Graphene could revolutionise nuclear power say Manchester scientists:
http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/ ... r-13006185
Scientists have hailed a ‘crucial milestone’ for graphene after revealing the wonder material could be used to clean up the nuclear industry. Research carried out by the University of Manchester has shown graphene-based membranes could make the production of ‘heavy water’ more efficient, leading to greener and cheaper nuclear power.
Heavy water - also known as deuterium oxide - is a key component within nuclear reactors. It’s now hoped that graphene could be used to reduce carbon dioxide emissions associated with producing the liquid by up to a million tonnes per year. Writing in leading science journal Nature Communications, a team from the university said they could demonstrate scaled prototypes of graphene membranes capable of producing heavy water. The complex process involves separating hydrogen isotopes.
Because of graphene’s unique material properties it has the potential to effectively separate sub-atomic particles, making the process more efficient and cost-effective, researchers said. Derived from pencil lead-style graphite, graphene is just one atom thin and was pioneered in Manchester by physicists Sir Andre Geim and Sir Kostya Novoselov. It has been hailed as the strongest and most conductive material in the world, with a huge range of potential electronic, material, and even medical uses.
The same group of researchers found last year that graphene could efficiently sieve hydrogen isotopes. Industrial opportunities regarding the discovery weren’t analysed because there were no membranes or fabrication methods suitable for scalable manufacturing. But the research group has now developed fully scalable prototype membranes and demonstrated the isotope separation in pilot studies. Dr Lozada-Hidalgo, a research fellow at the University of Manchester, said: “This is a crucial milestone in the path to taking this revolutionary technology to industrial application.
“The potential gains are high enough to justify its introduction even in the highly conservative nuclear industry.” The research team estimates that by using graphene, more than one hundred times less energy would be required to produce heavy water. Sir Andre Geim, a professor of condensed matter physics at the university who won the 2010 Nobel Prize in Physics for his work on graphene, added: “Tritium discharged both from nuclear power plants and as a result of environmental disasters is a major global concern. We believe this technology can economically transform the environmental footprint of future nuclear plants.”
