Jun Liu, Ruiqi Li, Guixin Hu, Nan Yao, Juan He, Ru Tao, Tingting Jia, Li Lu*, Liping Zhao, Jiang Gong*,
Mechanochemistry synthesis of Al-fumarate MOF towards high-performance in solar-driven interfacial water evaporation and power generation.
Journal of Environmental Chemical Engineering (2026) Accept. (IF2025 = 7.4) Link & PDF
The integration of solar-driven interfacial water evaporation and evaporation-induced electricity generation represents a promising strategy to address global energy and potable water crises. However, designing low-cost evaporators that can efficiently cogenerate freshwater and electricity, and establishing a reliable underlying mechanism, continue to be major challenges. Herein, we report the trace water-assisted mechanochemical fabrication of an Al-fumarate (Al-Fum) metal-organic framework (MOF) and subsequently fabricate a solar bi-functional evaporator using Al-Fum and graphene for simultaneous freshwater production and electricity generation. Al-Fum is composed of irregular, stacked nanosheet agglomerations with rich porous structures and shows a specific surface area of 813 m2 g-1. The evaporator exhibits outstanding solar absorption (98.2%), excellent photothermal conversion performance, efficient water migration capability, low enthalpy for water evaporation, and low thermal conductivity (0.062 W m-1 K-1). It demonstrates an impressive water evaporation rate of 2.53 kg m-2 h-1 and produces maximum output voltage of 340 mV, outperforming previous evaporator/generator systems. Furthermore, it is proved that the distinct difference in the interaction strength between Na?/Cl? and surface functional groups results in an imbalance of ionic transport at the interface, thereby establishing interfacial potential difference as well as voltage output. In outdoors, the evaporator delivers the output voltage of 240 mV and current of 4 μA, respectively, and shows a total water yield of 3.44 kg m-2, sufficient to supply the daily drinking water demand of two adults. This work offers new opportunities for the development of multi-functional evaporators towards co-generation of freshwater and electricity.
Keywords: Solar-driven interfacial water evaporation, mechanochemistry, Al-fumarate, metal-organic framework, power generation