Production of Hydrogen by Solar Thermochemical Water-Splitting Cycles

Florida Solar Energy Center

comment:

Once upon a time, I read about a methane reformer on the web.  Now, after googling all sorts of combination of searches, I can't find anything like what I saw before.

How frustrating.

Anyway, I did find this link.  Why produce methane when you may be able to produce hydrogen directly from a solar dish?  It would not require transportation, you would simply collect it from your own property.

Think of it this way.  If you drive 40 miles a day, it means less than 1 kilogram must be produced per day.

How much energy to produce one kg of hydrogen?  If it came from thermal, it could be cheaper than using electricity on it, or so I imagine.  Lets say 15 kwh would do it.  Now, 15 kwh out of a battery may go 60 miles in a Tesla.  With 15 kwh needed, and about 6 hours of sunshine per day, that would mean about 2.5 square meters of dish.  Or Fresnel lens.  That's three or so of Dan Rojas' Fresnel lens gadget thingies.

It would focus heat energy on the device and the device would split the water and collect the hydrogen.

This article doesn't discuss it that way, unfortunately.  It seems focused upon producing a system that would require transportation facilities that don't exist.