The release of hydrogen from ammonia borane over copper/hexagonal boron nitride composites

Abstract

Facile solution-phase synthesis of copper nanoparticles dispersed on h-BN via a solvothermal method is proposed for the hydrolytic dehydrogenation of ammonia borane. We found that the earth-abundant copper nanoparticles were highly stabilized on h-BN nanosheets. The resulting Cu/h-BN composites exhibited high catalytic activity and good recycling performance for hydrogen generation from the hydrolysis of ammonia borane under mild reaction conditions. Furthermore, the kinetics of the hydrolysis reaction were also investigated by varying the concentration of ammonia borane, the amount of catalyst, and the reaction temperature. An activation energy of 23.8 kJ mol⁻¹ was measured for the hydrolysis reaction catalyzed by the 29.4 wt% Cu/h-BN sample, which is lower than most of the reported values for other catalysts. This study demonstrates that Cu/h-BN nanocomposites can act as a potential non-precious and effective catalyst for hydrogen generation from the hydrolysis of ammonia borane.