A photo-assisted electrochemical-based demonstrator for green ammonia synthesis

Bridging laboratory research and practical utilization is of crucial importance for the development of green ammonia synthetic technologies. A decentralized photo-assisted electrochemical-based demonstrator has been proposed for green ammonia synthesis from renewable electricity, air and water, where well-known defect-laden WO₃ is used as the working electrode, and a commercially available PV panel supplies renewable electricity. In this demonstrator, defect-laden WO₃ exhibits the optimum electrochemical NH₃ formation rate (4.51 × 10^–12 mol s⁻¹ cm⁻²) in 0.1 M K₂SO₄ in a photovoltaic electrochemical (PV-EC) system. A system-level energy and cost analysis was conducted to investigate its economic viability and a general evaluation tool for system performance and cost estimation was proposed. This advance enables the possibility of integrating the small-scale green ammonia demonstrator into a stand-alone farm system.