Hydrogen sits at the center of some of the world's most important industrial processes, but its production still comes with a heavy environmental cost. Today, most hydrogen is produced through high-emissions processes like steam methane reforming and coal gasification.
But hydrogen can also be made by splitting water molecules using renewable electricity, eliminating fossil fuel emissions and other toxic byproducts. Such "green hydrogen" is made by running an electric current through water in an electrolyzer.
Green hydrogen won't scale through decarbonization alone. It also has to be cost-competitive with the traditional methods of production.
1s1 Energy thinks it has the technology to finally make green hydrogen go mainstream. The company says its boron-based membrane material unlocks previously unachievable performance and durability in electrolyzers.
In tests with partners, 1s1 says, electrolyzers with its membranes needed just 70 percent of the energy to produce each kilogram of hydrogen, compared to incumbent devices.
"Green hydrogen has been a hard industry to have success in so far," acknowledges 1s1 co-founder Dan Sobek '88, SM '92, PhD '97. "The difference with us is we've done very targeted customer discovery. We have a very strong value proposition that's not just about decarbonization. We have a pipeline of potential customers that see around a 60 percent reduction in operating costs with our technology. That's a nice point of entry."
Although 1s1 is focused on hydrogen production now, its technology could also be used in fuel cells and solid-state batteries, and to extract critical metals from mining waste. The company is beginning trials in some of those applications, and it is working with a large materials company to scale up production of its membranes for hydrogen production.
"We're at an inflection point for the company," Sobek says. "The plan is, by 2030, to have a solid business in several segments: electrolyzers, mineral extraction, and in collaborations with several large companies. But right now, we have to be judicious and focused."
Improving Electrolyzers
Sobek was born and raised in Argentina, but he also grew up at MIT over the course of three degrees and more than a decade. He first studied aeronautics and astronautics at MIT, then jumped to mechanical engineering as a graduate student, then moved to the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, where he worked under PhD advisors and MIT professors Martha Gray and Stephen Senturia. His thesis focused on a technique for quickly measuring optical properties of large numbers of biological cells.
"A lot of my learnings around microfabrication and materials chemistry ended up being really relevant for 1s1," Sobek says. "A class that was very important to me was taught by Professor Amar Bose. I was a teaching assistant for him for a couple of semesters, and that had an incredible influence on my thinking."
Following graduation, Sobek worked in microelectronics and microfluidics before founding his own company, Zymera, in 2004. The company developed deep-tissue imaging technology for detecting cancer and other serious diseases.
Around 2013, Sobek started talking to his Zymera co-founder, Sukanta Bhattacharyya, about making electrolysis more efficient, focusing on "proton exchange membrane" electrolyzers. Such electrolyzers employ a large amount of electricity to split water into hydrogen and oxygen ions. At their center is a membrane that can lose efficiency through voltage resistance.
On top of the efficiency challenge, electricity is often more expensive than fossil fuels in many parts of the world. Traditional hydrogen production also has the benefit of existing infrastructure, making it that much more difficult for green hydrogen production to scale.
Sobek and Bhattacharyya knew the most important part of such electrolyzers is their proton-conducting membrane, which shuttles hydrogen ions from the anode to the cathode in the electrolyzer's electrochemical cell.
"I asked Sukanta how we could improve the efficiency and durability of that element," Sobek recalls. "He gave me a one-word answer: boron."
Boron can be given a negative charge, which makes hydrogen ions, or protons, bond to it more quickly. The hydrogen ions can then be filtered through the membrane and released as they move through the cell. Boron-based materials are also more stable and resistant to corrosion, further improving the long-term performance of electrolyzers.
The company was officially founded in late 2019. After years of development, today 1s1 attaches a chemically tailored version of boron onto polymer materials to create its membranes for exchanging protons.
"These are first-of-a-kind membranes with stable and durable, super-acid proton exchange groups that do not poison catalysts," Sobek says.
Tiny Membranes With Big Impact
In 2021, the U.S. Department of Energy set a goal for proton exchange membrane electrolysis to achieve 77 percent electrical efficiency by 2031. Sobek says 1s1 is already reaching that milestone in tests.
"It's not just the technology, but the way we're applying it," Sobek says, "We're making hydrogen viable for use in the production of different industrial chemicals."
1s1 is currently conducting pilots with partners, including an electrical utility owned by a large steel company in Brazil. The company is also actively exploring other applications for its technology. Last year, 1s1 announced a project to produce green ammonia with the company Nitrofix through joint funding from the U.S. Department of Energy and the Israeli Ministry of Energy and Infrastructure. It's also working with a large mine in Brazil to extract a material called niobium, which is useful for high-strength steel as well as fast-charging batteries. A similar process could even be used to extract gold.
"We can do that without using harsh chemicals, because the standard processes used to extract niobium and gold use extremely strong acids at high temperatures or extremely toxic chemicals," Sobek says. "It's gratifying for me because my home country of Argentina has had a lot of problems with the use of toxic chemicals to extract gold. We're trying to enable low-cost, responsible mining."
As 1s1 scales its membrane technology, Sobek says the goal is to deploy wherever the technology can improve processes.
"We have a large number of potential customers because this technology is really foundational," Sobek says. "Creating high-impact technologies is always fun."