Utilizing Nanostructured Materials for Hydrogen Generation, Storage, and Diverse Applications

The rapid advancement of refined nanostructures and nanotechnologies offers significant potential to boost research activities in hydrogen storage. Recent innovations in hydrogen storage have centered on nanostructured materials, highlighting their effectiveness in molecular hydrogen storage, chemical storage, and as nanoconfined hydride supports. Emphasizing the importance of exploring ultra-high-surface-area nanoporous materials and metals, we advocate for their mechanical stability, rigidity, and high hydride loading capacities to enhance hydrogen storage efficiency. Despite the evident benefits of nanostructured materials in hydrogen storage, we also address the existing challenges and future research directions in this domain. Recent progress in creating intricate nanostructures has had a notable positive impact on the field of hydrogen storage, particularly in the realm of storing molecular hydrogen, where these nanostructured materials are primarily utilized.

Paving the Way to the Fuel of the Future-Nanostructured Complex Hydrides

Hydrides have emerged as strong candidates for energy storage applications and their study has attracted wide interest in both the academic and industry sectors. With clear advantages due to the solid-state storage of hydrogen, hydrides and in particular complex hydrides have the ability to tackle environmental pollution by offering the alternative of a clean energy source: hydrogen. However, several drawbacks have detracted this material from going mainstream, and some of these shortcomings have been addressed by nanostructuring/nanoconfinement strategies. With the enhancement of thermodynamic and/or kinetic behavior, nanosized complex hydrides (borohydrides and alanates) have recently conquered new estate in the hydrogen storage field. The current review aims to present the most recent results, many of which illustrate the feasibility of using complex hydrides for the generation of molecular hydrogen in conditions suitable for vehicular and stationary applications. Nanostructuring strategies, either in the pristine or nanoconfined state, coupled with a proper catalyst and the choice of host material can potentially yield a robust nanocomposite to reliably produce H2 in a reversible manner. The key element to tackle for current and future research efforts remains the reproducible means to store H2, which will build up towards a viable hydrogen economy goal. The most recent trends and future prospects will be presented herein.

A Unique Double-Layered Carbon Nanobowl-Confined Lithium Borohydride for Highly Reversible Hydrogen Storage

Poor reversibility and high desorption temperature restricts the practical use of lithium borohydride (LiBH₄ ) as an advanced hydrogen store. Herein, a LiBH₄ composite confined in unique double-layered carbon nanobowls prepared by a facile melt infiltration process is demonstrated, thanks to powerful capillary effect under 100 bar of H₂ pressure. The gradual formation of double-layered carbon nanobowls is witnessed by transmission electron microscopy (TEM) observation. Benefiting from the nanoconfinement effect and catalytic function of carbon, this composite releases hydrogen from 225 °C and peaks at 353 °C, with a hydrogen release amount up to 10.9 wt%. The peak temperature of dehydriding is lowered by 112 °C compared with bulk LiBH₄ . More importantly, the composite readily desorbs and absorbs ≈8.5 wt% of H₂ at 300 °C and 100 bar H₂ , showing a significant reversibility of hydrogen storage. Such a high reversible capacity has not ever been observed under the identical conditions. The usable volumetric energy density reaches as high as 82.4 g L^-1 with considerable dehydriding kinetics. The findings provide insights in the design and development of nanosized complex hydrides for on-board applications.

Tuning LiBH4 for Hydrogen Storage: Destabilization, Additive, and Nanoconfinement Approaches

Hydrogen technology has become essential to fulfill our mobile and stationary energy needs in a global low–carbon energy system. The non-renewability of fossil fuels and the increasing environmental problems caused by our fossil fuel–running economy have led to our efforts towards the application of hydrogen as an energy vector. However, the development of volumetric and gravimetric efficient hydrogen storage media is still to be addressed. LiBH₄ is one of the most interesting media to store hydrogen as a compound due to its large gravimetric (18.5 wt.%) and volumetric (121 kgH₂/m³) hydrogen densities. In this review, we focus on some of the main explored approaches to tune the thermodynamics and kinetics of LiBH₄: (I) LiBH₄ + MgH₂ destabilized system, (II) metal and metal hydride added LiBH₄, (III) destabilization of LiBH₄ by rare-earth metal hydrides, and (IV) the nanoconfinement of LiBH₄ and destabilized LiBH₄ hydride systems. Thorough discussions about the reaction pathways, destabilizing and catalytic effects of metals and metal hydrides, novel synthesis processes of rare earth destabilizing agents, and all the essential aspects of nanoconfinement are led.

Nanostructured Metal Hydrides for Hydrogen Storage

Knowledge and foundational understanding of phenomena associated with the behavior of materials at the nanoscale is one of the key scientific challenges toward a sustainable energy future. Size reduction from bulk to the nanoscale leads to a variety of exciting and anomalous phenomena due to enhanced surface-to-volume ratio, reduced transport length, and tunable nanointerfaces. Nanostructured metal hydrides are an important class of materials with significant potential for energy storage applications. Hydrogen storage in nanoscale metal hydrides has been recognized as a potentially transformative technology, and the field is now growing steadily due to the ability to tune the material properties more independently and drastically compared to those of their bulk counterparts. The numerous advantages of nanostructured metal hydrides compared to bulk include improved reversibility, altered heats of hydrogen absorption/desorption, nanointerfacial reaction pathways with faster rates, and new surface states capable of activating chemical bonds. This review aims to summarize the progress to date in the area of nanostructured metal hydrides and intends to understand and explain the underpinnings of the innovative concepts and strategies developed over the past decade to tune the thermodynamics and kinetics of hydrogen storage reactions. These recent achievements have the potential to propel further the prospects of tuning the hydride properties at nanoscale, with several promising directions and strategies that could lead to the next generation of solid-state materials for hydrogen storage applications.

Oxygen-free Layer-by-Layer Assembly of Lithiated Composites on Graphene for Advanced Hydrogen Storage

A facile hydrogenation-induced self-assembly strategy to synthesize lithium hydride (LiH) nanosheets with a thickness of 2 nm that are uniformly distributed on graphene is reported and designed. Taking advantage of LiH nanosheets with high reactivity and a homogeneous distribution on graphene support as a nanoreactor, the confined chemical synthesis of oxygen-free lithiated composites is effectively and efficiently realized.

Well-dispersed lithium amidoborane nanoparticles through nanoreactor engineering for improved hydrogen release

Well-distributed lithium amidoborane (LiAB) nanoparticles were successfully fabricated via adopting carbon nanofibers (CNFs) with homogenous pores uniformly containing Li3N as the nanoreactor and reactant, simply prepared by a single-nozzle electrospinning technique, for the subsequent interaction with AB. The hierarchical porous structure consists of various macropores, mesopores and micropores in situ produced during the formation of Li3N simultaneously serving as the reaction initiator, which not only controllably realizes the well-distribution of LiAB nanoparticles but also provides favorable channels for hydrogen release. Because of the hierarchical porous architecture and nanoscale size effects, the LiAB nanoparticles start to release hydrogen at only 40 °C, which is 30 °C lower than that of pure LiAB, and dehydrogenate completely within only 15 min at 100 °C (10.6 wt%). This work provides a new perspective to the controllable fabrication of nanosized hydrogen storage materials.