New insights on the mechanism of vapour phase hydrolysis of sodium borohydride in a fed-batch reactor

This study aims to produce H2 from sodium borohydride (NaBH4) and to initiate its hydrolysis at elevated temperature in the absence of a catalyst. Experimental results indicated that the hydrogen generation yield increased up to %99 at 150 °C in the NaBH4 concentration of %5 wt in the acidic medium. It can be concluded that experimental characterization of the by-products is quite important since they affected the reaction mechanism or pathway. When the experiments are carried out under aqueous condition, the primary by- product is sodium metaborate while it is boric acid under acidic condition. It is postulated that by-product boric acid decreased the mass transfer limitation due to its higher solubility that prevents the formation of shell and thus increases the contact area between NaBH4 and vapor. A series of fed-batch reactions were performed to confirm the hypothesis, and the conversions of NaBH4 reached 99% under the acidic condition.