Hydroenergy Inspiring Large‐Scale Piezoelectric Catalysis for Seawater Hydrogen Evolution

Abstract

Abstract The piezoelectric effect presents a promising avenue for harvesting and utilizing low‐grade mechanical energy. However, challenges from lacking matched industrial equipment and maintaining catalytic performance during scaling up impede the engineering of piezo‐catalysis. Here, utilizing mechanical energy of water to inspire piezoelectricity, a successful attempt at large‐scale piezo‐catalysis seawater H 2 evolution was reported for the first time, exhibiting an efficiency of 36.82% for converting mechanical energy to hydrogen energy. A scaling‐up test with 20 L of seawater was conducted, yielding an H 2 production rate of 0.73 L h −1 , which just occupied 0.7 m 2 . This performance (1.04 L h −1 m −2 ) exceeds the large‐scale photocatalytic pure water H 2 production by panel reactor array (0.18∼0.25 L h −1 m −2 ) reported in 2021. Additionally, the H 2 evolution activity of the 20 L system showed no obvious decline compared with the 50 mL system before scaling‐up, owing to the utilization of ternary piezo‐catalysts system, which capitalized on the synergistic coupling effect of kinetics and thermodynamics. This attempt provides a prototype for pursuing large‐scale piezo‐catalysis and practical engineering application.