Nanotechnology for Mega(Watt)-Energy: How nanomaterials and interfaces can boost performance for energy storage and conversion

Speaker: Prof. Philippe M. Vereecken, imec and KULeuven, Belgium

Abstract: This seminar gives a bird’s eye view of imec’s research activities in the field of energy storage and conversion. Imec is world renowned for its R&D in next generation chip technology. In the periphery of the nano-electronic devices and high-tech clean rooms, imec researchers and PhD students from universities leverage the know-how in nanomaterials, nanofabrication and atomic control of interfaces also in many other sectors such as health and energy. Interfaces and interphases are key in electrochemical devices such as batteries, electrolyzers and fuel cells. Using thin-film model systems and patterning, the electronic and ionic charge transfer and transport across interfaces can be studied, for example, to investigate the role of artificial interface coatings between battery active materials and electrolytes, being liquid or solid. Using such methodology, the difference between Li+/H+ ion-exchange and electrochemical protonation mechanisms could be discerned for high energy Ni-based active materials like LNMO and NMC. In another example, the role of stress on Li-ion diffusion induced by the intended (artificial) and non-intended interphase coatings on Li-ion insertion and extraction mechanisms was postulated. In a final example, the role of thin solid LiOH interphase coating for the electrodeposition of columnar lithium in the presence of water as an additive is discussed. In a second part of this seminar, the fabrication of electrodes and membrane-electrode-assemblies (MEA) for electrocatalysis will be covered. Monolithic and periodic nanostructured metal scaffolds, nicknamed the nanomesh, combine the function of current collector, electrocatalyst and porous transport layer. It will be shown that next to the performance increase due to the very large internal surface area, also confinement and electrical-double layer effects come at play leading to unexpected ion coupling effects. These nanomeshes are being developed as MEA’s for green-hydrogen production and novel gas-diffusion-electrodes for CO2 reduction in imec’s power-to-molecules program.

Prof. Dr. Philippe Vereecken is a Fellow at imec and part-time Professor at the KU Leuven, Belgium. His main expertise lays in the combination of electrochemistry, nanomaterials synthesis and solid-state devices for applications in semiconductors, electrocatalytic conversion and electrochemical storage. Dr. Vereecken received a PhD in Physical Chemistry at Gent University (Belgium) in 1998.  He was as a postdoctoral associate in the department of Materials Science and Engineering at The Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, MD (1998-2001) working on electrodeposition of thin films, nanowires and nanocomposites. Subsequently, he worked as a Research Staff Member at IBM T.J. Watson Research Center in Yorktown Heights, NY (2001-2005) developing electrochemical processes for next generation chips. Dr. Vereecken returned to Belgium in 2005 and joined imec working on nanomaterial synthesis and integration. In 2009, Dr. Vereecken started up the electrochemical storage and conversion activities in imec. In the same year he was appointed Professor at the university of Leuven (KU Leuven), Faculty of Bio Science Engineering (FBIW). His current research activities focus on nanomaterials for the development of next generation batteries, electrolysers and fuel-cells. Dr. Vereecken has authored and co-authored over 220 scientific publications and is inventor and co-inventor of more than 60 patent families. He is an active member of The Electrochemical Society (ECS), past director of the ECS board and past chair of the ECS Electrodeposition division.