Renewable Energy and Chemical Technologies Lab
Pioneering Sustainable Technologies:
Current Projects
Direct Air Capture
Capturing carbon dioxide directly from the air plays a crucial role in our efforts to reach ‘net zero’ carbon dioxide emissions, aimed at addressing unabatable emissions. However, current direct air capture technologies are costly. To bring down the cost of direct air capture, in our lab, we are working on innovative direct air capture processes from conceptualization to prototype testing.
Carbon Dioxide Utilization
The sequestration of carbon dioxide in commodity products offers many advantages over geologic sequestration. One of these advantages is the potential to generate a revenue stream; however, achieving economical utilization of biogenic carbon resources and carbon dioxide presents challenges. In our lab, we are working on highly efficient electrochemical pathways for converting biogenic resources, such as atmospheric carbon dioxide, to valuable products that can retain carbon for a long time, for example, plastics. Moreover, utilizing this ubiquitous resource can offset fossil fuel usage and lead to more independence of resource-constrained nations.
Green Steel
Steel production is responsible for about 7% of the energy sector's carbon dioxide emissions. By transitioning to renewable hydrogen, a majority of these emissions can be avoided. In our lab, we are studying decarbonization pathways for the steel industry and new system integration schemes to increase the industry's energy efficiency.
Pioneering Sustainable Technologies: Selected
Recent Publications
2023
Emerging concepts in intermediate carbon dioxide emplacement to support carbon dioxide removal, Energy & Environmental Science (2023), Breunig, Rosner, Lim, Peng.
Green steel: design and cost analysis of hydrogen-based direct iron reduction, Energy & Environmental Science (2023), Rosner, Papadias, Brooks, Yoro, Ahluwalia, Autrey, Breunig.
Techno-economic analysis of a CO2 direct air capture-cooling tower hybrid process at a geothermal facility, ChemRxiv (2023), Rosner, Schamberger, Breunig.
Techno-Economic Analysis of Electrochemical Refineries Using Solid Oxide Cells for Oxidative Coupling of Methane, ECS Transactions (2023), Rosner, Tucker, Hu, Breunig.