Enhancing Hydrogen Production through Integration of Electrolysis and Photocatalysis in a Cell

We present a new method for hydrogen production that combines photocatalysis and electrolysis in a cell. TiO₂ was doped with Ni and nitrogen to form Ni-TiO₂ and N-Ni-TiO₂ photocatalysts. XRD, UV-Vis, and SEM techniques were used to characterize the resulting samples. The Ni-TiO₂ and N-Ni-TiO₂ samples had anatase structures with energy gaps of 2.77 eV and 2.03 eV, respectively. A 50-watt UV lamp with a wavelength of 254 nm was used as the photon source. Our results indicate that this method produces more hydrogen than the sum of hydrogen generated by separate electrolysis and photocatalysis methods. The N-Ni-TiO₂ sample produced the highest yield of HHO gas among the Ni-TiO₂ and TiO₂ p.a samples. The underlying mechanisms responsible for this improvement, including the role of the Ni and nitrogen doping, are discussed and analyzed.