Nanoparticles Production from Glycerin via Electrospray and Size Measurement Techniques

Glycerin is a potential feedstock for hydrogen production because one mole of glycerin can produce up to four moles of hydrogen. In addition to glycerin, several potential biorenewable feedstocks, such as triglycerides and their derivatives, could be used for hydrogen production. The major challenge in using such feedstocks in a hydrogen-producing reformer is atomizing these viscous feedstocks for the gas phase reaction to occur. Moreover, due to the difficulty of atomization, the reforming reaction becomes mass transfer limited. This article presents a technique to produce nanoscale droplets from a highly viscous liquid (glycerin). In addition, several measurement techniques to quantify nanoscale droplets are discussed. The principle behind the nanospray formation is applying a sufficiently high electric field to the surface of the liquid, which causes emission of fine charged droplets. The mean and median sizes of the nanoparticles generated were 36.46 nm and 25.77 nm, respectively, with a geometric standard deviation of 1.7.