Hydrogen absorption and desorption in the V–Al–H system

Abstract

The presented work sets out to investigate the influence of aluminium on the hydrogenation of vanadium by first studying the hydrogenation properties of the V–H system in detail followed by the study of the V–Al–H system. Aluminium was found to have a stabilising effect on vanadium hydride phases. Presumably by functioning as an oxygen getter, aluminium lowers equilibrium pressures and increases hydrogen capacities in respect to the V/H ratio compared to the V–H system. Attempts of the synthesis of the hypothetical V(AlH₄)_x by metathesis and direct hydrogenation were not successful, suggesting its instability below room temperature at ambient pressure as well as up to 180 bar of hydrogen pressure in the temperature range of 30 to 100 °C.