Nature EnergyPub Date : 2024-08-21DOI: 10.1038/s41560-024-01612-9
Giulia Tregnago
{"title":"Increasing women’s representation in the energy sector","authors":"Giulia Tregnago","doi":"10.1038/s41560-024-01612-9","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s41560-024-01612-9","url":null,"abstract":"POWERful Women is a professional initiative established in 2014 targeting a gender-balanced, diverse and inclusive energy sector in the UK. To mark the tenth anniversary, Katie Jackson — Chair of POWERful Women — talks to Nature Energy about progress so far and the challenges ahead.","PeriodicalId":19073,"journal":{"name":"Nature Energy","volume":"9 10","pages":"1177-1178"},"PeriodicalIF":49.7,"publicationDate":"2024-08-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142013828","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"材料科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Nature EnergyPub Date : 2024-08-21DOI: 10.1038/s41560-024-01585-9
Holly Caggiano, Sara M. Constantino, Chris Greig, Elke U. Weber
{"title":"Community benefits can build bipartisan support for large-scale energy infrastructure","authors":"Holly Caggiano, Sara M. Constantino, Chris Greig, Elke U. Weber","doi":"10.1038/s41560-024-01585-9","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s41560-024-01585-9","url":null,"abstract":"In the United States, Democrats and Republicans are more likely to support energy projects that are community-owned, create jobs, and generate solar energy, but local elected officials underestimate their constituents’ support for projects with these characteristics. Since these officials play a key role in approving new energy projects and negotiating the benefits they bring to communities, aligning local elected officials’ perceptions with the public’s could improve progress toward just energy transitions.","PeriodicalId":19073,"journal":{"name":"Nature Energy","volume":"9 10","pages":"1187-1188"},"PeriodicalIF":49.7,"publicationDate":"2024-08-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.nature.com/articles/s41560-024-01585-9.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142013827","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"材料科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Nature EnergyPub Date : 2024-08-20DOI: 10.1038/s41560-024-01619-2
Ai-Min Li, Zeyi Wang, Taeyong Lee, Nan Zhang, Tianyu Li, Weiran Zhang, Chamithri Jayawardana, Munaiah Yeddala, Brett L. Lucht, Chunsheng Wang
{"title":"Asymmetric electrolyte design for high-energy lithium-ion batteries with micro-sized alloying anodes","authors":"Ai-Min Li, Zeyi Wang, Taeyong Lee, Nan Zhang, Tianyu Li, Weiran Zhang, Chamithri Jayawardana, Munaiah Yeddala, Brett L. Lucht, Chunsheng Wang","doi":"10.1038/s41560-024-01619-2","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s41560-024-01619-2","url":null,"abstract":"Micro-sized alloying anodes offer lower cost and higher capacity than graphite in Li-ion batteries. However, they suffer from fast capacity decay and low Coulombic efficiency in carbonate electrolytes because the organic solid electrolyte interphase (SEI) strongly bonds to the alloys, leading to cracks of both SEI and alloying particles, which allows electrolyte penetration and forms new SEI during lithiation–delithiation cycles. Using nano-sized alloying anodes can enhance the cell cycle life but also reduces the battery calendar life and increases the manufacturing costs. Here we significantly improved the cycle performance of micro-sized Si, Al, Sn and Bi anodes by developing asymmetric electrolytes (solvent-free ionic liquids and molecular solvent) to form LiF-rich inorganic SEI, enabling 90 mAh μSi||LiNi0.8Mn0.1Co0.1O2 and 70 mAh Li3.75Si||SPAN pouch cells (areal capacity of 4.5 mAh cm−2; N/P of 1.4) to achieve >400 cycles with a high capacity retention of >85%. The asymmetric electrolyte design forms LiF-rich interphases that enable high-capacity anodes and high-energy cathodes to achieve a long cycle life and provide a general solution for high-energy Li-ion batteries. Micro-sized alloying anodes in Li-ion batteries cost less and offer higher capacity than graphite but suffer from cyclability issues. Chunsheng Wang and colleagues develop asymmetric electrolytes for micro-sized Si, Al, Sn and Bi anodes using solvent-free ionic liquids and molecular solvents to tackle the issue.","PeriodicalId":19073,"journal":{"name":"Nature Energy","volume":"9 12","pages":"1551-1560"},"PeriodicalIF":49.7,"publicationDate":"2024-08-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142007635","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"材料科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Nature EnergyPub Date : 2024-08-19DOI: 10.1038/s41560-024-01601-y
