Smart manufacturing inspired approach to research, development, and scale-up of electrified chemical manufacturing systems

Derek Richard; Joonbaek Jang; Berkay Çıtmacı; Junwei Luo; Vito Canuso; Prakashan Korambath; Olivia Morales-Leslie; James F Davis; Haresh Malkani; Panagiotis D Christofides; Carlos G Morales-Guio

doi:10.1016/j.isci.2023.106966

Smart manufacturing inspired approach to research, development, and scale-up of electrified chemical manufacturing systems

iScience. 2023 May 29;26(6):106966. doi: 10.1016/j.isci.2023.106966. eCollection 2023 Jun 16.

Authors

Affiliations

¹ Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA.
² Office of Advanced Research Computing, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA.
³ CESMII, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA.
⁴ Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA.

Abstract

As renewable electricity becomes cost competitive with fossil fuel energy sources and environmental concerns increase, the transition to electrified chemical and fuel synthesis pathways becomes increasingly desirable. However, electrochemical systems have traditionally taken many decades to reach commercial scales. Difficulty in scaling up electrochemical synthesis processes comes primarily from difficulty in decoupling and controlling simultaneously the effects of intrinsic kinetics and charge, heat, and mass transport within electrochemical reactors. Tackling this issue efficiently requires a shift in research from an approach based on small datasets, to one where digitalization enables rapid collection and interpretation of large, well-parameterized datasets, using artificial intelligence (AI) and multi-scale modeling. In this perspective, we present an emerging research approach that is inspired by smart manufacturing (SM), to accelerate research, development, and scale-up of electrified chemical manufacturing processes. The value of this approach is demonstrated by its application toward the development of CO₂ electrolyzers.

Keywords: Catalysis; Chemical engineering; Chemistry; Electrical engineering; Engineering.

Publication types

Review