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1Scan for outdated or missing drivers - takes under a minute2Repair Windows errors before they cause bigger problems3Fix the driver behind crashes, sound loss and screen glitchesYes. A UNSW-led research team has shown that sunlight can drive glycerol photoreforming: the glycerol left over from biodiesel production is converted while hydrogen is released. Adding very small amounts of nickel and cobalt to a zinc indium sulfide photocatalyst increased hydrogen evolution by about ten times in visible-light tests and shifted the carbon products toward glyceraldehyde and dihydroxyacetone. The result is a laboratory demonstration under simulated sunlight, not yet a commercial hydrogen process.
Why glycerol is the target
Glycerol is the principal by-product discussed in this work. ANSTO reports that making one tonne of biodiesel generates approximately 100 kilograms of glycerol (2026). Crude glycerol can be worth as little as US$0.11 per kilogram, so treating it only as a disposal problem leaves potential value unused.
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Photoreforming uses light to make two reactions happen together. Organic molecules such as glycerol are oxidised on one part of a photocatalyst, while hydrogen ions are reduced to hydrogen on another. Instead of consuming a valuable feedstock solely to make H2, the process aims to recover hydrogen and upgrade the remaining carbon into saleable chemicals.
“Rather than using an expensive feedstock simply to produce hydrogen, photoreforming gives us the opportunity to do two useful things at once; generate hydrogen and convert a low-value by-product into more valuable chemicals,” said Dr Denny Gunawan of UNSW.
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What the nickel-cobalt catalyst changed
The base material was zinc indium sulfide, a visible-light photocatalyst. The researchers modified its surface with very small amounts of nickel and cobalt acting as cocatalysts. In the reported visible-light experiments, the modified material produced hydrogen at approximately ten times the rate of unmodified zinc indium sulfide.
| Feature | Unmodified zinc indium sulfide | Nickel-cobalt-modified material |
|---|---|---|
| Light condition reported | Visible light | Visible light |
| Hydrogen evolution | Baseline rate | Approximately ten times the unmodified rate in the reported tests |
| Dominant carbon pathway | Predominantly hydroxyacetone | More glyceraldehyde and dihydroxyacetone |
| Test setting | Simulated sunlight; the report does not establish commercial-scale performance | |
The important change was not only more hydrogen. The metal sites also altered which bonds glycerol preferentially broke and which intermediates remained on the surface. That selectivity is central to the economics of glycerol upgrading: hydrogen has value, but the carbon stream can be worth substantially more if it is directed toward a defined product rather than a mixture that is difficult to separate.
How glycerol photoreforming proceeds
The reported chemistry can be understood as a sequence of coupled events:
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- Light absorption: visible light excites the zinc indium sulfide photocatalyst, creating charge carriers that can participate in redox reactions.
- Charge management at the cocatalyst: nickel and cobalt provide reaction sites that change how those charges are used, improving the route to hydrogen and influencing glycerol intermediates.
- Glycerol oxidation: glycerol is transformed on the illuminated surface rather than being left as the sole waste stream. In the modified system, more of the reaction pathway led toward glyceraldehyde and dihydroxyacetone.
- Hydrogen evolution: hydrogen ions receive reducing equivalents and form H2, coupling fuel production to the organic conversion.
The chemistry has several possible branches. The unmodified surface predominantly favoured a hydroxyacetone pathway, whereas nickel and cobalt redirected more material toward the two named products. “The challenge is that glycerol can follow several different reaction pathways. If we understand what controls those pathways, we can start designing catalysts that steer the reaction towards the products we want,” Gunawan said.
How the team watched the catalyst work
The researchers used in-situ X-ray absorption spectroscopy, including fixed-energy XAS, at the Australian Synchrotron to monitor the nickel and cobalt sites during illumination. They also used in-situ synchrotron infrared microspectroscopy to track molecules and reaction intermediates on the catalyst surface.
Those measurements showed that changes at the metal sites occurred in less than one second after the light was applied. The changes reversed when the light was removed, and dark-control experiments confirmed that the response was driven by illumination rather than by time alone. Dr Bernt Johannessen, an ANSTO principal scientist, said the measurements made it possible to follow the nickel and cobalt sites as the catalyst responded to light in real time.
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This is more informative than measuring only the final hydrogen volume. A final product rate can show that a catalyst works; time-resolved spectroscopy can indicate which active sites and intermediates change while it works, information needed to design a more selective and durable material.
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Random freezes, missing sound and display glitches usually trace back to one bad driver. Find and replace yours safely.Free scan · under a minuteWhy glyceraldehyde and dihydroxyacetone matter
ANSTO gives approximate values of US$75 per kilogram for glyceraldehyde and US$150 per kilogram for dihydroxyacetone. Those figures are indicative values cited in the 2026 report, not guaranteed prices for purified material from a future reactor. Actual returns would depend on concentration, impurities, separation, purification, contracts and market conditions.
The potential advantage is therefore a combined product stream: hydrogen plus chemicals that can be more valuable than crude glycerol. Producing a mixture, however, is not automatically profitable. A practical system would need to retain the reported selectivity while handling feedstock variability and recovering the products without using more energy and materials than the products justify.
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What has—and has not—been demonstrated
- Demonstrated: nickel and cobalt on zinc indium sulfide increased hydrogen evolution by about tenfold in the reported visible-light experiments.
- Demonstrated: the catalyst shifted glycerol conversion toward glyceraldehyde and dihydroxyacetone compared with the unmodified material.
- Demonstrated: synchrotron measurements captured reversible, light-driven changes at the catalyst surface in less than one second.
- Not established by this report: long-duration catalyst durability, large-reactor operation, lifecycle emissions, full separation costs, or commercial economics.
- Test qualification: the experiments used simulated sunlight. ANSTO describes the hydrogen rate as competitive with other published solar-driven glycerol-photoreforming systems, which is a literature comparison rather than a commercial-scale demonstration.
These limits matter because a laboratory rate does not predict output from a field reactor. Scale-up introduces light-delivery losses, catalyst recovery, heat and mass transfer constraints, gas separation, product purification and possible deactivation. None of those issues is resolved by the reported tenfold rate increase.
Where this fits in current research
Sunlight-driven glycerol oxidation is an active research area. A 2024 peer-reviewed review describes both photocatalytic and photoelectrochemical approaches and identifies selectivity control and reaction-mechanism verification as continuing difficulties. A 2024 ACS study reported visible-light hydrogen evolution alongside glycerol oxidation using nickel/cobalt phosphate–titanium dioxide composites. A 2025 study indexed by PubMed reported glycerol upgrading to lactic acid coupled with hydrogen production using a defined heterojunction catalyst.
Those studies point to a broader strategy rather than a single winning formulation: tune the catalyst and operating conditions so that hydrogen production and a specific carbon product reinforce each other. The UNSW-led work adds evidence that nickel and cobalt can alter both the hydrogen rate and the product pathway, while the synchrotron observations provide a way to connect those outcomes to real-time surface chemistry.
What would be needed before deployment
Further work would have to establish stable operation over many cycles, quantify performance with realistic crude glycerol, and determine whether the catalyst can be manufactured and recovered economically. It would also need a complete energy and carbon accounting for sunlight collection, reactor construction, catalyst production, hydrogen handling and chemical purification. Until those measurements are available, the most defensible description is a promising solar-chemistry research demonstration: one process step that could turn a low-value biodiesel by-product into hydrogen and higher-value molecules, but not yet a proven industrial solution.
“We are beginning to understand how to control the chemistry so that solar energy can be used to produce hydrogen while directing the remaining carbon into useful products rather than waste,” Gunawan said.
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