Study on Al-Ga-In-SnCl2 composites for hydrogen production by hydrolysis

Hydrogen energy is increasingly attracting the attention of all countries in the world because of its green, clean and efficient characteristics. Hydrolysis of aluminium is a highly efficient, convenient and green method for hydrogen production. Due to passivation, aluminium does not react with water at room temperature. Low-melting metals such as gallium, indium can activate aluminium through mechanical ball milling method. X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), and energy dispersive spectroscopy (EDS), analysis of composition and morphology of aluminium alloys. The results show the formation of In3Sn or InSn4 phases, indicating that this reaction occurred during the milling process: Al+SnCl2→AlCl3+Sn In+Sn→InSn4. When mechanical milling, SnCl2 can be used as a grinding aid to eliminate agglomeration. At the same time, the aluminium-salt ball mill produces a large amount of fresh surface and defects, which helps to promote the hydrolysis reaction. As far as we know, our composite materials have not been reported. The experimental results show that our composite material has good hydrogen production performance and can be used as a hydrogen fuel cell hydrogen donor material. This paper studied the effect of different SnCl2 content on the hydrogen production performance of Al alloys in order to find the best Al alloy composition with the best hydrogen production performance. The maximum hydrogen production of alloy Al-3%Ga-3%In-5%SnCl2 reaches 1225ml, and the maximum hydrogen production rate is 1225ml/g min. The mechanical alloying parameters at this time were as follows: ratio of ball material 15:1, ratio of size ball 2:1, ball milling time 1 h, ball grinding speed 450 r/min.