Event Details

Join Professor Laurence Hardwick, Professor of Electrochemistry at the University of Liverpool, for a lecture on electrochemical energy storage.

Abstract

Electrochemical energy storage is one of the key technologies to enable the green energy transition. Progress in the optimisation of electrochemical energy storage technologies is hampered by an absence of fundamental understanding of the reaction mechanisms involved in both storage and side reactions within devices. Research within our group focuses on the understanding and control of electrode interfaces via utilisation of in situ (or operando) spectroscopies coupled with battery electrochemistry. For example, side reactions and passivation layers at the electrode/electrolyte interface affect the performance and safety of batteries. In this presentation I will highlight how surface enhanced Raman techniques (such as Shell-isolated Nanoparticles for Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy or SHINERS for short) can be used to investigate the dynamic chemical environment at the electrode/electrolyte interface and subsequently linked to actual practical full-cell performance.

Biography

Laurence Hardwick is Professor of Electrochemistry and Director of the Stephenson Institute of Renewable Energy within the Department of Chemistry in the University of Liverpool (UoL), UK. Since 2011 he has led a group of 12-15 researchers that have focused on understanding real-time interface processes in batteries and electrochemical capacitors, a crucial step in improving energy storage solutions to meet net zero targets. The work has focused on developing cutting-edge technologies such as advanced in situ Raman and infrared spectroscopic techniques that can probe the functionality of electrode interfaces at the nanoscale. Overall, the work has led to >100 publications. He has supervised >20 PhD students and has been intensely involved in international training networks through dual PhD partnership scheme between UoL and NTHU (Taiwan). He is an editor of the International Society of Electrochemistry Journal Electrochimica Acta (Elsevier) and was the Conference Chair of the 2023 Royal Society of Chemistry Faraday Discussion conference on Metal-air Batteries.