Citation :

Geoffrey Kubuli Makhanu, Patrick Nziu, Obadiah Mwanzi Maube, "Response Surface Methodology-Based Optimization of Alkaline Water Electrolysis Parameters for Hydrogen Production," International Journal of Mechanical Engineering, vol. 13, no. 4, pp. 85-96, 2026. Crossref, https://doi.org/10.14445/23488360/IJME-V13I4P107

Abstract

This study investigates the key effects of the key operational variables, namely the applied voltage, the electrolyte concentration, and the electrode spacing, on the efficiency of the very hydrogen production through the alkaline water electrolysis process. In this work, the stainless steel electrodes were used as both the anode and the cathode materials in order to ensure the material consistency throughout the experiments. Moreover, the experiments were conducted at atmospheric pressure using aqueous potassium hydroxide (KOH) solutions of varying concentrations. To systematically evaluate the influence of the selected parameters, a full factorial experimental design incorporating the Response Surface Methodology (RSM) was employed. Accordingly, this approach was used to analyze the individual effects as well as the interaction effects of the selected operating parameters on the overall system performance. In addition, the quadratic regression models were developed in order to predict the process responses and to check the statistical importance of the results by using the Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) method with the Minitab 19.1.10 software. In this study, the experimental results showed that the applied voltage and the electrode spacing have an important effect on the hydrogen generation rate and also on the overall system efficiency. It is important to note that higher voltage and smaller electrode spacing were found to improve hydrogen production performance. Furthermore, the increase in the very electrolyte concentration improved the underlying electrical conductivity of the solution and also increased the current density in the electrolysis cell. In addition, based on the optimization results, the best operating conditions were obtained at the higher voltage and the smaller electrode distance, and therefore, this confirms the strong effect of the electrochemical parameters on the water splitting efficiency. The results of the study show a contribution to the development of cost-effective and energy-efficient hydrogen production technologies, especially for clean energy applications.

Keywords

Green hydrogen, Hydrogen production, Alkaline water electrolysis, Renewable energy, Response surface methodology, Experimental optimization.

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