Projects
Ongoing projects:
High-performing Organic Redox flow bATteries (HORTA)
The HORTA project (High-performing Organic Redox flow bATteries) pioneers a new generation of long-duration energy storage (LDES) based on safe, sustainable, and fully metal-free organic redox flow batteries. As industry and the electricity grid shift toward large shares of wind and solar power, storage systems capable of delivering energy for many hours become essential. HORTA addresses this need by developing…
Elevated temperature and pressure: a game changer for CO2 electrolysis efficiency by balancing kinetics and mass transfer
To reach the target of the European Union to become climate-neutral by 2050, the defossilization of the industry and the transport sector is essential. Certain sectors, like aviation and chemical production, are hard to abate if no alternatives arise. In this respect, CO2 electrolysis is an interesting and quickly evolving alternative. While CO2 electrolysis is slowly shifting towards increasing TRL…
Combining electrode structuring and battery pressure management towards fast charging applications of high energy density lithium-ion batteries
The project’s goal is to develop, combine and understand two key novel strategies that will enable the usage of thick lithium-ion battery electrodes. The first strategy involves the structuring of electrodes by femtosecond laser ablation, giving rise to batteries with increased capacity retention and decreased lithium plating risks, allowing increased charging rates for thick electrodes (>100 μm). The second strategy…
3D structured electrodes towards high performance pulsatile flow batteries
Flow batteries are an emerging technology for the stationary storage of intermittent renewable energy sources such as wind and solar power. However, their widespread adoption is hindered by energy losses that occur during charging and discharging. This project aims to minimize these losses by enhancing mass transfer and reducing pumping losses through the integration of a novel pulsatile flow regime…
Flow‑cell C3 Oxygenate production: Rational Catalyst Engineering via transmission electronmicroscopy (FORCE)
To help achieve carbon neutrality by 2050, electrochemical CO2 reduction (eCO2R) is attractive as it can both reduce fossil fuel dependency and afford valuable industrial chemicals using renewable energy. While the low solubility of CO2 limits eCO2R viability in batch cells, flow cells using a gas diffusion electrode (GDE) boost mass transport of CO2 to the electrocatalyst, attaining viable performance…
 Development of a TRL6 CO2 electrolysis testing facility at industrial scale (ELECTRA)
This project aims to establish a TRL6 CO2 electrolysis plant and testing facility, a first of its kind in Flanders, to evaluate electrolyzer technologies under industrially relevant conditions such as flue gas feeds and fluctuating high-power loads. The absence of such infrastructure in the region has limited progress in advancing CO2 electrolysis technology, and this project seeks to address that…
Development of GDE-MEA for CO2-electrolysis with low anolyte contribution (EFFORT)
The EFFORT project seeks to advance the technologies necessary for the widespread adoption of CO2 electrolyzers, with a primary goal of developing high-performance devices capable of operating at 2.5 V and 200 mA cm-2. Central to this effort is the creation of non-fluorinated, highly selective Anion Exchange Membranes (AEMs) tailored to reduce (bi)carbonate crossover. Alongside, innovative gas diffusion electrode (GDE)…
Allylic oxidation of hydrocarbons on anodes (ALOHA)
The ALOHA project aims to develop an electrochemically assisted process for the selective oxidation of olefins, such as propene, at the allylic position to produce unsaturated acids like acrylic acid. This process replaces dissolved redox mediators with anode-incorporated mediators inspired by N-hydroxyphthalimide. Operating under mild conditions (<100 °C, low O2 content), the approach minimizes voltage and energy requirements and will…
Redox flow batteries: better and cheaper through improved material design (REBBID)
This project is dedicated to developing the next generation of redox flow batteries, a technology considered highly promising for storing renewable electricity on a large scale. Unlike conventional batteries, redox flow batteries store energy in liquid electrolytes that can be circulated through the system. This makes them especially attractive for grid applications, where long lifetimes, flexible operation, and safety are…
Accelerated degradation techniques for improving the performance and durability of flow batteries
Flow batteries are a promising technology for the stationary storage of intermittent renewable energy. Yet their commercial prospects are hindered by the lack of techniques to evaluate the durability of the different battery materials. This research project will enhance the performance and durability of flow batteries (FBs) for energy storage applications through the development of accelerated degradation techniques (ADTs). In…
Past projects:
Upscaling effects on the purity of circular formic acid for ecological descaler production
The awareness of society in terms of sustainability and the fragility of ecosystems and our environment has pushed governments to pass legislation imposing stricter product requirements on industry. Companies are therefore looking for alternative feedstocks with less impact on the environment. This implies that the origin of these feedstocks has to be renewable or they have to be recycled from what would otherwise be a waste stream. A pioneer in this matter is Ecover. It is their mission to produce cleaning agents ecologically, economically and in a socially responsible manner….
