A self-powered electrolytic process for glucose to hydrogen conversion

Glucose is a promising feedstock for hydrogen production but the existing microbial electrolysis process suffers from low efficiency. Here we show a process for hydrogen production using an integrated device consisting of a liquid-catalyst fuel cell (LCFC) stack and a polymer exchange membrane electrolytic cell (PEMEC). Glucose that cannot be directly used in traditional fuel cell was used as both the fuel to power the LCFC and the hydrogen sources. Different from simple combination of two independent units, the LCFC and PEMEC in our device are dependant one on another by using a SHAREDCELL, and all electrolytes in both fuel cell and electrolyzer are self-regenerated without using external electricity. As a result, feed stock of glucose was converted to pure hydrogen in cathode, and carbon dioxide in anode. The net reaction of the process is that glucose decomposes to hydrogen and carbon dioxide under thermal heating at ~85 o C.