STTR Phase II: Scalable Thermochemical Conversion of Carbon Dioxide to Commodity Chemical Intermediates

The broader impact/commercial potential of this Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) Phase II project is to advance dynamic chemical reactor systems that repurposes waste gases (primarily carbon dioxide (CO2)) for use as fuels and as chemicals. This effort can have substantial commercial and market impacts as its output is compatible with existing infrastructure.

This project leverages significant recent investments into carbon capture, renewable energy generation, and green hydrogen. A particularly interesting application of this technology is the production of chemical feedstocks that are used to make plastics and other commodity chemicals from living organisms. This is inherently a step towards carbon negative manufacturing.

The proposed project aims to re-purpose pollutants to a feedstock for fuels and chemicals. Although renewable energy sources are increasing and becoming cheaper, these technologies are not ready for heavy-duty transportation and chemical sectors. No commercial scale operation is in existence in which CO2 is captured from the air or flue gas and converted to value-added fuels despite much fundamental research effort.

The research objectives are to scale up the materials and system from the Phase I results and conduct a design and analysis of a full-scale system. The main advance is to achieve dynamic chemical reactor modules that achieve high reactant conversions. These results will permit analysis of a pilot-scale facility as well as translation of the benefits of this sustainable chemical reaction toward industrial scale production of clean and green hydrocarbon fuels and chemicals.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.