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A team of researchers from the University of Amberes and Lovaina, Belgium, has developed a device that cleans air and produces storable hydrogen for use in fuel cells or power generation. Not only that, the cell just needs light to work.

The device consists of two chambers separated by a membrane of nanomaterials. The membrane breaks down the suspended particles that form the environmental pollution and uses the resulting products to generate hydrogen in the form of gas that can be condensed and stored for later use.

The electrochemical cell is not much different than the one used to generate hydrogen from water. The novelty here is that the creators of this version have discovered that it can be adapted to filter the air and, in fact, is more efficient generating hydrogen in this way.
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<center>http://i.imgur.com/8bY3pLu.png</center>
<center>[Source](http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/store/10.1002/cssc.201700485/asset/image_m/cssc201700485-toc-0001-m.png?v=1&s=c9e4ffde5eedbfda1ce04c1dad0df427a99d1adc)</center>
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The more polluted and charged the air is, the better the device works. The best part is that, to separate the elements, the energy provided by sunlight is sufficient.

The prototype created in Belgium measures only a few square centimeters, but its creators are already working on refining the process and scale it to be applicable on an industrial scale. There may still be some time for that, but if it works it could end up with the pollution generated by many factories and industrial facilities.

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### Professor Verbruggen explains:
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"We are currently working on a scale of only a few square centimetres. At a later stage, we would like to scale up our technology to make the process industrially applicable. We are also working on improving our materials so we can use sunlight more efficiently to trigger the reactions."

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## <center>Source</center>
* https://phys.org/news/2017-05-power-polluted-air.html
* http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/cssc.201700485/full
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