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Economical electrolyser solution

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 ARTICLE IN PRESS
I N T E R N AT I O N A L J O U R N A L O F H Y D R O G E N E N E R G Y 33 (2008) 3041 – 3044

Available at www.sciencedirect.com

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/he

Economical electrolyser solution

Daniel Marcelo, Alessandro Dell’Era

CIRPS—Interuniversity Research Centre for Sustainable Development, University of Rome ‘‘La Sapienza’’, Via Eudossiana, 18, Rome, Italy

art i cle info ab st rac t

Article history: In the market there are conventional alkaline electrolysers and advanced polymer
Received 12 October 2007 membrane electrolysers, with higher performance, but they are both quite expensive.
Received in revised form Indeed, the materials commonly utilized for water electrolysis in alkaline electrolysers are
5 February 2008 those based on Raney nickel and their alloys, but these materials are expensive. Taking into
Accepted 21 February 2008 account those aspects, the following work aims, as other authors [Olivares-Ramı́reza JM,
Available online 5 May 2008 Campos-Corneliob ML, Uribe Godı́nezb J, Borja-Arcob E, Castellanosb RH. Studies on the
hydrogen evolution reaction on different stainless steels. Int J Hydrogen Energy 2007; 32:
Keywords:
3170–3. [1]; Henrique dos Santos Andrade M, Lima Aciolia M, Ginaldo da Silva Juniora J,
Hydrogen
Carlos Pereira Silvaa J, Oliveira Vilarc E, Tonholoa J, Preliminary investigation of some
Alkaline electrolysis
commercial alloys for hydrogen evolution in alkaline water electrolysis. Int J Hydrogen
Cost analysis
Energy 2004;29:235–41. [2]], to highlight how it is possible to produce hydrogen in
economical ways using less advanced technologies. A conventional alkaline electrolytic
cell, ‘‘lab-electrolyser’’, has been built using economical material. It is composed of
electrodes of 5.0 cm  5.0 cm characterized by a current density of about 250 mA/cm2 and an
efficiency of about 65% at 55 1C; the cell produces about 2.7 Nl/h of hydrogen. The overall
cost of this devise has been compared with the cost of the electrolysers available on the
market, hypothesizing a linear dependence cost with the productive capacity. The
conclusion has been that there is a big margin for costs decreasing even taking into
account all the auxiliary systems for an electrolysis process.
& 2008 International Association for Hydrogen Energy. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights
reserved.

1. Introduction using renewable resources generates power without produ-

Hydrogen is the fuel for the future, and the future is ‘‘today’’.
The hydrogen economy is still at the beginning but the
society, innovation, and market push inexorably towards
hydrogen, inspiring the idea of an energy integrated system
that can satisfy, in an independent way, the energy needs
of small-sized consumers. According to the ‘‘closed cycles
philosophy’’ [3,4] of our research group (GEA—Energy
and Environment Group—of CIRPS—Interuniversity Center
of Research For Sustainable Development, University of Rome
‘‘La Sapienza’’), the integrated system should perform a
closed cycle—ecologically neuter and sustainable because
cing refusals [5]. To size energetically the system the average
energy needs of an Italian family for 1 day has been taken into
account. The assessment is about 9 kW h and 55% of this
energy is supposed to be used during the daily hours directly
from the photovoltaic system. The remaining energy to be
supplied is 4 kW h during the evening and the night. There-
fore, this amount of energy has to be produced and stored
during the day exploiting the sunshine or wind energy. How
can this be done? This can be achieved by producing
hydrogen from water and accumulating it either in a normal
tank or in a special one containing a particular material able
to adsorb and desorb hydrogen. To produce hydrogen, an

Corresponding author.
E-mail address: alessandro.dellera@uniroma1.it (A. Dell’Era).
0360-3199/$ - see front matter & 2008 International Association for Hydrogen Energy. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.ijhydene.2008.02.078
 ARTICLE IN PRESS
3042 I N T E R N AT I O N A L J O U R N A L O F H Y D R O G E N E N E R G Y 33 (2008) 3041 – 3044

