The chemical industries that produce the world’s fuels, fertilisers, plastics and pharmaceuticals are among the largest energy users on the planet. Integrating renewable energy into these processes is one of the central engineering challenges of the energy transition. The Chair in Reaction Engineering is dedicated to developing the fundamental knowledge needed to make this possible, focusing on understanding catalysts in sufficient depth that novel ones can be designed for new operating conditions, including the variability that comes with renewable energy inputs. Based within the Catalysis Institute in the Department of Chemical Engineering, the Chair’s work spans CO2 hydrogenation, selective oxidation of methane and photo-catalytic generation of hydrogen.

A key contribution of the Chair has been the development of a simplified model to differentiate between two competing pathways in CO2 hydrogenation, a fundamental question that shapes the design of better catalysts for converting renewable hydrogen into liquid fuels. Work on selective methane oxidation has led to a patent for a novel process that converts methane to formaldehyde at moderate temperatures, with selectivity above 70% and high productivity. The Chair has also commissioned a novel multi-tube fixed bed reactor for rapid catalyst testing and pioneered new isothermal and high-pressure flow reactors for photo-catalytic studies that allow precise control over light wavelength and intensity.