Hydrogen Diffusion Technology


[custom_frame_right]Palladium Micro Channel Technlogy[/custom_frame_right]Power + Energy’s hydrogen separation products use patented Palladium Alloy Micro-Channel™ Technology. Palladium (Pd) metal adsorbs hydrogen. In P+E’s micro-channel hydrogen separator, a low-purity hydrogen feed gas is fed into a system containing a Micro Channel™ membrane assembly.  The gas stream moves along Pd alloy tubes.  When the molecular hydrogen comes into contact with the tubes’ outer walls, it dissociates into atomic hydrogen and is absorbed into the metal’s lattice structure.

While diffusing through the membrane walls, individual hydrogen atoms share their electrons with the host palladium.

The hydrogen atoms recombine on the other side of the low pressure side of the wall and are desorbed as a hydrogen molecule.  The resulting ultra-pure hydrogen has a purity level of 99.999999999%

Applications of Micro-Channel™ Technology

The primary uses of this novel hydrogen diffusion technology involve systems that either demand ultra-pure hydrogen or systems that need the hydrogen almost entirely removed.

Hydrogen Separators

P+E’s hydrogen separators make ultra-pure hydrogen for fuel cell application.  Here, a hydrogen-rich gas stream is fed through the separator.  Pure hydrogen is fed to the fuel cell stack while the impurity gases are vented.

Hydrogen Isotope Diffusers

P+E’s hydrogen isotope diffusers separate hydrogen, deuterium and tritium from inert gas streams allowing for either the collection of scarce hydrogen isotopes or for the removal of these isotopes from a re-usable purge gas stream.  Learn more about our tritium purifiers.

Hydrogen Analyzers

P+E’s HEMS instruments leverage the hydrogen purification methods for the purposes of detecting impurity gases.  By removing 99.999999% of the hydrogen from the feed gas, HEMS concentrates the analytes by a factor of 108 . The concentrated analytes are then measured by a mass spectrometer.  It is the hydrogen removal  that makes HEMS such a sensitive and powerful instrument.