Hydrogen storage performance of nano Ni decorated LiBH4 on activated carbon prepared through organic solvent

LiBH4 is considered as a prominent solid state hydrogen storage material with 18.3 wt% hydrogen storage capacity, while suffering sluggish dehydrogenation kinetics and poor reversibility. It is hypothesized that nano scale LiBH4 and catalyst mixture will show improved dehydrogenation performance. In this study, LiBH4 and Ni catalyst precursors were well mixed in organic solvent with activated carbon, followed by freeze drying and thermal reduction process. The as-prepared sample showed a nano Ni decorated LiBH4 clusters covered by the thin film of activated carbon, which helped reduce the doping amount of Ni catalyst and improve the reversibility of LiBH4. The onset of LiBH4 decomposition temperature was reduced to 243 degrees C with the first main hydrogen releasing peak at 278 degrees C. The sample desorbs 5.5 wt% hydrogen within 1 h at 330 degrees C. Although underwent serious degradation, a partial reversibility was observed under 9 MPa hydrogen pressure for 3 h at 400 degrees C. (C) 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.