As you are aware, electrocatalysis has a great potential for efficient storage of renewable electricity in fuels and chemical mitigating thus the looming climate change. In fact, large-scale implementation of associated catalytic technologies represents one of the biggest challenges chemistry faces in the 21st century.
The potential of catalysis to de-fossilize industry and the transportation sectors requires an interdisciplinary approach. However, concepts so far took course separately in apparently diverse fields of chemistry, like e.g. material chemistry, electrochemistry, and theoretical chemistry. Rationally and synergistically applied catalysis enables the awaited impact to kick-off large-scale implementation of hydrogen production, carbon dioxide valuation and renewables-powered ammonia production. There is still an apparent lack of cross-sectoral discussion between experts in adjacent fields and industry. We would like to offer a platform bridging this gap by organizing the »Challenges on the Renewable Energy« – a focused meeting of science and technology oriented community with interest in electrocatalysis, catalysis and theoretical chemistry. The science community is obligated to identify the most urgent research issues that have to be addressed in the near future.
The meeting should not only outline the current state of the art but also facilitate the discussion of the role science and technology in tackling this societal challenge. Based on the Energy-X project the technical program of the »Challenges on the Renewable Energy« will be centered around three pivotal catalytic processes – hydrogen evolution, CO2 valuation and ammonia synthesis. Each topic will be introduced by a featured talk followed up by discussion panels of a few topics selected by the speaker and finalized by a short report. A poster session is also planned with each poster being presented by an author for a few minutes using one transparency.