Researchers at the RIKEN Center for Emergent Matter Science (CEMS) in Japan have found a simple and affordable way to store ammonia :
For its current use, ammonia is stored in pressure-resistant containers after liquefying it at temperatures of -27 Fahrenheit (-33 degrees Celsius).
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Kawamoto’s team found that the perovskite ethyl ammonium lead iodide (EAPbI3) reacts with ammonia at room temperature and pressure to make lead iodide hydroxide, or Pb(OH)I. Ethyl ammonium lead iodide has a one-dimensional columnar structure but, after reacting with ammonia, forms a two-dimensional layered structure.
Ammonia is a highly corrosive gas, but the chemical reaction with the perovskite allows for its safe storage that does not need any special equipment to store it either. The retrieval process is also very straightforward. Under vacuum, ethyl ammonium lead iodide can be heated to 122 Fahrenheit (50 degrees Celsius) to release ammonia gas.
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The perovskite-ammonia reaction is fully reversible, and the perovskite can be reused to store ammonia again after retrieval is completed. Interestingly, the perovskite also changes color to white when it stores ammonia and returns to its original yellow after ammonia is retrieved. Scientists can exploit this feature to make color-based sensors to determine the amount of ammonia stored in the perovskite.
Eh, reasonably cheap and easy to distill ammonia gas out of aqueous solution (at max concentration for atmospheric pressure) and dry by venting the stream through a column packed with calcium chloride, or heat ammonium chloride over oxide of alkaline earth metal, calcium and magnesium are best. Pretty easy to decompose small alkyl amines or amides, especially urea.
But anyway, we’ve been transporting pure gases as compressed liquids in high pressure canisters and tanks for decades and its just not that big a deal.
Agree. This is a nonsense article. Ammonia has been stored and used for around 100 years. It is/was a common industrial refrigerant. The Boston Fish Pier used it for their refrigerators. And farmers use anhydrous ammonia as a fertilizer.
It would be a neat project to see how cheap and/or small one could make a Haber Bosch (alternatively, electrochemical) device that one could plug into a regular electrical outlet for which would output pure ammonia from inputs of air and water. If you only need small amounts, no need to store and transport.
I did some runs on an h-cube micro continuous flow hydrogenator and one didn’t even use tanks or a facility feed, a little electrical hydrogen generator using distilled water made as much as the cube could use anyway. There are some times you would want to feed ammonia into the reactor, and a similar generator could be useful, so a potential idea for business development.
That said, the fact that it is a materially lossless pathway that does not need further inputs beyond energy to cycle does suggest possible niche applications for convenience, assuming of course it is as reported.