Ultra-fast green hydrogen production from municipal wastewater by an integrated forward osmosis-alkaline water electrolysis system

This paper introduces a modular forward osmosis-water splitting (FOWS) system integrated with alkaline water electrolysis (AWE), denoted as FOWSAWE, for high-purity hydrogen production directly from wastewater. The system achieves a remarkably fast hydrogen production rate of 448 Nm³/day/m² of membrane area, exceeding state-of-the-art techniques by over 14 times, with low specific energy consumption (3.96 kWh Nm⁻³). This is achieved by using 1 M potassium hydroxide (KOH) as both the draw solution for water extraction and the electrolyte for AWE, facilitated by a KOH-tolerant and hydrophilic FO membrane. A developed water-hydrogen balance model allows for scalable system design across various scales and water sources.

Gabriela Scheibel Cassol, Chii Shang, Alicia Kyoungjin An, Noman Khalid Khanzada, Francesco Ciucci, Alessandro Manzotti, Paul Westerhoff, Yinghao Song, Li Ling