Seeds for a SciFi movie where the process is designed to be self replicating and gets spilled into the oceans. Massive red-tides on a global scale.
DOESN’T HE KNOW THAT CREATES CO2!?!?!?!
From the article: The “artificial leaf” is a thin sheet of metal, electronics and catalysts about the size of a credit card. When placed in a gallon of water in direct sunlight Nocera said this device could create enough electricity to power a home in the developing world.
Bzzzzt! Sorry, this fails the basic physics test unless the "home in the developing world" doesn't need much electricity. Credit cards are 85.60 × 53.98 mm, which is 0.0046 square meters. Solar energy is about 1 kilowatt per square meter, so this would produce 4.6 watts at 100% efficiency. That's 1.65 kilowatt hours per month for 12 hours of sun per day. To give some comparison, my electric bill averages around 800 kWh per month. Now maybe if you had an array of them it would produce a useful amount.
Swamp Thing says: BS!..................
I guess that’s another way to power Nissan’s coal burning car. At least the name Leaf would make sense.
Great - now gimme back my light bulbs.
The device bears no resemblance to Mother Nature’s counterparts on oaks, maples and other green plants, which scientists have used as the model for their efforts to develop this new genre of solar cells. About the shape of a poker card but thinner, the device is fashioned from silicon, electronics and catalysts, substances that accelerate chemical reactions that otherwise would not occur, or would run slowly. Placed in a single gallon of water in a bright sunlight, the device could produce enough electricity to supply a house in a developing country with electricity for a day, Nocera said. It does so by splitting water into its two components, hydrogen and oxygen.Note that he says "supply a house in a developing country", and does not give a figure as to the actual amount of energy produced per unit area.