In Situ Transmission Electron Microscopy and Soft X-Ray Spectro-Microscopy to Understand Electrochemical Processes

Electrochemical CO2 conversion offers a route to use renewable sources of electricity to convert CO2 into valuable carbon-based fuels and chemicals, including carbon monoxide, ethanol and ethylene. For electrochemical CO2 conversion technologies to become a viable component of future sustainable energy infrastructures, improved performance materials (catalysts, electrodes, membrane electrode assemblies) are needed to achieve high conversion rates, selectivity and single-pass utilization of CO2. This talk will focus on the development of techniques to characterize the properties of electrochemical CO2 conversion materials under reaction conditions. These in-situ methods are producing results which will guide the design of next generation materials and reactors. The talk will focus primarily on in situ transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and related spectroscopic techniques (energy dispersive X-ray analysis and selected area electron diffraction), along with synchrotron-based methods including in-situ soft X-ray scanning transmission X-ray microscopy (STXM).