Outdoor direct solar-driven massive photo-thermo-catalytic reforming of methanol into hydrogen at lower temperature

Solar-driven massive fuel production technology with the utilization of photo-thermo-catalytic method is emerging as a future energy development trend. This paper is aimed at establishing an outdoor flow photo-thermo-catalytic system of reforming methanol into hydrogen at low temperature to explore the outdoor operation condition for future commercial applications. Moreover, a massive preparation process is designed to fabricate CuO/ZnO/ZrO2 (CZZ) nano -catalysts with the solar full-spectrum absorption of 91.4%. Under the optimal liquid feeding rate and the water/methanol molar ratio, the solar-to-chemical conversion efficiency can reach 10.7% under a low temperature of 422K when the direct irradiation intensity is 700 W/m2, which is 5.2% higher than that of the experimental basic research at the same temperature.(c) 2022 Hydrogen Energy Publications LLC. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.