Kinetics of Catalytic Hydrolysis of Stabilized Sodium Borohydride Solutions

The kinetics of catalytic hydrolysis of stabilized sodium borohydride solutions has been studied for a Ni-metal supported catalyst over a temperature range from 273 to 303 K and a NaBH 4 concentration range from 1.34 to 5.44 M. The rate may be represented by the expression: −(d N NaBH 4 / w ·d t ) = k ·[N a BH 4 ] -0.41 [N a OH] 0.13 [H 2 O] 0.68 k = 11579.1·exp(−6269.9/ T ) The activation energy for the hydrogen generation reaction was determined to be 52 kJ/mol. The factors affecting energy storage density of sodium borohydride based systems and the performance of hydrogen generation reactors are discussed.