Photoelectrochemical (PEC) Hydrogen Production has advanced significantly in recent years, in particular, PEC devices with solar-to-hydrogen (STH) conversion efficiency that exceeded 10% were demonstrated in a range of configurations at the laboratory scale. To further advance this technology and reach the bench scale (0.1 kg/day) and sub-scale (2 kg/day) operational platforms, development of comprehensive Best Practices in screening, characterization and benchmarking at materials level, component level, device level and system level is critical.

In this presentation, I will talk about recent community-based efforts in defining targets, best practices and gaps in PEC hydrogen production in HydroGEN Energy Material Network (EMN) consortium. Specific challenges related to PEC will be discussed including scale up challenges, integration challenges at component level, lack of performance data and test protocols for photoelectrodes under real-world operating conditions and lack of fundamental understanding of photoelectrode corrosion mechanisms and accelerated test protocols. In addition, a briefly summary and status reports on lab EMN nodes/capabilities for PEC water-splitting will be addressed. Cross-cutting interactions with other advanced water-splitting technologies, including low/high temperature electrolysis and solar thermochemical water splitting, will also be discussed.