A new type of water electrolysis using an alkaline polymer electrolyte and a non-precious metal catalyst, which works in just regular water, has been developed by scientists in China.
Current solid polymer electrolytes are acid-based and require noble metals catalyst (such as Pt and Ir), which are expensive and rare. This alkaline polymer electrolyte uses a non-precious metal catalyst and can work with normal pure water (instead of KOH solution).
Read the Communication featured in EES:
First Implementation of Alkaline Polymer Electrolyte Water Electrolysis Working Only with Pure Water
Li Xiao, Shuai Zhang, Jing Pan, Cuixia Yang, Minglong He, Lin Zhuang and Juntao Lu
Energy Environ. Sci., 2012, Accepted Manuscript
DOI: 10.1039/C2EE22146B
