In general, the solution to future energy demand is renewable energy from wind, seawave, water, biomass, geothermal energy, etc. Unfortunately, the energy they produce has weaknesses, too.
Prof. Dr. Iip Izul Falah assessed that such energy is convertable into electricity, but cannot be used directly by mobile vehicles, such as truck, bus, car, motorcycle, ship or plane as the road or route they travel is changing. To resolve the issue, electricity process has been made to change it into chemical energy that is stored in battery.
“Although only able to travel a short distance, the battery is usable for mobile vehicles. Another possibility is by changing the electrical into chemical energy in the form of hydrogen through electrolic process,” he said in the Senate Hall on Thursday (28/3) when inaugurated as professor in Chemistry from Faculty of Mathermatics and Natural Sciences UGM.
According to Iip Izul Falah, the chemical energy in the battery and in the hydrogen is environmentally friendly energy as it does not pollute the air. The challenge is how to make a light container to store enough hydrogen in low balance pressure. “We can make use of strong adsorbent hydrogen that can travel a long distance,” he said in the inauguration speech entitled Bioalkane from Cracking Catalytic Vegetable Oil and Biomass as Renewable Energy.
In his speech, he said the chemical substance that is considered hazardous by society is, in fact, safe if used correctly.
Iip added that apart from vegetable oil, biomass is an abundant renewable source in Indonesia. It can be processed into fuel through pyrolysis and cracking. “We’re optimistic to be able to find the formula of mesoporous catalyst, for example based on A1MCM-41 which is suitable as catalyst biomass cracking and vegetable oil to produce fuel, so, predictions for energy crisis in the future will not come true,” he added.