Browsing by Author "Crandall, Bradie S."
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Item Techno-Economic Assessment of Green H2 Carrier Supply Chains(Energy Fuels, 2023-01-19) Crandall, Bradie S.; Brix, Todd; Weber, Robert S.; Jiao, FengGreen hydrogen can play a key role in affordably decarbonizing society. However, storage and transmission costs pose significant barriers to green hydrogen distribution. These limitations may be overcome with liquid green hydrogen carriers like ammonia, methanol, and toluene/methylcyclohexane, as well as formic acid, which has only recently received limited attention. A techno-economic assessment of these hydrogen carriers is presented across a wide range of scales. Green formic acid is identified to be the most cost-effective carrier when the entire supply-chain cost is considered. Additional analysis shows that formic acid is the only green carrier that is more affordable to produce than its fossil-based counterpart and is the safest of the studied carriers. Finally, research and policy outlooks are provided to guide efforts toward the realization of a green hydrogen economy. This work provides information on the selection of a suitable green hydrogen carrier, which is essential to decarbonize at the rate needed to avoid climate catastrophe.Item Turning Carbon Dioxide into Sustainable Food and Chemicals: How Electrosynthesized Acetate Is Paving the Way for Fermentation Innovation(Accounts of Chemical Research, 2023-06-20) Crandall, Bradie S.; Overa, Sean; Shin, Haeun; Jiao, FengConspectus The agricultural and chemical industries are major contributors to climate change. To address this issue, hybrid electrocatalytic–biocatalytic systems have emerged as a promising solution for reducing the environmental impact of these key sectors while providing economic onboarding for carbon capture technology. Recent advancements in the production of acetate via CO2/CO electrolysis as well as advances in precision fermentation technology have prompted electrochemical acetate to be explored as an alternative carbon source for synthetic biology. Tandem CO2 electrolysis coupled with improved reactor design has accelerated the commercial viability of electrosynthesized acetate in recent years. Simultaneously, innovations in metabolic engineering have helped leverage pathways that facilitate acetate upgrading to higher carbons for sustainable food and chemical production via precision fermentation. Current precision fermentation technology has received much criticism for reliance upon food crop-derived sugars and starches as feedstock which compete with the human food chain. A shift toward electrosynthesized acetate feedstocks could help preserve arable land for a rapidly growing population. Technoeconomic analysis shows that using electrochemical acetate instead of glucose as a fermentation feedstock reduces the production costs of food and chemicals by 16% and offers improved market price stability. Moreover, given the rapid decline in utility-scale renewable electricity prices, electro-synthesized acetate may become more affordable than conventional production methods at scale. This work provides an outlook on strategies to further advance and scale-up electrochemical acetate production. Additional perspective is offered to help ensure the successful integration of electrosynthesized acetate and precision fermentation technologies. In the electrocatalytic step, it is critical that relatively high purity acetate can be produced in low-concentration electrolyte to help ensure that minimal treatment of the electrosynthesized acetate stream is needed prior to fermentation. In the biocatalytic step, it is critical that microbes with increased tolerances to elevated acetate concentrations are engineered to help promote acetate uptake and accelerate product formation. Additionally, tighter regulation of acetate metabolism via strain engineering is essential to improving cellular efficiency. The implementation of these strategies would allow the coupling of electrosynthesized acetate with precision fermentation to offer a promising approach to sustainably produce chemicals and food. Reducing the environmental impact of the chemical and agricultural sectors is necessary to avoid climate catastrophe and preserve the habitability of the planet for future generations.