Decade

Distributed chemicals and fuels production from CO₂ in photoelectrocatalytic devices

DECADE is an EU Project from Horizon 2020 under Grant agreement no: 862030.The aim is to develop a novel PEC device engineered to use waste CO₂ and bio-alcohols as feeding inputs to synthetize value-added products. The key novel element is the enhanced energy efficiency realized through the design of a PEC device which exploits both sides of the electro-catalytic cells to produce the same chemicals and integrates a PV cell to drive the reaction by sunlight. In the main investigated case of the use of ethanol as bioalcohol, ethyl acetate (EA) and ethyl formate (EF) will be produced for use as green solvents/chemicals or fuel additives (octane booster). Companies to exploit both aspects are participating to the project. As alternative to ethanol, the use of methanol will allow to produce methyl formate (MF) to lower the carbon footprint in methanol plants producing added-value chemicals. A main methanol plant manufacturing company participates to the project. The ambition of DECADE is to develop and engineer a conceptually novel PEC device AND to explore its potential use as a multi-purpose solution to improve circular economy and lower carbon footprint in chemical & energy processes.

Figure 1: DECADE project concept

Project partners:

ERIC, Belgium;
INSTM, Italy;
ICIQ, Spain;
MPI Coll, Germany;
CIC Biomag, Spain;
Forschungszentrum Jülich GmbH, IEK-5 Photovoltaics;
NEXTCHEM, Italy;
HYS, Italy;
EKODENGE, Turkey;
UNISMART, Italy;
MOTOROIL, Greece;
MERITCONS., Belgium;
TOKYO UNIV, Japan;
FILA, Italy;
CASALE, Switzerland;
MERIT GR, Greece

Website

https://www.decadeproject.eu/