Hydrogen and Electrochemical Research for Decarbonization (HERD) Lab
Principal Investigator: Dr. Luca Mastropasqua
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Electrochemical production of renewable energy vectors

Hydrogen and e-fuels

The production of sustainable electrochemical energy vectors is one of the main focus areas of our group. We work to design, optimize, and integrate novel electrolysis devices to produce sustainable energy vectors (e.g., hydrogen, synthetic methane, ammonia, and others) to be used as fuels, energy storage, or as sustainable feedstock to the chemical industry.

Electrolysis systems convert electricity and low-value or waste molecules (e.g., water, CO2, nitrogen) into valuable products via a non-spontaneous electrochemical process. High temperature electrolysis (400-800°C) cells and stacks, based on either solid oxides or molten salt electrolytes, as well as polymer electrolyte membrane systems (90-120°C) are poised to be some of the predominant technologies for hydrogen and renewable fuels production via renewable pathways.XRF_Health_monitoring_SOFC_HERD_Mastropasqua

We specifically manufacture high temperature solid oxide cells for steam and carbon dioxide reduction, we characterize their electrochemical performance, and evaluate their degradation. We focus on sub-component level design (e.g., electrodes, seals, current collectors) and optimize their integration into a new device of improved performance, demonstrated at lab scale.

Electrolysis technology must reach widespread commercialization and plummet in cost to have a meaningful impact in our race against climate change, other than on reaching our national sustainability targets for H2 production at $1/kg. Therefore, we are focused in providing engineering solutions to scale-up and test electrolysis technologies at the stack and system level.

We investigate solid oxide electrochemical membranes (proton conductors, or oxygen-ion conductors), molten oxide membranes (carbonate-ion conductors, and others), and their composites for gas separation and recovery applications.

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In the framework of power-to-gas applications, and blending of hydrogen into the gas grid, we investigate hydrogen electrochemical separation from reducing gases (e.g., natural gas) and compression to pressures relevant to industrial applications (i.e., 10-30 bar) with solid oxide membranes.

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