A Cooperative Approach to Solve the Problem of Solar Water Splitting

Bruce Parkinson^a

^aUniversity of Wyoming, Laramie, Wyoming 82071, EE. UU., Laramie, United States

Proceedings of International Conference on Light Driven Water Splitting Using Semiconductor Based Devices (SolarFuel15)

Illetes, Spain, 2015 March 11th - 13th

Organizers: Leslie Frotscher, Sixto Gimenez Julia, Wolfram Jaegermann and Bernhard Kaiser

Invited Speaker, Bruce Parkinson, presentation 076
Publication date: 15th December 2014

The full potential of solar energy cannot be realized unless there is method to store it and use it as fuel. Despite large efforts in the past and the present there has been very little progress in the quest to develop a practical, inexpensive and efficient photoelectrochemical solar fuel device. In this talk I will explain the reasons that photoelectrochemical production of hydrogen from water is preferable to large-scale carbon dioxide reduction for solar fuel production. However materials that are stable and have the proper band gaps for an efficient photoelectrochemical water splitting device are currently unknown. In addition these materials need to be catalytic for water oxidation or reduction reactions or have catalyst layers deposited on their surfaces. I will discuss combinatorial methods for discovering new oxide semiconductors and solid-state catalysts that might be further optimized to be useful in a solar water splitting device. Researchers need to focus on quickly evaluating the structural and electronic properties of many new materials that will emerge from the combinatorial searches to identify a few that have the potential to be stable, efficient and inexpensive. Expertise in both synthetic and property measurement in various laboratories is then leveraged to quickly evaluate the promise of these new materials so a quick decision can be made about whether further studies are considered fruitful or unproductive. An example of collaborations between my laboratory and other laboratories on one newly identified material will be given as an example.

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