Israeli company QD-SOL has quite a few things going for it. Not only is it working to produce completely green hydrogen – the renewable energy’s sector game-changing card and biggest buzzword – but it is also backed by none other than Hollywood star and sustainability entrepreneur Ashton Kutcher.
“Almost the entire hydrogen production industry is a polluting industry. After it’s produced, hydrogen is an excellent, green energy provider, but it’s usually made by burning gasses that also release a lot of carbon dioxide together with the desired hydrogen,” QD-SOL CEO Gil Davidman tells ISRAEL21c.
“The world’s already decided to take steps toward net zero emissions by 2050, so to reach that, among other things, you have to turn the production of hydrogen green.
At the moment, one way to produce green hydrogen in a non-polluting way is by electrolysis — directing electricity generated by solar or wind power to a system that isolates hydrogen from water.
This method, says Davidman, “can cost around five times more than the polluting ways of producing hydrogen, and yet there are many companies who are investing in the process.”
QD-SOL has taken a different approach. “As far as I know, we’re the first and only ones to break through the boundaries of academia,” Davidman says.
The company’s solution puts the whole process inside a solar panel, generating hydrogen directly from sunlight using nanoparticles that catalyze the separation of hydrogen from oxygen in water molecules. This is accomplished without emitting carbon dioxide.
Keep reading at israel21c.org.
QD-SOL is a green hydrogen startup whose technology is based on years of research conducted by company Co-founder and Technion Professor Lilac Amirav.
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