Invention of high-capacity hydrogen storage material makes use of hydrogen as a common fuel possible

One of the major difficulties in using hydrogen as a commercial fuel was the problem of storing it. The conventional methods were either too risky or wasted a lot of energy along with being expensive. This problem however, may soon be resolved, due to the brilliance of Javad Rafiee, a doctoral student in the Department of Mechanical, Aerospace, and Nuclear Engineering at Rensselaer. He used super material graphene made by mechanical grinding, plasma treatment and annealing it. These processes cause the graphene molecules to get arranged in a chain-link fence structure, thus maximizing the already high hydrogen storage capacity of graphene molecules.

Javad Rafiee, got a $30,000 student prize, which he rightly deserved, for making this material whose hydrogen storage capacity is almost twice that of US Department Of Energy’s target of 7.5% by weight at room temperature. This development sure offers hope to make the use of hydrogen as a fuel, possible on a large scale.
[gas2]