electrolyser that splits distilled water into hydrogen and
oxygen has been taken into account. The main unit is the
electrolysis stack where the electric energy from the photo-
voltaic or eolic system is converted into chemical energy
producing hydrogen [6]. This hydrogen has to be stored and
the two main options under consideration are a conventional
cylinder tank or a special one inside which a particular
material adsorbs and desorbs hydrogen [5]. There are several
kinds of materials capable of receiving and releasing hydro-
gen due to their own crystalline structure, which hosts the
hydrogen atoms. All of the current methods and the projected
technologies of producing hydrogen from solar energy are
much more costly (greater than a factor of 3) when compared
with hydrogen production from coal or natural gas plants.
This high difference puts enormous pressure on the need of
reducing the cost of a solar energy recovery device. Nowadays
all system components are very expensive as well as the
Fig. 1 – (a) Durability test. (b) Polarization curves of
electrolytic cell at 20 and 55 1C and comparison between
the polarization curves of a commercial electrolyser at 55 1C.
electrolyser. In the future, as the cost of the fuel cell
approaches $50/kW, the cost of an electrolytic cell to
electrolyse water is also expected to approach a low number
(about $125/kW).
2. Discussion
In this context and with the intention to improve the
hydrogen economy, this work aims at demonstrating how,
without losing a substantial percentage of efficiency, it is
possible to build a low cost electrolyser using a simple
technology and conventional material. However, the produc-
tion of low cost hydrogen can help the introduction of solar
energy storage in the market. The effective cost of an
electrolytic cell has been analysed and the proportional cost
of an electrolyser stack estimated much more productive, on
the basis of the material that we used. Other authors, with
the same focus, studied the hydrogen evolution reaction on
different stainless steels (AISI 304, 316, 430) [1]; in this work
the stainless steel AISI 310 has been tested in a conventional
alkaline electrolytic cell. It is composed of net shape electro-
des of 5.0 cm  5.0 cm (mesh ASTM ¼ 70; AISI 310—composi-
tion: 0.25%C–25%Cr–21%Ni–2%Mn–1.5%Si (UNI4047)), char-
acterized by a current density of about 250 mA/cm2 with an
efficiency of 65% at about 55 1C, producing about 2.7 Nl/h of
hydrogen, using economical material. To measure the hydro-
gen and oxygen volumes produced, a laboratory system was
used, consisting of two burettes full of water connected with
the cathodic and anodic compartment, respectively. In this
way, it was possible to measure the variation of level of water
and to establish that there was a perfect correspondence
between the hydrogen volume measured and the current
passed through the cell and that the faradic efficiency is very
close to 100%. Durability test has been accomplished to test
the electrochemical stability and the material degradation. In
Fig. 1a the voltage cell as function of time is shown; it can be
noted that also after 300 h the voltage does not suffer
appreciable changes. In Fig. 1b the polarization curves of the

Table 1 – Electrolyser parameters P1, P2, P3, Vrev, Vdec, Vw

Lab-electrolyser Commercial electrolyser Lab-electrolyser Commercial electrolyser

Fitting Experiment

T (1C) 20 55 55 55 55
P1 (O cm2) 1.57 0.87 0.66 – –
P2 (V) 0.12 0.13 0.14 0.21 0.2
P3 1.15  106 1.71  105 5.8  103 1.3  105 5.8  103

Lab-electrolyser Commercial electrolyser

T (1C) 20 55 55
Vrev (V) 1.23 1.19 1.19
Vdec (V) Cathodic process 1.4 1.24
iffi0 Anodic process 0.57 0.52
Vw (V) Cathodic process 1.56 1.41
i ¼ 250 mA/cm2 Anodic process 0.73 0.63
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I N T E R N AT I O N A L J O U R N A L O F H Y D R O G E N E N E R G Y 33 (2008) 3041 – 3044 3043

electrolytic cell at 20 and 55 1C are reported. Comparing the depend on quality of the manufacturing procedure. The
performance at 55 1C with a commercial electrolyser, the following relation has been used to make the fitting [7,8]:
performances are not so different, considering that they also
V ¼ Vrev þ P1  i þ P2 logðP3  iÞ (1)

where Vrev is the thermodynamic potential that depends on

the temperature T, P1 is the ohmic specific resistance. P2 is
 
RT 1 1
P2 ¼ 2:306 þ (2)
F a1 a2

where R is the gas constant, T is the temperature, F is

Faraday’s constant and a1 and a2 are the transfer coefficients
for the cathodic process on the cathode and for the anodic
process on the anode. Finally, P3 is
 a2 =ða1 þa2 Þ  a1 =ða1 þa2 Þ
1 1
P3 ¼ (3)
i01 i02

Fig. 2 – Cyclic voltammetries (20 mV/s) of lab and
commercial electrolyser electrodes at 55 1C.
where i01 and i02 are exchange current density for the
cathodic and anodic processes.
By the fitting it was possible to estimate only the global
parameters P1, P2, P3, reported in Table 1, but not the values
that appear inside, as the exchange current densities or the
transfer coefficient ai (i ¼ 1; 2), while by a cyclic voltammetry
(EG&G Princeton Applied Research model 273 potentiostat/
galvanostat) those parameters and the voltage decomposition
Vdec of the anodic and cathodic processes, for all electrodes,
have been evaluated and reported in Table 1. In Fig. 2 the

Fig. 3 – (1) Tafel curve for cathodic process of lab-electrolyser

electrode; (2) Tafel curve for anodic process of commercial
electrolyser electrode; (3) Tafel curve for cathodic process of Fig. 4 – (m) Electrolytic cell efficiency at 55 1C (’); electrolytic
lab-electrolyser electrode; (4) Tafel curve for cathodic process cell efficiency at 20 1C; (J) cost to produce an electrolysis
of commercial electrolyser electrode. stack of 1000 Nl/h as function of the efficiency.

