Carbon-based materials have attracted great attention over past few years in hydrogen storage applications. In particular, nanofibrous carbon working as support for sodium alanate exhibits great improvement in the kinetics of H2 releasing/uptaking. Herein, we used graphene with various dopants to simulate the carbon materials and performed a periodic density functional theory study on the impact of the modifications on the hydrogen interaction in the supported sodium alanate. Our results showed that the impact of various defects and dopants can be categorized in groups: (i) Pristine graphene and pentagon-heptagon (5-7) pair defective graphene, as well as nitrogen and sulfur doped graphene do not promote H2 formation. (ii) Carbon vacancies, as well as boron and chlorine doped systems, cause instantaneous H2 formation. (iii) Oxygen, phosphor and fluorine doped graphene led to the formation of a meta-stable di-hydrogen state with a H-H distance of ~ 0.96 Å. In addition, we confirmed the importance of van der Waals interaction in our system.

Sodium alanate, or the Na-Al-H system, has been the focus of intense research over the past decade due to its ability to hold almost 5 wt% of hydrogen. In this research, the effective thermal conductivity, k, of a sample of titanium-doped sodium alanate is studied over a range of operating conditions pertinent to practical on-board hydrogen storage. A transient technique employing a platinum hot-wire is used to make the measurements. A cylindrical experimental apparatus was designed with the aide of a finite element model that was used to quantify the cylinder boundary effects. The apparatus dimensions were optimized based on the finite element results with the goal of minimizing measurement uncertainty and temperature rise during testing. Finite element results were also used to predict test times and current requirements. A sample of sodium alanate was obtained and loaded into the experimental apparatus which was enclosed in a pressure vessel with a controlled atmosphere. Effective thermal conductivity was measured as a function of pressure at the fully-hydrided and fully-dehydrided states. The results from the pressure-dependence investigation were compared to an existing study that utilized an alternate measurement technique. The results matched well qualitatively — the effective thermal conductivity was highly dependent on pressure, and was found to be significantly higher in the fully-dehydrided state. However, the results of this study were 20 to 30% lower than the existing available data. Additionally, an exploratory investigation used the PCI technique to study the effect of varying composition between the fully-hydrided state and the intermediate decomposition step at a relatively constant pressure. Effective thermal conductivity did not vary significantly over this range of compositions. / Master of Science

The present study focuses on the development of Al-based systems and their examination as a medium for reversible hydrogen uptake. The first part of this thesis is dedicated to the chemistry and properties of Al-N-based materials. The synthesis, characterization, and detailed thermal decomposition studies of several aminoalanes have been described. As a result, single-crystal X-ray diffraction analyses revealed two new crystal structures of piperidinoalanes. The perspective approach employing activated aluminum and piperidine for reversible hydrogen uptake has been established. The second part of this work was focused on the modification of the properties of NaAlH4-based systems in order to generate the material with the high dissociation pressure suitable for high-pressure tank technologies. Considerable progress has been achieved in improving the hydrogen sorption properties by adding the extra aluminum powder to the Ti-catalysed NaAlH4-based system. Thus, the present study contributes to the understanding of the hydrogen sorption behavior of Al-based systems with perspectives being applicable to other related materials.:DECLARATION ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS DEFINITIONS AND ABBREVIATIONS ABSTRACT CONTENTS LIST OF TABLES LIST OF FIGURES MOTIVATION AND GOALS 1 INTRODUCTION 1.1 The prospects for hydrogen-based energy systems 1.2 Requirements for the hydrogen storage system 1.3 An overview of hydrogen storage strategies 1.4 Complex hydrides as a promising hydrogen storage materials 1.4.1 Metal borohydride systems 1.4.2 Alanate-based systems 1.4.3 Nitrogen-containing complex hydrides 1.5 Summary 2 GENERAL CHARACTERIZATION METHODS 2.1 X-ray crystallography 2.1.1 X-ray powder diffraction (XRPD) 2.1.2 Single-crystal structure analysis 2.2 Thermal analysis 2.3 Quantitative chemical analysis 2.3.1 Elemental analysis 2.3.2 Inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectrometry (ICP-OES) 2.4 Nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy (NMR) 3 LIQUID-STATE HYDROGEN STORAGE 3.1 State of the art 3.1.1 Liquid-state hydrogen storage materials 3.1.2 Al-N-based compounds as potential materials for hydrogen storage 3.1.3 Summary 3.2 Materials preparation and experimental details 3.2.1 Chemicals and sample handling 3.2.2 Synthesis of aminoalane in diethyl ether solution with aluminum hydride 3.2.3 Preparation of activated aluminum 3.2.4 Direct hydrogenation of activated aluminum supported by amine 3.3 Results and discussion 3.3.1 Is the solid-state hydrogen storage in aminoalanes possible? 3.3.2 Optimization of the direct hydrogenation of activated aluminum supported by amine 3.3.2.1 Synthesis and characterization of triethylenediamine alane complex 3.3.2.2 Synthesis of aminoalanes via direct hydrogenation of activated aluminum and N-heterocyclic amine 3.3.3 Investigation of piperidinoalanes for reversible hydrogen uptake 3.3.3.1 Crystal structure determination of piperidinoalanes 3.3.3.2 Influence of the initial reaction parameters on the piperidinoalane formation 3.3.3.3 Reversible hydrogenation in piperidinoalane system 3.3.4 Conclusions 4 SOLID-STATE HYDROGEN STORAGE 4.1 State of the art 4.1.1 Thermodynamic tuning of the hydrides 4.1.2 Features of the sodium alanate system 4.1.3 Catalytic enhancement of reversible hydrogenation in sodium alanate 4.1.4 The relevance of the Al-TM species in doped sodium alanate 4.1.5 Summary 4.2 Materials preparation and experimental details 4.2.1 Chemicals and purification procedure 4.2.2 Activation procedure of sodium alanate via mechanochemical treatment 4.2.3 Pressure-composition-isotherm measurements with a Sieverts-apparatus 4.2.4 High-pressure differential scanning calorimetry investigation of sodium alanate samples 4.3 Results and discussion 4.3.1 Tailoring the properties of sodium alanate-based system with the help of Ti-additive 4.3.2 Influence of the aluminum addition on the sorption behavior of Ti-doped sodium alanate 4.3.3 High-pressure DSC study of hydrogen sorption properties of doped sodium alanate system 4.3.4 Conclusions 5 SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS RECOMMENDATIONS AND OUTLOOK REFERENCES SUPPORTING INFORMATION Appendix A Appendix B Appendix C Publications