Courtesy of Digital Trends:
Imagine if painting the outside of your house not only made it look easy on the eye, but also took care of all of your home’s energy needs.
This, it seems, could soon be a reality as researchers in Australia have come up with a “solar paint” capable of absorbing moisture from the air and turning it into hydrogen fuel for clean energy.
Based at RMIT University in Melbourne, southern Australia, the research team has developed a unique paint containing a newly developed compound that acts like silica gel — that’s the stuff used in those little sachets that absorb moisture to keep things like food, medicines, and electronics in good shape.
But where they differ is that the new material, called synthetic molybdenum-sulphide, “also acts as a semiconductor and catalyzes the splitting of water atoms into hydrogen and oxygen,” a report on the university’s website explained.
RMIT lead researcher Dr. Torben Daeneke said his team discovered that “mixing the compound with titanium oxide particles leads to a sunlight-absorbing paint that produces hydrogen fuel from solar energy and moist air.”
Okay we may not yet have flying cars, but you have to admit that they we are living in amazing times.
Source http://ift.tt/2slHi9H
Imagine if painting the outside of your house not only made it look easy on the eye, but also took care of all of your home’s energy needs.
This, it seems, could soon be a reality as researchers in Australia have come up with a “solar paint” capable of absorbing moisture from the air and turning it into hydrogen fuel for clean energy.
Based at RMIT University in Melbourne, southern Australia, the research team has developed a unique paint containing a newly developed compound that acts like silica gel — that’s the stuff used in those little sachets that absorb moisture to keep things like food, medicines, and electronics in good shape.
But where they differ is that the new material, called synthetic molybdenum-sulphide, “also acts as a semiconductor and catalyzes the splitting of water atoms into hydrogen and oxygen,” a report on the university’s website explained.
RMIT lead researcher Dr. Torben Daeneke said his team discovered that “mixing the compound with titanium oxide particles leads to a sunlight-absorbing paint that produces hydrogen fuel from solar energy and moist air.”
Okay we may not yet have flying cars, but you have to admit that they we are living in amazing times.
Source http://ift.tt/2slHi9H
