravaca A. et al, Proceedings of the Royal Society A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Science, 2016; 472 (2191) [2]
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