The electrical conversion and storage of solar energy is a key challenge for world energy supply. Significant achievements have been reported for photoelectrochemical processes to split water or CO2, mimicking artificial photosynthesis. However, the lack of hydrogen distribution infrastructure limits their implementation as the unique solution. This symposium is focused in Solar Powered Electrochemical Energy Storage devices that have emerged as a synergic field together with solar fuels. It integrates a semiconducting light absorber and an electrochemical cell into a single device, being a promising alternative for a more efficient solar energy usage. The photoelectrochemical cell can harvest the solar energy and store it in-situ and distribute the energy as electric power when needed, overcoming energy distribution issues.
- Solar redox flow batteries
- PV coupled devices with batteries and supercaps
- Hybrid systems (solar supercapacitors with hydrogen generation,..)
- Novel photoabsorbers
- Photocharging kinetics and mechanisms
- In-situ characterization of interfaces
- Devices and system design
- Technoeconomical analysis of solar powered energy storage devices
Dr. Teresa Andreu is lecturer professor at the University of Barcelona since 2020. She received the degree in Chemistry (1999) and PhD in Materials Science (2004) from the University of Barcelona. After a period in industry and academia, she joined IREC in 2009 as senior researcher and the Institute of Nanoscience and Nanotechnology at UB in 2020. Her research is focused on the development of materials and reactors for emerging technologies for hydrogen generation and carbon dioxide conversion (photoelectrochemistry, heterogeneous catalysis and plasma-catalysis). She is the author of more than 130 scientific publications and 4 patents.
Dowon Bae received his BSc and MSc (Honors) from the Russian State Technological University named after K.E. Tsiolkovsky (current - Moscow Aviation Institute). After research activities within solar cells at the LG Innotek (South Korea; 2008 – 2012), he joined the VILLUM Center for the Science of Sustainable Fuels and Chemicals at the Technical University of Denmark (DTU), where he conducted his PhD study and Postdoc under the supervision of Prof. Ib Chorkendorff. His research has focused on PEC (photoelectrochemical) device design for solar-fuel applications. From 2018 to 2020, he has worked as a Postdoc at the Delft University of Technology with LEaDing Fellowship (Marie-Curie COFUND) support. He has held academic appointment as an Assistant Professor at Heriot-Watt University from 2020. His research concerns PEC devices and rechargeable flow-battery systems.
Ravinder DahiyaCristina FloxProfessor Adélio Mendes (born 1964) received his PhD degree from the University of Porto in 1993.
Full Professor at the Department of Chemical Engineering of the Faculty of Engineering of the University of Porto. Coordinates a large research team with research interests mainly in dye sensitized solar cells and perovskite solar cells, photoelectrochemical cells including water splitting and solar redox flow batteries, photocatalysis, redox flow batteries, electrochemical membrane reactors (PEMFC, H-SOFC, chemical synthesis), methanol steam reforming, membrane and adsorbent-based gas separations and carbon molecular sieve membranes synthesis and characterization.
Professor Mendes authored or co-authored more than 300 articles in peer-review international journals, filled 23 families of patents and is the author of a textbook; received an Advanced Research Grant from the ERC on dye-sensitized solar cells for building integrated of ca. 2 MEuros and since 2013 he is partner in 4 more EU projects and leads one EU project. Presently he is the leader of a FET Open project, GOTSolar, on perovskite solar cells. He received the Air Products Faculty Excellence 2011 Award (USA) for developments in gas separation and Solvay & Hovione Innovation Challenge 2011 prize, the Prize of Coimbra University of 2016, and the prize of Technology Innovation - 2017 by the University of Porto. Presently, he is the Coordinator of CEner-FEUP, the Competence Center for Energy of the Faculty of Engineering at the University of Porto.