Ben Farrer, Robert Holahan, Kellyanne Allen, Lydia Allen, Jonathan E. Doriscar, Victoria Johnson, Tara Riggs, Soleil Smith
{"title":"Assessing how energy companies negotiate with landowners when obtaining land for hydraulic fracturing","authors":"Ben Farrer, Robert Holahan, Kellyanne Allen, Lydia Allen, Jonathan E. Doriscar, Victoria Johnson, Tara Riggs, Soleil Smith","doi":"10.1038/s41560-024-01601-y","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s41560-024-01601-y","url":null,"abstract":"To extract natural gas through hydraulic fracturing, energy companies often need to obtain consent from many different private landowners, whose properties lie atop the gas reservoir. Negotiations with these landowners have important economic, environmental and social implications. In this paper we present a dataset on negotiations in Ohio and use these data to investigate how landowners may be advantaged or disadvantaged in these lease negotiations. We find that they are disadvantaged in two ways. First, because energy companies can use persistent and personal strategies to overcome landowner reluctance. Second, because of the institutional context: specifically the widespread use of compulsory unitization. We conclude by discussing the implications of these findings for equity in energy policy and by drawing out the other potential uses of these data. Energy companies must often obtain consent from private landowners for natural gas extraction. This study analyses lease negotiations between these two parties in Ohio, noting disadvantages on the side of the landowner in the process.","PeriodicalId":19073,"journal":{"name":"Nature Energy","volume":"9 11","pages":"1369-1377"},"PeriodicalIF":49.7,"publicationDate":"2024-08-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142002805","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"材料科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Nature EnergyPub Date : 2024-08-16DOI: 10.1038/s41560-024-01614-7
Andong Liu, Charles B. Musgrave III, Xing Li, William A. Goddard III, Yayuan Liu
{"title":"Non-aqueous alkoxide-mediated electrochemical carbon capture","authors":"Andong Liu, Charles B. Musgrave III, Xing Li, William A. Goddard III, Yayuan Liu","doi":"10.1038/s41560-024-01614-7","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s41560-024-01614-7","url":null,"abstract":"Electrochemically mediated carbon capture utilizing redox-tunable organic sorbents has emerged as a promising strategy to mitigate anthropogenic carbon dioxide emissions. However, most reported systems are sensitive to molecular oxygen, severely limiting their application under ambient air conditions. Here we demonstrate an electrochemical carbon capture concept via non-aqueous proton-coupled electron transfer, where alkoxides are employed as the active sorbent while carbon dioxide absorption and desorption are modulated reversibly by the redox-tunable Brønsted basicity of certain organic molecules. Since all species involved in the process have outstanding oxygen stability and relatively low vapour pressure, our electrochemically mediated carbon capture mechanism intrinsically minimizes parasitic reactions and evaporative losses under aerobic conditions. Flow-based prototypes are demonstrated to operate efficiently in the presence of 20% oxygen under various practically relevant carbon dioxide feed concentrations, paving a way towards effective carbon capture driven by electrochemical stimuli. Sensitivity to O2 hinders the application of some electrochemically mediated carbon capture technologies under ambient air conditions. Here the authors report electrochemical CO2 capture via non-aqueous proton-coupled electron transfer, employing alkoxides as active sorbents, in which all species involved are highly air stable.","PeriodicalId":19073,"journal":{"name":"Nature Energy","volume":"9 11","pages":"1415-1426"},"PeriodicalIF":49.7,"publicationDate":"2024-08-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141991812","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"材料科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Nature EnergyPub Date : 2024-08-15DOI: 10.1038/s41560-024-01613-8
