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Purdue researcher finds ways to recycle hydrogen

It's the year 2025. A gallon of gas costs $15.34. The world is in the midst of an energy crisis with society calling for new, cheaper fuel. Far-fetched, or the future?

This world-crippling situation is what P.V. Ramachandran and his team of researchers are trying to avoid.

Ramachandran, an associate professor of chemistry, and a team of researchers are looking at new ways to store, ship and recycle one of nature's most volatile and important elements: hydrogen.

It's a quiet morning in the Herbert C. Brown Center for Borane Research in Brown Hall. Ramachandran walks into his office and apologizes for being late. "I suppose I'm only a minute late," says Ramachandran. "I was dropping my children off."

Ramachandran sits down at his desk, pulls out multiple documents, and starts to talk about what he has a quarter of a century of experience in, borane research.

And of course, he is excited to talk about the revolutionary research he is working on with his team of graduate and post doctorate students.

"Our research involves working on hydrogen storage materials for fuel cells, release of the hydrogen, and how to recycle it," said Ramachandran. "The big question is how to store and ship hydrogen safely because nobody wants to sit on a gas tank filled with hydrogen."

Ramachandran's work is being translated to fuel cells for automobiles and batteries for the military. But with an international energy crisis cusping, automobiles have become a huge research area, he said.

"Chrysler demonstrated a minivan (called Natrium) that can use hydrogen power with sodium borohydride to travel about 300 miles with one filling," said Ramachandran. "But once the hydrogen is spent, what do you do with the generated byproduct? How can you recycle it?"

But he and his team have found the way to recycle, which is the leading dilemma in commercial hydrogen fuel use.

"Now we have some answers on how to recycle it," said Ramachandran. "Of course I believe this is a major achievement, but that is up to the scientific community to decide for sure."

One of the major breakthroughs of this research has been directly related to that one factor the world runs on: money. Ramachandran said for batteries for the military side of their research, money was the main issue. The cost of the product that releases hydrogen for energy use is Borane Ammonia.

"The price of this material is what is slowing the progress of the use of this energy," said Ramachandran. "But what we have done through our research is reduce the price from approximately $11,000 per kilogram to about $150 per kilogram."

But he can't do this alone. "I am trying to refer to everything in the third-person," said Ramachandran with a laugh. "I can't take all the credit. We are a team."

Ramachandran stands up and says, "Well, let's see the lab." The lab looks familiar to most student's Chemistry 115 lab, but the work being done here goes beyond the standard precipitate reaction. A team of students in lab coats and safety goggles move around bubbling beakers and testing equipment. "T