Pure hydrogen can be catalytically generated by hydrolysis of sodium tetrahydroborate NaBH4. The present paper reports the kinetics of hydrolysis of aqueous alkaline solution of NaBH4. The investigated catalyst was 1 wt% Ru-promoted sulphated zirconia. The reaction orders for both NaBH4 and NaOH, the reaction order for Ru and the apparent activation energy were determined. The hydrogen generation rate can be written following a power law: r = k[NaBH4](0.23)[NaOH](-0.35)[Ru](1.27). The activation energy for the hydrogen generation reaction is of 76 kJ mol(-1). Otherwise, the present paper shortly reviews the kinetic data that are available in the open literature and notices the discrepancies that exist for these data. The kinetic data of the present study also contribute to these discrepancies. (c) 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.