Dept. of Materials Science and Engineering Spring Seminar Series: David Sinton

Description

David Sinton, a professor of mechanical and industrial engineering at the University of Toronto, will give a talk titled "Renewably Powered CO2 Capture and Conversion" for the Department of Materials Science and Engineering.

Abstract:

The capture and conversion of CO2 – when powered by renewable electricity – presents an opportunity to reduce emissions and de-carbonize the production of fuels and chemicals. These processes will require electrocatalytic systems that provide reactants, electrons, and products at high rate and efficiency, and that are compatible with established upstream and downstream processes. In this talk I will outline our progress on electrochemical systems to meet this challenge. To enable renewably powered CO2 capture, we have developed an electrochemical capture fluid regeneration strategy that circumvents the thermal process, and associated emissions, of the incumbent system. To convert the captured CO2 we develop a catalyst strategy that increases local CO2 availability and tunes intermediate adsorption for the production of multicarbon products. We adapt this strategy to achieve high single pass utilization of CO2 via engineering bipolar membranes and fixed cationic groups. To achieve energy and carbon efficiency simultaneously we develop a cascade approach, with CO2-to-CO followed by CO-to-products. I'll close with a discussion on the challenges ahead for the field to achieve commercial viability, stability and scale.