The Haber-Bosch process, which is commonly used to synthesize ammonia (NH3)—the foundation for synthetic nitrogen fertilizers—by combining hydrogen (H2) and nitrogen (N2) over catalysts at high pressures and temperatures, is one of the most important scientific discoveries to have helped improve crop yields and increase food production globally.
Credit: Tokyo Tech The Haber-Bosch process, which is commonly used to synthesize ammonia (NH 3 )—the foundation for synthetic nitrogen fertilizers—by combining hydrogen (H 2 ) and nitrogen (N 2 ) over catalysts at high pressures and temperatures, is one of the most important scientific discoveries to have helped improve crop yields and increase food production globally. However, the process requires high fossil fuel energy inputs due to its requirements of high temperatures and pressure. Hydrogen used for this process is produced from natural gas (mainly methane). This hydrogen-producing process is energy-consuming and accompanies huge emissions of carbon dioxide. To overcome these issues, various catalysts have been developed to allow the reaction to proceed under milder conditions, using hydrogen produced by water electrolysis via renewable energy. Among them are nitride-based catalysts that contain active metal nanoparticles like nickel and cobalt (Ni, Co) loaded on lanthanum nitride (LaN) supports. In these catalysts, both the support and the active metal are involved in the production of NH 3 . The active metal splits the H 2 while the LaN support contains nitrogen vacancies and nitrogen atoms in its crystal structure that adsorb and activate nitrogen (N 2 ).…