Efficiency limits for photoelectrochemical water-splitting

Fountaine, Katherine T.; Lewerenz, H. J.; Atwater, Harry A.

doi:10.1038/ncomms13706

Cited by 241 publications

(266 citation statements)

References 35 publications

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“…For solar hydrogen generation with a tandem light absorber, device models (35) indicate that lowering the photoanode band gap from the BiVO 4 gap of 2.4 eV to the 1.8-eV value observed with several tier-7 compounds can elicit a 2-to 3-fold enhancement in device efficiency, highlighting the opportunities provided by our discovery of low-band-gap photoanodes. As with well-established photoanodes such as BiVO 4 and Fe 2 O 3 , each photoanode reported here will require extensive research and development to optimize its solar energy conversion efficiency.…”

Section: Significancementioning

confidence: 99%

Solar fuels photoanode materials discovery by integrating high-throughput theory and experiment

Yan

Suram

et al. 2017

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

174

177

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The limited number of known low-band-gap photoelectrocatalytic materials poses a significant challenge for the generation of chemical fuels from sunlight. Using high-throughput ab initio theory with experiments in an integrated workflow, we find eight ternary vanadate oxide photoanodes in the target band-gap range (1.2-2.8 eV). Detailed analysis of these vanadate compounds reveals the key role of VO 4 structural motifs and electronic band-edge character in efficient photoanodes, initiating a genome for such materials and paving the way for a broadly applicable high-throughput-discovery and materials-by-design feedback loop. Considerably expanding the number of known photoelectrocatalysts for water oxidation, our study establishes ternary metal vanadates as a prolific class of photoanode materials for generation of chemical fuels from sunlight and demonstrates our high-throughput theory-experiment pipeline as a prolific approach to materials discovery. solar fuels materials | density-functional theory | high-throughput experiments | complex oxides | photocatalysis T he use of predictive simulation in combination with experiments for the accelerated discovery and rational design of functional materials is a challenge of significant contemporary interest. High-throughput computing and materials databases (1-3), largely based on density-functional theory (DFT), have recently enabled rapid screening of solid-state compounds with simulation for multiple properties and functionalities (4-10). Since their advent just a few years ago, these DFT-based databases and analytics tools have already been used to identify more than 20 new functional materials that were later confirmed by experiments across a number of applications (8), motivating concerted efforts to validate theory predictions with experiments (11). However, in photoelectrochemistry for the renewable synthesis of solar fuels, efficient metal-oxide photoanode materials--photoelectrocatalysts for the oxygen evolution reaction (OER)--remain critically missing (12). Forty years of experimental research has yielded just 16 metal-oxide photoanode compounds with band-gap energy in the desirable 1.2-2.8-eV range that strongly overlaps with the solar spectrum. Prior high-throughput computational screening studies have yet to expand this list (6, 7, 13), in part due to quantitative limitations in predictability of the electronic structure--especially band-gap energy, E g , and the valence band maximum (VBM) energy, E VBM --from the chemical composition and crystal structure. Our integration of ab initio theory with high-throughput experiments has yielded a most prolific materials discovery effort, as demonstrated by the identification of 12 water oxidation photoelectrocatalysts in the target band-gap range, including our recently reported 4 copper vanadates (14) and 8 additional metal vanadates reported here.Monoclinic BiVO 4 (15) has received substantial attention as a solar fuels photoanode material due to its promising OER photoactivity. It has a desirable 2.4-eV band...

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Section: Significancementioning

confidence: 99%

Solar fuels photoanode materials discovery by integrating high-throughput theory and experiment

Yan

Suram

et al. 2017

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

174

177

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“…Charges are separated via external ohmic contact and the HER and OER are spatially isolated on cathode and anode, respectively. External bias is frequently required if the light‐activated potential is thermodynamically insufficient for water splitting . Another type of STH system is the photovoltaic water electrolysis, which is realized by combining a solar cell and a water electrolysis cell via ohmic contact.…”

Section: Figurementioning

confidence: 99%

“…External bias is frequently required if the light-activated potential is thermodynamically insufficient for water splitting. [19] Another type of STH system is the photovoltaic water electrolysis, which is realized by combining a solar cell and a water electrolysis cell via ohmic contact. The former converts solar into electricity and the latter converts electricity into hydrogen.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

