Energy Conversion at the Interface

我的研究计划的主要目标是开发一种电解槽，能够利用电力将二氧化碳（CO2）转化为高效和选择性的有用产品（即CO或碳氢化合物）。我们的使命是由今天可再生电力的低成本驱动的，并且需要开发经济上可行的存储解决方案，以永久支持这种低价格。利用过剩的可再生电力通过电解方式减少二氧化碳是很有吸引力的，因为处理燃料和化学产品的基础设施已经到位。该提案不涉及应该最积极地追求哪一种二氧化碳电解的具体产出（我们正在进行一项市场研究，将为这一挑战提供清晰的答案），但我们寻求任何类型的二氧化碳电解槽都需要的基础科学和技术进步，以适应供应链。该提案描述了新的电催化剂，分析工具和电解槽流动电池的设计，以帮助我们实现实现商业上可行的二氧化碳电解槽的更大使命。我们的目标是利用我的课程中化学、工程、建模和分析专业知识的多样性，并将利用与学术和工业合作伙伴的许多合作关系。

The primary objective of my research program is to develop an electrolyzer capable of using electricity to convert carbon dioxide (CO2) into useful products (i.e., CO or hydrocarbons) with high efficiency and selectivity. Our mission is motivated by the strikingly low cost of renewable electricity available today, and the need to develop economically viable storage solutions in order to support such low prices in perpetuity. The electrolytic reduction of CO2 using excess renewable electricity is compelling because the infrastructure is already in place to handle the fuel and chemical products. This proposal is agnostic to the subject of which specific outputs of CO2 electrolysis should be pursued most vehemently (we are engaged in a market study which will provide clarity to this challenge), but we seek fundamental science and technology advances that are required for any type of CO2 electrolyzer to fit in a supply chain. This proposal describes the design of new electrocatalysts, analytical tools, and electrolyzer flow cells to help us achieve our larger mission of realizing a commercially viable CO2 electrolyzer. Our objectives take advantage of the diverse range of chemical, engineering, modeling and analytical expertise within my program, and will draw upon many collaborative relationships with academic and industrial partners. The first section of this proposal is motivated by the need to develop robust property-activity relationships for multi-metallic CO2 electrocatalysts. We will, for example, attempt to link composition, lattice strain and mixing patterns of alloys to catalytic selectivity, efficiency and durability. A successful outcome of these projects is the ability to deliberately tune the conversion of CO2 towards a specific product (e.g., CO, ethylene, propanol). The following section outlines our plans for building novel preparative and analytical tools to rapidly advance the rate of materials discovery and systems optimization. We plan to leverage materials printing techniques coupled to machine learning tools to produce, manage and process large data sets involving the testing of >106 compositions annually. Tools tailored for investigating how strain at the atomic level (e.g., lattice expansion) through to the macroscopic level (e.g., cracks) of catalytic films are proposed, as is the rapid prototyping of electrolyzer flow cell components. The last section will apply the learnings from the previous two vignettes to aid the design and development of a pilot CO2 electrolyzer system. This research will build on a gas-phase electrolyzer system that we recently designed to achieve high rates of CO2-to-CO conversion. The development of innovative technologies that reduce atmospheric CO2 concentrations is a priority for Canada, and the successful deployment of a commercial CO2 electrolyzer described in this proposal will contribute directly to this initiative.