Hydrogen could be an ideal fuel. It can either be used to make electricity in a fuel cell, or burned to make heat. Like gasoline, hydrogen could be used to store energy. Scientists have now come up with a new hydrogen-making catalyst that contains phosphorus, sulfur and cobalt.

Passing water over a catalyst can 'magically' transform that water into hydrogen and oxygen at much lower energies, said experts.

According to experts, if they could get only hydrogen out of abundant water, they could burn it for heat or use it in fuel cells to power cars and factories, or store energy in the form of hydrogen at wind and solar farms.

The hydrogen economy has faced several hurdles, but still it remains one of the scientifically attractive options that could take us beyond the current capriciousness of alternative energy.

The researchers discovered a cheap and efficient alternative to the use of noble gasses as a catalyst in hydrogen production. Their new alternative is a combination of phosphorus, sulfur and cobalt, a metal which is nearly 1,000 times cheaper than the cheapest noble metals.

The team said that their new catalyst also works with sunlight-powered water-splitting devices. So far electricity has been used to spilt water and produce hydrogen.

Song Jin, a chemistry professor at Wisconsin, said, "We have demonstrated a proof-of-concept device for using this cobalt catalyst and solar energy to drive hydrogen generation, which also has the best reported efficiency for systems that rely only on inexpensive catalysts and materials to convert directly from sunlight to hydrogen".