CATALYSIS FOR SUSTAINABLE ENERGY

Essentially all sustainable energy systems rely on the energy influx from the sun. In order to store solar energy it is most conveniently transformed into a chemical form, a fuel. The key to provide an efficient transformation of energy to a chemical form is the availability of suitable catalysts, and we will need to find new catalysts for a number of processes if we are to successfully synthesize fuels from sunlight. Insight into the way the catalysts work at the molecular may prove essential to speed up the discovery process. The lecture will discuss some of the challenges to catalyst discovery, the associated challenges to science as well as some approaches to molecular level catalyst design. Specific examples will include the (photo-)electrochemical oxygen evolution and hydrogen evolution reactions, carbon dioxide reduction, and biomass transformation reactions. Jens Nørskov received his MSc in physics and chemistry and his PhD in theoretical physics at the University of Aarhus, Denmark. After spending time at the IBM T. J. Watson Research Center, Yorktown Heights, NY, the Nordic Institute for Theoretical Physics, Copenhagen and Haldor Topsøe A/S, Lyngby, Denmark he joined the Technical University of Denmark as a Professor of Physics in 1987. He has been director of the Center for Atomic-scale Materials Design 1993-2010 and of the Catalysis for Sustainable Energy Initiative 2009-2010. Presently he is professor of Chemical Engineering and of Photon Science at Stanford University and at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory. He holds the Leland T. Edwards Professorship in Engineering at Stanford and is director of the SUNCAT Center for Interface Science and Catalysis.

Speaker: Jens Nørskov's research aims at developing theoretical methods and concepts to understand and predict properties of materials. He is particularly interested in surface chemical properties, heterogeneous catalysis, electro-catalysis and the link to enzyme function.