Summary:
JODHPUR: IIT-Jodhpur has taken a major leap towards developing a future fuel in a natural way by a process exactly opposite to photosynthesis in plants. "This is for the first time that we have succeeded in obtaining oxygen-free pure hydrogen, which means a pure and quality fuel, that too at a very low price," Sharma said. The hydrogen fuel available today costs about Rs 150-200 per litre which is a huge price in comparison to conventional petrol.According to Sharma, the actual cost of producing hydrogen using the new process will be known only after it is produced on a large scale. But given the fact that it uses sunlight, it will be at par with current fuel prices or lesser.Sharma said that automobile giants like BMW and Honda have made cars which run on hydrogen but they couldn't gain popularity due to the high price of this fuel. The chemistry department of the institute has leveraged abundantly available sunlight for this process wherein water is broken into oxygen and hydrogen.Catalyst lanthanide used in this process traps oxygen while the pure hydrogen is left, which can be used as zero emission natural fuel.A team led by Rakesh Kumar Sharma tried over 700 types of catalyst combinations for obtaining pure hydrogen unlike in the process prevalent presently..