Electrochemical oxygen generator with 99.9% oxygen purity and high energy efficiency

doi:10.21203/rs.3.rs-1463731/v1

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Research Article

Electrochemical oxygen generator with 99.9% oxygen purity and high energy efficiency

https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-1463731/v1

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posted 18 Mar, 2022

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Under the growing crisis of coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic, the global medical system is facing the predicament of an acute shortage of medical-grade oxygen (O₂, ≥ 99.5% purity). Herein, we manufactured an oxygen generation device relying on electrochemical technology. The performance of electrochemical oxygen generator (EOG) was remarkably improved to a practically applicable level, achieving long-term (>200 h), stable, and quick production (>1.5L/min) of high purity O₂(99.9%) under high energy efficiency (496 L/kW·h), viasimultaneous optimizations for intrinsic electrochemical reaction mechanism, electrocatalysts, and external cell structure. The EOG also presents powerful competitiveness in user experience, which finds expression in high portability (4.7 kg), nearly instant O₂ production (<1 s), and a quiet working condition (<39 dB). The EOG shows great potential to substitute commercial pressure swing adsorption O₂ generation devices, which may significantly impact the traditional oxygen production industry.

Chemical Engineering

Oxygen generator

Electrochemical oxygen production

ORR and OER

two electron transfer

In summary, our work designed an EOG and improved its performance to an applicable level. Such remarkable enhancement of the performance originates from the targeted optimizations for intrinsic oxygen production mechanism, electrocatalysts, and external cell structure. Our EOG is powerfully competitive compared with the commercial PSA devices, which is reflected in the comparable energy efficiency, higher O₂ purity, lighter device weight, lower noise level, and quicker start-up time. Under the severe pressure of COVID-19, our EOG is expected to be ideal medical-oxygen supply equipment for patients in a variety of emergency conditions, and fill the great shortage of O₂ generation devices in the worldwide market.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION

The Supplementary Information includes Supplementary Methods, Supplementary Figures S1-S16, Supplementary Tables S1-S3 and Supplementary Video S1.

AUTHOR CONTRIBUTIONS

Author Contributions: Y. Z. and C. Z. carried out the sample synthesis, characterization, and electrochemical measurements. K. X., F. W. and S. L. co-contributed to the theoretical studies. Y. Z. and Y. W. co-wrote the paper. Q. X., J. H., H. D. and J. Z. performed the X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy experiments. F. Z., P. L., Y. T. and D. L. helped with the modification of the paper. All authors participated in the discussion of the results, commented on the implications, and fully approved the content of the manuscript.

† These authors contributed equally to this work.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This work was supported by National Key R&D Program of China 2017YFA (0208300, 0700104), the DNL Cooperation Fund, CAS (DNL201918), the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (WK2060120004, WK2060000021, WK2060000025 and KY2060000180)，the National Natural Science Foundation of Fujian Province, China (2020J02025), and National Natural Science Foundation of China (21973013). This work was partially carried out at the USTC Center for Micro and Nanoscale Research and Fabrication. Thank the funding support from CAS Fujian Institute of Innovation, and the “Chuying Program” for the Top Young Talents of Fujian Province. We acknowledge the Experimental Center of Engineering and Material Science in the University of Science and Technology of China. We thank the photoemission endstations BL1W1B in Beijing Synchrotron Radiation Facility (BSRF), BL14W1 in Shanghai Synchrotron Radiation Facility (SSRF), BL10B and BL11U in National Synchrotron Radiation Laboratory (NSRL) for the help in characterizations.

DECLARATION OF INTERESTS

The authors declare no competing interests.

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Electrochemical oxygen generator with 99.9% oxygen purity and high energy efficiency

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