Clusters for CO2 electrolyzers to Ethylene (CLUE)
CLUE aims to develop the next generation CO2 electrolyzers for sustainable production of ethylene with reduced carbon footprint by designing novel, selective and highly robust electrocatalysts using an innovative approach based on Cluster Beam Deposition (CBD) technology. For electrochemical conversion of CO2 to ethylene, stimulating results have recently been obtained mainly on copper-based catalysts, yielding relatively high Faradaic efficiency (FE ≈ 60-70%) and current densities (100-200 mA cm−2) by using a flow cell with a gas diffusion electrode. Although the prospects for electrochemical ethylene production are promising, several challenges need…
Novel catalytic materials towards a combined photo and electrochemical conversion of CO2 to methanol
The negative impact of CO2 on climate change makes the decrease of anthropogenic CO2 emissions one of the biggest scientific challenges our current generation faces. One possible solution is the direct photo- or electrochemical conversion of CO2 to highly value-added products such as methanol, using merely H2O as proton source and renewable electricity as driving force. However, in the current state-of-the-art these processes are not productive or not selective enough. In this respect, photo-electrochemistry emerges as a highly promising technique as it combines the advantages of photochemistry with those of…
Femtosecond pulsed laser micromachining for engineering materials and catalysis research
Through femtosecond pulsed laser micromachining a wide variety of materials such as ceramics (e.g. glass), hard metals (e.g. Hastelloy), and polymers can be processed with microscale resolution, offering innovation and beyond state-of-the-art research opportunities. To name a few, the planned research infrastructure would allow to tune the catalytic properties of surfaces, to enhance flow distribution, heat transfer and mass transfer in chemical reactors, to increase detection limit of photoelectrochemical sensors, to facilitate flow chemistry, to tailor-make EPR and TEM measurement cells, and to allow machine learning for hybrid additive manufacturing….
Understanding the role of dopants as a key step towards efficient oxygen evolution catalysts (WEAVE)
Water electrolysis has since long been considered as a sustainable and scalable technology to generate green hydrogen, which is a promising candidate to store and liberate energy from. In order to increase the overall energy efficiency of this process, it is important to understand and improve the sluggish oxygen evolution reaction (OER) by developing more efficient electrocatalysts. Crucial in this search is the role dopants play in this process, as they severely impact the activity and stability of the electrocatalyst which can result in a positive or negative outcome. The…
Electrochemical conversion of CO2 to formic acid at elevated temperatures
One of the greatest challenges faced by our current generation is lowering the concentration of greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere and reducing anthropogenic CO2 emissions. The electrochemical CO2 reduction (ECR) provides a solution to this problem by utilizing CO2 in combination with renewable energy and convert it to valuable chemicals (here formic acid, FA). However, to make the process more rapidly industrially feasible it would be beneficial to replace the anodic oxygen evolution reaction at the counter electrode with an economically more interesting one, like alkane dehydrogenation. This reaction, however,…
Intensification of CO2 capture processes (CAPTIN-2)
While capture of CO2 is crucial to reduce CO2-emissions, the high cost and technological limitations of available technologies restrict their successful and general industrial deployment in the CO2 capture and utilization (CCU) context. Moreover, given the limited potential of carbon utilization (e.g. the use of CO2 for the production methanol and urea has a sequestration potential of only 0.5% of the total anthropogenic CO2 emissions), Carbon Capture is essential to limit global warming. To allow economically justifiable capture and conversion of CO2 into chemicals, CAPTIN aimed at the development of…
NuCryPept-control – Control of Nucleation and Crystallization of Oligopeptides in Flow
The NuCryPept-control project aims to create tools for the simplification of parameter-space exploration in the development of oligopeptide nucleation and crystallization. We are developing precise and accurate control technologies for various parameters in the crystallization process (pH, composition, concentration, temperature) that not only work on microscale, but in addition are scalable, so that the same technologies used for screening can also be applied in manufacturing to unburden, through crystallization, the purification process of biomacromolecules, which is currently expensive and inefficient.
Reactive Amine Scrubbing for CO2 Conversion
The project aims at developing innovative continuous flow technologies with as prospective industrial implementation. Flow technology is especially useful for continuous processes and can be implemented at different levels going from efficient and economic screening of process conditions to process intensification.
Flow technology as solution for up-scaling and increasing efficiency of chemical processes
The project aims at developing innovative continuous flow technologies with as prospective industrial implementation. Flow technology is especially useful for continuous processes and can be implemented at different levels going from efficient and economic screening of process conditions to process intensification