Title: MÉTODOS OPTO-ELECTROQUÍMICOS MODULADOS PARA LA CARACTERIZACIÓN AVANZADA DE MATERIALES PARA EL ALMACENAMIENTO DE ENERGÍA EN CONDICIONES DE TRABAJO
Acronym of the project: ADD
Funding entity: MCTI - MINISTERIO DE CIENCIA Y TECNOLOGIA
Modality: PROJECTES DE GENERACIÓ DE CONEIXEMENT
Entity code: PID2023-149158OB-C41
UJI accounting code: 24I383
Principal researchers: 
  1. Francisco Fabregat-Santiago
  2. Elena Mas Marzá
Dates: 2024-09-01 to 2027-08-31
Total amount: 225.000,00€
Involved researchers: 
  1. Diego Iglesias Bernardo
  2. Guillem Beltran
  3. Jose Solera Rojas
  4. Kikaru Tabata
Summary/Abstract: 
To mitigate climate change, it is essential to accelerate the transition to renewable energies and reverse the concentration of greenhouse gases to pre-industrial levels. To achieve the first of these objectives, it is necessary to develop massive storage systems that allow managing the intermittency of renewable energies and meeting the demands of the transport sector, the second largest emitter of these gases after the energy sector. Batteries and hydrogen are two of the technologies called to solve this problem. The capture and fixation of excess CO2 in the atmosphere is a formidable challenge that, with current technologies, has a high energy and economic cost. However, the planet has its own system, plants, which transform CO2 into biomass at no cost. The transformation of this biomass into products to supply the industry avoids (or delays) the carbon it contains from returning to the atmosphere after its decomposition or combustion and eliminates (or reduces) the use of oil as a raw material. This project proposes the development of materials for energy storage in batteries and hydrogen through electrochemical and photoelectrocatalytic cells. For the development and optimization of these materials and devices, it is essential to have characterization tools that allow understanding their behavior, both at the macroscopic and nano and microscopic level. Therefore, a large part of this project will be dedicated to the development of a tool for the analysis of the properties of materials and devices that, combining advanced techniques of chemical, electrochemical, morphological and structural characterization, allows understanding in an integral and precise way, the mechanisms that control the response of our systems, what processes limit their performance and how they can be improved. This tool will combine advanced techniques such as X-ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy, Scanning Transmission Electron Microscopy, Energy Dispersive X-ray Spectroscopy, Electron Energy Loss Spectroscopy, Synchrotron Xray analysis and Impedance and Light Modulated Photovoltage and Photocurrent spectroscopies, to perform measurements in operation (in-situ) and ex-situ and obtain a complete view of the properties of the materials, well ahead of the current state of the art. Another very relevant novelty is associated with the substitution of water by the use of biomass derivatives (e.g. sugars) as raw material for the simultaneous production of hydrogen and acids of industrial interest (e.g. succinic). This will allow hydrogen production to be more competitive and sustainable, while fixing carbon in the production chain. Among the new materials that will be studied are high entropy oxides and metal alloys for the manufacture of low-cost electrodes for electrocatalysis and state-of-the-art metal-air batteries. This strategy allows the integration of materials with the different functionalities required by each device and that, rarely, are found in a single material. In addition, the use of ultra-thin protective layers to improve their stability will be explored. The combination of experience, quality and effort of the four teams that make up ADD will allow achieving the ambitious and disruptive objectives of this project.