A New Strategy for Solar‐to‐Hydrogen Energy Conversion: Photothermal‐Promoted Electrocatalytic Water Splitting

Zhang

Cao

2019

ChemElectroChem

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Solar‐to‐hydrogen (STH) energy conversion can be typically realized by photocatalytic water splitting, photoelectrochemical water splitting, and photovoltaic water electrolysis. Herein, we propose a new strategy for STH energy conversion based on photothermal‐promoted electrocatalysis (PTPE). First, carbon hemispheres were developed with strong capability of collecting and concentrating heat by absorbing photons (>630 nm). Second, we incorporated two representative materials, Co(OH)2 and MoS2, with the heat collectors (carbon hemispheres) as electrocatalysts for the oxygen evolution reaction (OER) and hydrogen evolution reaction (HER), respectively. The two hybrids showed enhanced electrocatalytic activity of water splitting under light irradiation, owing to the elevated local temperature of carbon that had been heated by the light. PTPE might be widely applied in electrocatalytic systems for solar energy utilization via a simple STH and subsequent heat‐promoted electrosynthesis route.

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“…In particular, electrochemical (EC) splitting of water offers a promising way to convert solar energy into hydrogen because of its low conversion losses. Hydrogen production requires a thermodynamic EC voltage of 1.23 V. In addition, overpotentials are caused by the charge carrier transport in the electrodes and the electrolyte, catalytic effects, and other losses of the systems . As a result, the total voltage required to drive the reaction is in the range from 1.6 to 2.0 V. There are several ways to achieve this voltage using semiconductor materials.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…systems. 2 As a result, the total voltage required to drive the reaction 3 is in the range from 1.6 to 2.0 V. There are several ways to achieve this voltage using semiconductor materials. To achieve a feasible design, the proposed device should use relatively stable and cheap material.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Designing a hybrid thin‐film/wafer silicon triple photovoltaic junction for solar water splitting

Perez‐Rodriguez

Vijselaar

Huskens

et al. 2018

Progress in Photovoltaics

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Solar fuels are a promising way to store solar energy seasonally. This paper proposes an earth‐abundant heterostructure to split water using a photovoltaic‐electrochemical device (PV‐EC). The heterostructure is based on a hybrid architecture of a thin‐film (TF) silicon tandem on top of a c‐Si wafer (W) heterojunction solar cell (a‐Si:H (TF)/nc‐Si:H (TF)/c‐Si(W)) The multijunction approach allows to reach enough photovoltage for water splitting, while maximizing the spectrum utilization. However, this unique approach also poses challenges, including the design of effective tunneling recombination junctions (TRJ) and the light management of the cell. Regarding the TRJs, the solar cell performance is improved by increasing the n‐layer doping of the middle cell. The light management can be improved by using hydrogenated indium oxide (IOH) as transparent conductive oxide (TCO). Finally, other light management techniques such as substrate texturing or absorber bandgap engineering were applied to enhance the current density. A correlation was observed between improvements in light management by conventional surface texturing and a reduced nc‐Si:H absorber material quality. The final cell developed in this work is a flat structure, using a top absorber layer consisting of a high bandgap a‐Si:H. This triple junction cell achieved a PV efficiency of 10.57%, with a fill factor of 0.60, an open‐circuit voltage of 2.03 V and a short‐circuit current density of 8.65 mA/cm2. When this cell was connected to an IrOx/Pt electrolyser, a stable solar‐to‐hydrogen (STH) efficiency of 8.3% was achieved and maintained for 10 hours.

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Efficiency limits for photoelectrochemical water-splitting

Cited by 241 publications

References 35 publications

Solar fuels photoanode materials discovery by integrating high-throughput theory and experiment

Solar fuels photoanode materials discovery by integrating high-throughput theory and experiment

A New Strategy for Solar‐to‐Hydrogen Energy Conversion: Photothermal‐Promoted Electrocatalytic Water Splitting

Designing a hybrid thin‐film/wafer silicon triple photovoltaic junction for solar water splitting

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