The increasing energy demand and the depletion of fossil-fuel reserves, threatening our energy security and the environment, have aroused intense global concern. To mitigate this, the EU aims to become climate-neutral by 2050, by targeting at the next-generation of biofuels from non-land and non-food competing bio-wastes. Butanol (BuOH), heavier alcohols and hydrogen (H2), if produced from bio-ethanol, are promising advanced biofuels due to their high energy content, long shelf-life and, in case of BuOH, compatibility with the current engines and fuel distribution infrastructure. However, their production faces challenges due to the low yields and selectivities during ethanol reforming. GlaS-A-Fuels envisions a holistic approach to transform bio-ethanol to advanced biofuels employing recyclable and cooperative catalysts from earth-abundant elements. The concept is based on the engineering of a light-trapping and light-tuning photonic glass reactor, self-powered by a thermoelectric module, and tailored to amplify the effectiveness of photoamplified single-atom catalysts. GlaS-A-Fuels aims to harness the full power of the light-activated carriers of photoactive supports by channeling this energy to the surface-exposed transition metal-cation single atom sites. Metal-metal and metal-support cooperativity, charge transfer phenomena and strongly polarized oxidations states can further contribute to the required enhanced catalytic performances and difficult-to-achieve key reaction intermediates. To develop efficient processes for the production of advanced biofuels, GlaS-A-Fuels will leverage in a concerted way the key expertise of five partners in materials science for solar and thermal energy harvesting, catalysis, laser technologies for tuning light-matter interactions, intelligent process-control systems.
The main objectives of the work carried out within M1-M12 are summarized as follows:
• Development of highly efficient and stable thermoelectric (TE) composites for encapsulation in inorganic oxide glasses.
• Encapsulation of luminescent materials and TE composites inside inorganic oxide glasses, along with laser processing of composite glasses, towards the development of the required glass photonic-reactor components.
• Theoretical calculation of the catalysis reaction mechanisms and the interaction of the reactants with the catalysts.
• Development and optimization of effective, cooperative, solar light amplified photocatalytic nanoplatforms.
• Experimental validation of the catalysis mechanisms upon using advanced characterization techniques.
• IP management of novel scientific knowledge, development of dissemination assets, explore innovation potential and identify potential markets for each innovation.
