Seawater

Scientists have found a clever way to generate hydrogen straight from salty seawater. This could be another step towards a clean energy future, if renewables power the process.The new device makes a few chemical modifications to existing technologies, making it possible to extract hydrogen from untreated, unpurified seawater – which could alleviate concerns about using precious water supplies."We have split natural seawater into oxygen and hydrogen… to produce green hydrogen by electrolysis, using a non-precious and…

Ancient seawater pockets trapped in an iron pyrite framboid, shown here, offer a new source of clues to climate change in vanished oceans and our own. Credit: Photo courtesy of Daniel Gregory | University of Toronto; color added by Cortland Johnson | Pacific Northwest National LaboratoryThese findings could revolutionize climate science and assist in the identification of underground locations for secure hydrogen storage for carbon-free energy.The remnants of an ancient inland sea, trapped for centuries, have finally been…

One problem with renewably-produced hydrogen is that it uses fresh water – and with a quarter of the world's population already facing severe water scarcity at least one month of every year, freshwater is an ever more finite and precious resource. So technologies that can electrolyze hydrogen out of the abundant seawater that blankets most of the planet are a vital area of enquiry. You can desalinate seawater and then split it, but it's not a great solution; most of your input energy is lost in the desal process, and that…

Researchers can isolate magnesium feedstocks from the ocean, important for renewable energy applications. Credit: Cortland Johnson | Pacific Northwest National LaboratoryMagnesium salt is extracted from Sequim seawater using a novel flow-based technique.People have been using salts from the ocean, like table salt, since prehistoric times. While table salt is the most easily obtained, seawater is a rich supply of other minerals, and researchers are investigating which ones may be extracted from the sea. Magnesium is one of…

Polarized Light Microscopy image of polyester textile fiber found in sample. Credit: Nekton. As nations meet in Uruguay to negotiate a new Global Plastics Treaty, marine and forensic scientists publish new results this week that reveal the discovery of synthetic plastic fibers in air, seawater, sediment and sea ice sampled in the Antarctic Weddell Sea. The field research was undertaken during an expedition to discover Sir Ernest…

By using advanced microscopes and imaging technology to study tiny pockets of liquid trapped in ancient minerals, scientists have gained new insights into how seawaters have changed over time, and how they might do so in the future. The research centers on small samples of seawater sealed away for 390 million years, and could inform not just the field of climate science, but open up new possibilities in the safe storage of hydrogen as a clean source of energy.The breakthrough actually came about by chance, with a research…

Giant sea scorpions once roamed the ancient Devonian sea 400 million years ago. Now, researchers are learning more about that world. Credit: Aunt Spray | Shutterstock.com Trapped for millennia, the tiniest liquid remnants of an ancient inland sea have now been revealed. The surprising discovery of seawater sealed in what is now North America for 390 million years opens up a new avenue for understanding how oceans change and…

Microplastics are a bane that harms wildlife, but you may be staring at the solution to this problem in your breakfast. Princeton researchers have used egg whites to create a lightweight, porous aerogel that can remove microplastics and salt from seawater. When you freeze-dry and superheat the whites (up to 1,652F) in an oxygen-free space, their pure protein system produces a mix of carbon fiber strands and graphene sheets that can remove 99 percent of tiny plastics from water, and 98 percent of the salt. Even fried and…

Phosphate solubility in anoxic seawater at 25°C. At pH >7.2–7.7, total aqueous phosphate is limited by greenalite and octacalcium phosphate (OCP) solubility, whereas at pH 2-rich fluids at two different water:rock ratios; long dashed lines: two high-Mg and high-Ca fluid compositions derived from the interaction between basalt and CO2-rich fluids at two different water:rock ratios; short dashed line: modeled high-Ca and low-Mg composition assuming…

Images of salts of elements being ionized for isotopic measurements in a Thermal Ionization Mass Spectrometer hosted in Ramananda Chakrabarti’s lab at the Centre for Earth Sciences, IISc. Credit: Ramananda Chakrabarti Researchers at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) have identified a way to estimate ancient seawater temperature by probing tiny bones in the ears of fish.…