Table 2 – Current exchange density i0, Tafel slope b and charge transfert coefficient a at 55 1C

T ¼ 55 1C Lab-electrolyser Commercial electrolyser

Current exchange density i0 (A/cm2) Cathode 7.5  106 9  103

Anode 7.5  106 1.3  104
Tafel slope b (V/Dec) Cathode 0.145 0.136
Anode 0.07 0.07
charge transfer coefficient a Cathode 0.45 0.48
Anode 0.95 0.93
 ARTICLE IN PRESS
3044 I N T E R N AT I O N A L J O U R N A L O F H Y D R O G E N E N E R G Y
Table 3 – Lab-electrolyser materials and costs
Electrodes Stainless steel net AISI 310
(mesh ASTM ¼ 70)
Current collectors Stainless steel net AISI 310
(mesh ASTM ¼ 18)
Bipolar plates Stainless steel plate AISI 310
Membrane Polypropylene, Plexiglas
Gasket Polyisoprene
Electrolyte Water, KOH 30% weight
tangent method for the voltage decomposition evaluation is
illustrated and the values are reported in Table 1, while the
Tafel curves (from Butler–Volmer equation) have been plotted
in Fig. 3 to calculate the current exchange density and the
charge transfer coefficient for both processes and for all
electrodes, reported in Table 2. The parameters P1, P2, P3 vary
with the temperature as expected: the global transfer
coefficient [1/a1+1/a2] and the exchange current densities
increase, and the overall ohmic specific resistance decreases.
Though the ohmic specific resistance of the commercial
electrolyser is lower than lab-electrolyser, as well the para-
meter ‘‘P3’’, these differences do not presuppose so high a
difference of costs, as underlined in the Conclusion. In Fig. 4,
the efficiency of the electrolyser is reported as a function of
the current density for two temperature values. The working
temperature of electrolysis, normally, is about 50–60 1C and
the current density is about 250–300 mA/cm2, and at these
values, the efficiency is about 65%. The electrolyser works
quite good and is very chip. The materials used are reported
in Table 3 and the components are shown in Fig. 1. Therefore,
to produce 2.7 Nl/h of hydrogen the expense for the material
of the cell was about h2. On the basis of this result a possible
effective cost to produce an electrolysis stack of 1000 Nl/h
as a function of the efficiency has been estimated and the
results reported in Fig. 4, where it is possible to see that from
Z ¼ 0.55 to 0.7 (high current density and small electrolyser)
the costs increase slowly, while from Z ¼ 0.7 to Zffi1 (low
current density and big electrolyser) the costs rise quickly.
Comparing the working voltage Vw at 250 mA/cm2 (Table 1)
between lab and commercial electrolyser, it can be noted that
there is a difference of about 25 mV and therefore a difference
of about 6.2  102 W/cm2. Assuming the faradic efficiency
close to 1, to produce 1000 Nl/h the difference becomes about
0.6 kW.
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33 (2008) 3041 – 3044
3. Conclusion
h0.2
By this work, a cost analysis of an alkaline electrolysis process
h0.2 has been presented. There is a good agreement between
parameters i0, b and a recorded by experiment and by fitting
h0.8 as results from Table 1. For an efficiency of about 65%, the cost
h0.3 of the materials for an electrolysis stack of 1000 Nl/h can be
h0.2
h740 (Fig. 4), thus about 140 h/kW, much lower than the actual
h0.3
alkaline electrolyser stack. Nowadays the price of an alkaline
electrolyser stack is about h12.500 and the technology for this
kind of process is, by this time, developed and acquired.
Despite the commercial electrolyser, performances are better
than lab-electrolyser and despite a difference of 0.6 kW, the
diversity between costs is too high; only the stack of an
electrolyser costs as two utility passenger cars, approaching
close to the price of four cars considering the overall alkaline
electrolyser. In conclusion, the comparison results depicted
demonstrate that there is a high margin to diminish the
present alkaline electrolyser costs.
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J, Borja-Arcob E, Castellanosb RH. Studies on the hydrogen
evolution reaction on different stainless steels. Int J Hydrogen
Energy 2007;32:3170–3.
[2] Henrique dos Santos Andrade M, Lima Aciolia M, Ginaldo da
Silva Juniora J, Carlos Pereira Silvaa J, Oliveira Vilarc E,
Tonholoa J. Preliminary investigation of some commercial
alloys for hydrogen evolution in alkaline water electrolysis. Int
J Hydrogen Energy 2004;29:235–41.
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proceedings hypothesis V. Porto Conte Ricerche Alghero,
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[4] Orecchini F, Naso V. La Società No Oil. Orme Editori, Milano;
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hydrogen and oxygen by solar water electrolysis. Int J
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2003;28:21–33.
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