Electrochemistry toward the Efficient Generation of Energy Materials

Fundamentally, society and its technologies are at the tipping point in changing from our historic carbon-based thermal technologies to carbon neutral or carbon negative approaches. Many of the key approaches to achieving this transition depend on moving to electrification and subsequent use of electrochemical processes which offers the potential for a truly sustainable energy system. One key area of focus is to move the chemical industry most particularly energy materials from thermal processing to electrochemical processes which can be substantially more efficient and use renewably generated electrons. This includes key large scale chemicals such as H2, NH3, CO2 reduction products as well as the larger set of currently thermally processed chemicals. Many of the electrochemical processes can be done up to 30% more efficiently and easily adapt to continuous flow reactors and readily incorporate the principles of green chemistry. In many areas these transformations are taking place very rapidly, enabled by new generations of materials with reduced energy demands and reduced costs that can be scaled due to the cost and availability of renewable electrons.