2017/02/28 by M. Lozada-Hidalgo, S. Zhang, Sheng Zhang +7 · 180 citations
Chemical Engineering · Chemistry · Environmental Science · Materials Science · Physics and Astronomy · #Ammonia Synthesis and Nitrogen Reduction #Chemical Synthesis and Characterization #Chemical vapor deposition #Chemistry #Computer science #Deuterium #Environmental science #Graphene #Hydrogen #Hydrogen Storage and Materials #Materials science #Nanotechnology #Nuclear physics #Physics #Process engineering #Scalability #cond-mat.mtrl-sci
paper · pdf · doi:10.1038/ncomms15215
published in Nature Communications 8(1), 15215 (Nature Portfolio)
openalex publication_date 2017/05/09 · arxiv created 2017/05/17 · arxiv updated 2017/05/18 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
Abstract Thousands of tons of isotopic mixtures are processed annually for heavy-water production and tritium decontamination. The existing technologies remain extremely energy intensive and require large capital investments. New approaches are needed to reduce the industry’s footprint. Recently, micrometre-size crystals of graphene are shown to act as efficient sieves for hydrogen isotopes pumped through graphene electrochemically. Here we report a fully-scalable approach, using graphene obtained by chemical vapour deposition, which allows a proton-deuteron separation factor of around 8, despite cracks and imperfections. The energy consumption is projected to be orders of magnitude smaller with respect to existing technologies. A membrane based on 30 m 2 of graphene, a readily accessible amount, could provide a heavy-water output comparable to that of modern plants. Even higher efficiency is expected for tritium separation. With no fundamental obstacles for scaling up, the technology’s simplicity, efficiency and green credentials call for consideration by the nuclear and related industries.