NewHydrogen, Inc., the Santa Clarita developer of ThermoLoop, a breakthrough technology that uses water and heat instead of electricity to produce low-cost clean hydrogen, has announced that it has jointly filed an international patent application with the University of California, Santa Barbara.
The patent is for its innovative clean hydrogen production process and associated technology titled “Coupled Multi-phase Oxidation-Reducing For Production of Chemicals.”
The inventors of the patent application include Dr. Eric McFarland, the company’s Chief Technology Officer and Ryan Patrick, the company’s Senior Chemical Engineer.
NewHydrogen filed an international patent application under the Patent Cooperation Treaty that further expands the basis for the company’s ThermoLoop thermochemical water splitting process together with new material compositions discovered by the UCSB technology team and the new isothermal hydrogen process.
A key innovation in the filing is the use of artificial intelligence and Large Language Models to discover and design optimal materials for these reaction networks. This allows the team to identify and optimize complex mixed-metal oxides and other regenerable materials that can operate efficiently within specific temperature ranges. For example, the technology enables hydrogen production at temperatures below 1,000°C, which avoids the energy-inefficient large temperature swings required by previous methods.
“This international patent filing represents a critical milestone in our mission to produce the world’s most cost-effective clean hydrogen,” said Steve Hill, CEO of NewHydrogen. “By combining advanced material science with AI-driven discovery, we are creating a scalable, carbon-free path for hydrogen production that bypasses the high costs of electricity-intensive electrolysis.”
The PCT application establishes a filing date in all 158 contracting countries, providing the company with a robust foundation to protect its intellectual property as it moves toward commercialization.
NewHydrogen is developing ThermoLoop, a breakthrough technology that uses water and heat instead of electricity to produce the world’s cheapest clean hydrogen.
Hydrogen is the key ingredient in making fertilizers needed to grow food for the world. It is also used for transportation, refining oil and making steel, glass, pharmaceuticals and more.
Nearly all the hydrogen today is made from hydrocarbons like coal, oil and natural gas, which are dirty and limited resources. Water, on the other hand, is an infinite and renewable worldwide resource.
Currently, the most common way of making clean hydrogen is to split water into oxygen and hydrogen with electricity using an electrolyzer, a very expensive process.
By using heat directly, it can dramatically reduce the use of expensive electricity. A massive source of inexpensive heat can be obtained from current and future power plants, especially small modular nuclear reactors.
Working with a world class research team at UC Santa Barbara, NewHydrogen’s goal is to help usher in the clean hydrogen economy that Goldman Sachs estimated to have a future market value of $12 trillion.
For more information about NewHydrogen, Inc., located at 27936 Vista Canyon Blvd., Suite 202, Santa Clarita, CA 91387, visit newhydrogen.com.
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