Looking below the surface: Revealing Interfacial Reactions for Sustainable Electrochemical Technologies

我们时代的最大挑战之一是迅速向低碳经济过渡，以限制气候变化的程度。英国政府承诺到2050年实现净零排放，这将要求所有行业都进行脱碳，因此需要开发新技术，以确保维持安全可靠的能源供应。太阳能和风能的扩张导致可再生能源的成本与化石燃料替代品竞争，甚至低于化石燃料替代品。然而，进一步向可再生能源过渡将需要我们在转换、储存和使用能源方面做出重大改变，包括采取措施应对其不稳定性和增加电气化。电化学能量储存和转换技术将是这一脱碳努力的核心，与当前的热化学过程（例如燃烧）相比，它可能会提高效率。然而，实现这些效率沿着大规模部署所需的性能需要设计改进的电池和电催化剂材料。这需要了解这些材料的性质以及使用过程中在其表面发生的反应。虽然我们目前可以在死后研究这些材料，但这几乎不能告诉我们它们在活跃生命中发生的反应。该奖学金详细介绍了开发和应用一套创新表征技术的计划，这些技术将使电化学设备中埋藏界面处发生的化学反应能够在操作过程中直接观察到。通过使用对X射线、电子和中子透明的窗口，可以揭示可充电电池电极和电催化剂表面上发生的原子级过程，而不会干扰它们运行的液体环境。这将使现有材料组合的局限性得到理解，并确定和测试新材料解决方案。该项目的电池和电催化股之间的统一主题将集中在浓缩电解质上，其中带正电和带负电的离子不再完全被溶剂（例如水）包围。这是抑制不期望的反应以延长电池寿命和提高电催化剂效率的有前景的策略。它还可以潜在地降低毒性并提高基于这些电解质的设备的安全性，这对于它们的大规模实施是非常理想的。所提出的方法将提高我们对离子和溶剂如何在这些浓缩溶液中的电化学界面排列的理解，以及由此产生的对电化学反应发生的影响。通过这项研究计划开发的理解有望为设计适合电网规模存储的低成本，安全的电池系统提供信息，以缓冲间歇性可再生能源。它还将有助于确定用于生产碳中性液体燃料和化学品的改进的电催化剂材料和工艺。这些进步将减少我们对化石燃料开采的依赖，最终有助于应对气候变化等长期挑战。

One of the greatest challenges of our time is to rapidly transition towards a low-carbon economy in order to limit the extent of climate change. The UK government's pledge to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050 will require decarburisation across all sectors, and thus the development of new technologies to ensure secure, reliable energy supplies are maintained. The expansion of solar and wind power has resulted in renewable energy costs that are competitive with or even undercut fossil fuel alternatives. However, further transition to renewable energy sources will require major changes in how we convert, store and use energy, including measures to deal with their intermittency and increased electrification.Electrochemical energy storage and conversion technologies will be central to this decarburisation effort, offering potential improvements in efficiency compared to current thermochemical processes (e.g. combustion). However, realising these efficiencies along with the performance needed for large-scale deployment requires the design of improved battery and electrocatalyst materials. This requires understanding of the nature of these materials and the reactions occurring on their surfaces during use. Although we can currently study these materials post-mortem, this tells us little about the reactions that occurred during their active life. This fellowship details a plan to develop and apply a suite of innovative characterisation techniques that will enable chemical reactions occurring at the buried interfaces in electrochemical devices to be directly observed during operation. By using windows that are transparent to X-rays, electrons and neutrons, the atomic-scale processes occurring on the surface of rechargeable battery electrodes and electrocatalysts for producing valuable chemicals will be revealed without disturbing the liquid environments in which they operate. This will enable the limitations of existing material combinations to be understood, and for new material solutions to be identified and tested.A unifying theme between the battery and electrocatalysis strands of this project will be a focus on concentrated electrolytes, in which the positively and negatively charged ions are no longer fully surrounded by a solvent (e.g. water). This is a promising strategy for supressing undesired reactions in order to extend battery life and improve electrocatalyst efficiency. It can also potentially reduce toxicity and improve safety in devices based on these electrolytes, which is highly desirable for their implementation at scale. The proposed approach will improve our understanding of how ions and solvents arrange at electrochemical interfaces in these concentrated solutions, and the resulting impact on the electrochemical reactions occurring.The understanding developed through this program of research is expected to inform the design of low-cost, safe battery systems suitable for grid-scale storage to buffer intermittent renewable energy sources. It will also contribute to the identification of improved electrocatalyst materials and processes for the production of carbon-neutral liquid fuels and chemicals. These advances will reduce our reliance on fossil fuel extraction, ultimately helping to tackle long-term challenges such as climate change.