Chongwen Li, Lei Chen, Fangyuan Jiang, Zhaoning Song, Xiaoming Wang, Adam Balvanz, Esma Ugur, Yuan Liu, Cheng Liu, Aidan Maxwell, Hao Chen, Yanjiang Liu, Zaiwei Wang, Pan Xia, You Li, Sheng Fu, Nannan Sun, Corey R. Grice, Xuefei Wu, Zachary Fink, Qin Hu, Lewei Zeng, Euidae Jung, Junke Wang, So Min Park, Deying Luo, Cailing Chen, Jie Shen, Yu Han, Carlo Andrea Riccardo Perini, Juan-Pablo Correa-Baena, Zheng-Hong Lu, Thomas P. Russell, Stefaan De Wolf, Mercouri G. Kanatzidis, David S. Ginger, Bin Chen, Yanfa Yan, Edward H. Sargent
{"title":"Diamine chelates for increased stability in mixed Sn–Pb and all-perovskite tandem solar cells","authors":"Chongwen Li, Lei Chen, Fangyuan Jiang, Zhaoning Song, Xiaoming Wang, Adam Balvanz, Esma Ugur, Yuan Liu, Cheng Liu, Aidan Maxwell, Hao Chen, Yanjiang Liu, Zaiwei Wang, Pan Xia, You Li, Sheng Fu, Nannan Sun, Corey R. Grice, Xuefei Wu, Zachary Fink, Qin Hu, Lewei Zeng, Euidae Jung, Junke Wang, So Min Park, Deying Luo, Cailing Chen, Jie Shen, Yu Han, Carlo Andrea Riccardo Perini, Juan-Pablo Correa-Baena, Zheng-Hong Lu, Thomas P. Russell, Stefaan De Wolf, Mercouri G. Kanatzidis, David S. Ginger, Bin Chen, Yanfa Yan, Edward H. Sargent","doi":"10.1038/s41560-024-01613-8","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s41560-024-01613-8","url":null,"abstract":"Perovskite tandem solar cells show promising performance, but non-radiative recombination and its progressive worsening with time, especially in the mixed Sn–Pb low-bandgap layer, limit performance and stability. Here we find that mixed Sn–Pb perovskite thin films exhibit a compositional gradient, with an excess of Sn on the surface—and we show this gradient exacerbates oxidation and increases the recombination rate. We find that diamines preferentially chelate Sn atoms, removing them from the film surface and achieving a more balanced Sn:Pb stoichiometry, making the surface of the film resistive to the oxidation of Sn. The process forms an electrically resistive low-dimensional barrier layer, passivating defects and reducing interface recombination. Further improving the homogeneity of the barrier layer using 1,2-diaminopropane results in more uniform distribution and passivation. Tandems achieve a power conversion efficiency of 28.8%. Encapsulated tandems retain 90% of initial efficiency following 1,000 h of operating at the maximum power point under simulated one-sun illumination in air without cooling. The stability of perovskite tandem solar cells is an issue. Li et al. show that diamines improve the compositional homogeneity of a low-bandgap perovskite surface and form a low-dimensional barrier that passivates defects, leading to an operational stability of over 1,000 h.","PeriodicalId":19073,"journal":{"name":"Nature Energy","volume":"9 11","pages":"1388-1396"},"PeriodicalIF":49.7,"publicationDate":"2024-08-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141986477","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"材料科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Conductive colloidal perovskite quantum dot inks towards fast printing of solar cells","authors":"Xuliang Zhang, Hehe Huang, Chenyu Zhao, Lujie Jin, Chihyung Lee, Youyong Li, Doo-Hyun Ko, Wanli Ma, Tom Wu, Jianyu Yuan","doi":"10.1038/s41560-024-01608-5","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s41560-024-01608-5","url":null,"abstract":"Quantum dot (QD) provides a versatile platform for high-throughput processing of semiconductors for large-area optoelectronic applications. Unfortunately, the QD solar cell is hampered by the time-consuming layer-by-layer process, a major challenge in manufacturing printable devices. Here we demonstrate a sequential acylation-coordination protocol including amine-assisted ligand removal and Lewis base-coordinated surface restoration to synthesize conductive APbI3 (A = formamidinium (FA), Cs or methylammonium) colloidal perovskite QD (PeQD) inks that enable one-step PeQD film deposition without additional solid-state ligand