Two PNNL Staff Receive Clean Energy Education and Empowerment Awards
PNNL Chief Diversity Officer and Director for STEM Education and PNNL Battery Materials and System group leader will receive Clean Energy Education and Empowerment (C3E) awards at the 2023 C3E Women in Clean Energy Symposium.
SYSTEM AND PROCESS FOR CAPTURE OF ACID GASSES AT ELEVATED PRESSURE FROM GASEOUS PROCESS STREAMS
A system, method, and material that enables the pressure-activated reversible chemical capture of acid gasses such as CO2 from gas volumes such as streams, flows or any other volume. Once the acid gas is chemically captured, the resulting product typically a zwitterionic salt, can be subjected to a reduced pressure whereupon the resulting product will release the captures acid gas and the capture material will be regenerated. The invention includes this process as well as the materials and systems for carrying out and enabling this process.
Capture and Release of Mixed Acid Gasses with Binding Organic Liquids
“Switchable Solvents,” recently discovered by Philip Jessop (Queens University, Canada) and David Heldebrant (Nature, 2005, 436, 1102), show promise as attractive CO2 capture and transfer agents. The alcohol/amidine or guanidine liquid blend chemically binds CO2 at any CO2 pressure to form an ionic amidinium (R2 = C) or guanidinium (R2 = N) alkylcarbonate salt, which is liquid at room temperature (ionic liquid, Figure 1). Switchable Solvent systems are liquid, non-corrosive CO2 trapping agents, whether CO2 is bound or not. The homogeneous liquid phase without a precipitate offers tremendous engineering advantages compared to corrosive liquid, solid or multi-phase chemical trapping agents. Switchable Solvents can be regenerated with gentle heating (50 ˚C) under N2, releasing bound CO2. The release of CO2 is also attainable at room temperature by sparging the system with N2, however the rate of CO2 release is much slower. Switchable Solvents are highly tunable, reversible, and recyclable.
Capture and Release of Acid-Gasses with Acid-Gas Binding Organic Compounds
“Switchable Solvents,” recently discovered by Philip Jessop (Queens University, Canada) and David Heldebrant (Nature, 2005, 436, 1102), show promise as attractive CO2 capture and transfer agents. The alcohol/amidine or guanidine liquid blend chemically binds CO2 at any CO2 pressure to form an ionic amidinium (R2 = C) or guanidinium (R2 = N) alkylcarbonate salt, which is liquid at room temperature (ionic liquid, Figure 1). Switchable Solvent systems are liquid, non-corrosive CO2 trapping agents, whether CO2 is bound or not. The homogeneous liquid phase without a precipitate offers tremendous engineering advantages compared to corrosive liquid, solid or multi-phase chemical trapping agents. Switchable Solvents can be regenerated with gentle heating (50 ˚C) under N2, releasing bound CO2. The release of CO2 is also attainable at room temperature by sparging the system with N2, however the rate of CO2 release is much slower. Switchable Solvents are highly tunable, reversible, and recyclable.
Hybrid Anodes for Energy Storage Devices
This invention relates to a hybrid design of connected carbon-metal electrode for advanced Na and Li batteries. The invention covers the following: 1. A hybrid electrode made of connected carbon and metal electrode for Li and Na battery applications. The carbon can be intercalation carbon, high surface area carbon, or hard carbon. The carbon and the metal can be connected as speparate electrodes, or carbon coating on metal, or as mixed carbon-metal electrodes. 2. Li-S battery in which the anode is made of connected carbon-Li electrode. 3. Li-ion battery in which the anode is made of connected carbon-Li electrode. 4. Li-ion battery in which the anode is made of carbon-Si electrode. 5. Li-ion battery in which the anode is made of Carbon-metal electrode, and cathode is made of LiFePO4, LiMnPO4, mixed metal oxides, and mixed composites of the active materials, conductors and binders, or any combination of the cathdoe and anode materials. 6. Na-ion battery in which the anode is made of connected carbon-Na electrode. 7. Na-ion battery with carbon-Na anode, and any combination of the cathdoe and anode materials. 8. Li-air battery in which the anode is made of connected carbon-Li electrodes. 9. Other metal air battery in which the anode is made of connected carbon-metal electrodes. 10. Hybride capacitor-battery devices using connected active metal, active carbon as one of the electrode materials.
METHODS OF CHEMICAL SEPARATION USING SELECTIVE AND SEQUENTIAL PRECIPITATION IN REACTION-DIFFUSION GEL MEDIA (iEdison No. 0685901-23-0116)
We developed a strategy based on reaction-diffusion coupling to achieve selective precipitation from a multicomponent feedstock solution. As proof-of-concept, we demonstrated this approach for a solution of mixed metal salts, namely Mn-Co-Ni chlorides; an important problem in the context of critical materials recovery from recycled electrodes. The solution mixture is placed in a cylinder on top of an agarose hydrogel layer loaded with reacting counterions, in this case sodium hydroxide (Figure 1). As the metal ions diffuse into the gel, crystallization begins to take place in regions of high supersaturation, which locally depletes the ions, to be subsequently replenished by diffusive flux. This interplay of diffusion, nucleation, and growth kinetics results in a spatial unfolding of unique nonequilibrium conditions along the length of the reactor. We observe that the chemical composition of the precipitates showed a gradient along the length of the reactor, ultimately producing almost pure manganese (hydr)oxide beyond a sharp boundary of other mixed phases (Figure 3, unpublished). Note that this separation was accomplished without the use of complex membranes, binding agents, high temperature processing, or even electric fields. The metal ion mixture was simply placed on top of a hydrogel loaded with sodium hydroxide and allowed to 'develop" such that the various metal oxides were formed in order of their precipitation rates as they diffuse into the gel.
Hybrid Energy Storage Devices Having Sodium
The present invention discloses a novel ZEBRA-type sodium-sulfur (Na-S) battery. The cathode consists of active material of sulfur mixed with Ni current collector. NaAlCl4 is employed as the catholyte, which is similar to that in ZEBRA batteries. This new type of battery retains most of the advantages of the state-of-the-art Na-S and ZEBRA batteries while overcoming the related deficits. The most attractive features of this new battery are the lower operating temperature, higher energy density and better cycle life than both Na-S and ZEBRA batteries, which makes it suitable for renewable integration and grid applications, along with commercial or fleet transportation.
ZINC-IODINE SECONDARY ENERGY STORAGE METHODS, DEVICES, AND ELECTRLYTES
Disclosed are cathodes having electron-conductive high-surface-area materials, aqueous non-halide-containing electrolytes, secondary zinc-iodine energy storage devices using the same, and methods for assembling the same. The disclosed high-surface-area materials and the aqueous non-halide-containing electrolyte solutions can contribute together to the confinement of the active iodine species in the cathode and to the minimization of shuttle effects and self-discharging. The non-halide-containing electrolyte salts can facilitate preferential adsorption of the iodine species to the cathode material rather than dissolution in the aqueous electrolyte solution, thereby contributing to the confinement of the active iodine species.