NSERC-DFG SUSTAIN: Development of Organic Photocatalyst Materials to Broaden the Use of Sustainable Photocatalysis in Organic Syntheses

NSERC-DFG SUSTAIN：开发有机光催化剂材料以拓宽可持续光催化在有机合成中的应用

• 批准号: 534235866
• 负责人: Professor Dr. Burkhard König
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: Institut für Organische Chemie
• 依托单位国家: 德国
• 项目类别: Research Grants
• 资助国家: 德国
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://gepris.dfg.de/gepris/projekt/534235866?language=en
• 关键词: NSERC; DFG; SUSTAIN; Development; Organic

The chemical synthesis industry is an important pillar of Canadian and German economies and underpins the production of high-value commodities such as pharmaceuticals, agrochemicals, cosmetics, coatings, and polymers. Germany’s chemical industry is the 3rd largest internationally with a revenue of 160 billion EURO in 2020. In 2021, the chemical manufacturing industry in Canada was worth $64 billion CAD, directly employed 78,500 people, and indirectly supported an additional 392,500 jobs. However, today’s chemical syntheses are energy and material intensive and new approaches are needed to improve their sustainability. Sustainability of the chemical sector requires the exploration of different approaches that can lead to significant reductions in energy consumption. Compared to other industrial subsectors, the chemical industry is the largest energy consumer and third largest direct source of CO2 emissions. To reach Net Zero goals, CO2 emissions must decouple from production by 2030, which is not the direction we are currently heading in. New synthetic tools critically are needed to ensure the continuity of the chemical synthesis industry during the transition to a new low carbon economy. Photocatalysis, a way of making unreactive molecules react using the energy of light, is being developed to access more benign and sustainable chemical reaction conditions. Importantly, photocatalysis can make use of sustainable solar energy, either directly or through solar cells powering artificial lighting. However, broad application of photocatalysis in chemical transformations is hampered by the narrow range of effective light-driven reactions and the difficulty of using simple, unactivated chemical feedstocks. This international collaboration aims to establish new tools to decarbonize industrial chemical synthesis processes using photocatalysis. By bringing together chemical synthesis expertise from Germany and materials expertise in Canada, we aim to develop new, more sustainable synthetic processes that make better use of materials, consume less energy, and reduce CO2 emissions. Our starting point is carbon nitride, a polymeric photocatalysts made from simple and inexpensive precursors such as urea. Typical carbon nitride has proved to be useful for some photocatalytic transformations, but more extreme oxidative and reductive potentials are needed to fully utilize simple, widely accessible chemical feedstocks. By leveraging chemical synthesis expertise from Germany and materials expertise in Canada, we will advance fundamental research and generate novel photocatalysts and photocatalytic reactions. These can be used by Canadian and German industries to improve the energy and material efficiencies of their chemical synthesis processes, leading to a more environmentally sustainable chemical sector.

化学合成工业是加拿大和德国经济的重要支柱，是药品、农用化学品、化妆品、涂料和聚合物等高价值商品生产的基础。德国的化学工业是世界第三大工业，2020年的收入为1600亿欧元。2021年，加拿大的化学制造业价值640亿加元，直接雇用78，500人，间接支持额外392，500个工作岗位。然而，今天的化学合成是能源和材料密集型的，需要新的方法来提高其可持续性。化学品部门的可持续性要求探索可导致大幅减少能源消耗的不同办法。与其他工业分部门相比，化学工业是最大的能源消耗和第三大二氧化碳直接排放源。为了实现净零排放目标，到2030年，二氧化碳排放必须与生产脱钩，这不是我们目前的方向。在向新的低碳经济过渡期间，迫切需要新的合成工具来确保化学合成行业的连续性。光催化是一种利用光能使非反应性分子发生反应的方法，正在开发以获得更良性和可持续的化学反应条件。重要的是，太阳能电池可以直接或通过太阳能电池为人工照明提供动力，从而利用可持续的太阳能。然而，由于有效的光驱动反应的范围狭窄以及难以使用简单的未活化的化学原料，阻碍了光催化剂在化学转化中的广泛应用。这项国际合作旨在建立新的工具，以脱碳工业化学合成过程中使用的二氧化碳。通过汇集来自德国的化学合成专业知识和加拿大的材料专业知识，我们的目标是开发新的，更可持续的合成工艺，更好地利用材料，消耗更少的能源，并减少二氧化碳排放。我们的出发点是氮化碳，一种由尿素等简单廉价的前体制成的聚合物光催化剂。典型的氮化碳已被证明可用于某些光催化转化，但需要更极端的氧化和还原电位，以充分利用简单，广泛使用的化学原料。通过利用德国的化学合成专业知识和加拿大的材料专业知识，我们将推进基础研究，并产生新型光催化剂和光催化反应。加拿大和德国的工业界可以利用这些技术来提高其化学合成工艺的能源和材料效率，从而使化学部门在环境上更具可持续性。