exchange. The resultant PeQD film displays uniform morphology with elevated electronic coupling, more ordered structure and homogeneous energy landscape. Narrow-bandgap FAPbI3 PeQD-based solar cells achieve a champion efficiency of 16.61% (certified 16.20%), exceeding the values obtained with other QD inks and layer-by-layer processes. The conductive PeQD inks are compatible with large-area device (9 × 9 cm2) fabrication using the blade-coating technique with a speed up to 50 mm s−1. The manufacturing of perovskite quantum dot solar cells is hampered by time-consuming layer-by-layer processes. Zhang et al. demonstrate a method for preparing conductive quantum dot inks compatible with fast film printing.","PeriodicalId":19073,"journal":{"name":"Nature Energy","volume":"9 11","pages":"1378-1387"},"PeriodicalIF":49.7,"publicationDate":"2024-08-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141974115","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"材料科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Nature EnergyPub Date : 2024-08-12DOI: 10.1038/s41560-024-01602-x
Pei Zhao, Shaojun Zhang, Paolo Santi, Dingsong Cui, Fang Wang, Peng Liu, Zhaosheng Zhang, Jin Liu, Zhenpo Wang, Carlo Ratti, Ye Wu
{"title":"Challenges and opportunities in truck electrification revealed by big operational data","authors":"Pei Zhao, Shaojun Zhang, Paolo Santi, Dingsong Cui, Fang Wang, Peng Liu, Zhaosheng Zhang, Jin Liu, Zhenpo Wang, Carlo Ratti, Ye Wu","doi":"10.1038/s41560-024-01602-x","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s41560-024-01602-x","url":null,"abstract":"The electrification of trucks is a major challenge in achieving zero-emission transportation. Here we gathered year-long records from 61,598 electric trucks in China. Current electric trucks were found to be significantly underutilized compared with their diesel counterparts. Twenty-three per cent of electric delivery trucks and 30% of semi-trailers could achieve one-on-one replacement with diesel counterparts, while on average 3.8 electric delivery trucks and 3.6 electric semi-trailers are required to match the transportation demand that is served by one diesel truck separately. For diesel trucks that are capable of one-on-one replacement, electric trucks have 15–54% and 1–49% reductions in cost and life-cycle CO2 emissions, respectively. Enhancements in usage patterns, vehicle technologies and charging infrastructure can improve electrification feasibility, yielding cost and decarbonization benefits. Increased battery energy densities with optimized usage can make one-on-one electrification feasible for more than 85% of diesel semi-trailers. In addition, with cleaner electricity, most Chinese electric trucks in 2030 will have lower expected life-cycle CO2 emissions than diesel trucks. Truck electrification is an important but challenging task for decarbonization. Here the authors investigate usage data from >60,000 electric trucks to pose category-tailored strategies for overcoming the hurdles of feasibility, cost and decarbonization in this sector.","PeriodicalId":19073,"journal":{"name":"Nature Energy","volume":"9 11","pages":"1427-1437"},"PeriodicalIF":49.7,"publicationDate":"2024-08-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141918866","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"材料科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Nature EnergyPub Date : 2024-08-08DOI: 10.1038/s41560-024-01595-7
Eric McCalla
{"title":"Electrodes with 100% active materials","authors":"Eric McCalla","doi":"10.1038/s41560-024-01595-7","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s41560-024-01595-7","url":null,"abstract":"Battery researchers are struggling to design viable all-solid batteries, which promise enhanced safety but are currently achievable only at a high cost and with complex cell designs. Now a study on a sulfide-based cathode material demonstrates that a radical redesign of the electrode using 100% active material may help address the issue.","PeriodicalId":19073,"journal":{"name":"Nature Energy","volume":"9 9","pages":"1056-1057"},"PeriodicalIF":49.7,"publicationDate":"2024-08-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141904258","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"材料科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}