PERFORMANCE OF HYDROGEN PRODUCTION PROCESS USING SOLAR ENERGY

Abstract

The present experimental work is devoted to explore the efficiency of alkaline water electrolysis in producing hydrogen when it is operated by solar energy. The overall system efficiency is determined by measuring the solar irradiance as the source of the input energy, and the amount of hydrogen produced as the source of the output energy. Hence, the losses through the Photo-Voltaic (PV) cell, connecting wires, and the water electrolyzer, are all considered in the present study. Moreover, the effects of the gab width distance and the separators' types, on the overall system efficiency are also presented. It is found that, the higher the electrolyzer efficiency, the higher is the overall system efficiency at almost conditions. The significant reduction in system efficiency may be due to losses of the energy conversion through the PV cell and the electrical losses in the connecting wires. Though, the electrolyzer efficiency reaches 90% and the maximum overall system efficiency of 1.7% is barely achieved.