Energy-X: societal concerns in technology development for a circular and low-carbon economy

Running from 2019 to 2020.
Funded by EU Horizon 2020.

The EU-funded ENERGY-X project (Horizon 2020 Grant Agreement n°820444) aims at building a strategic roadmap towards a large-scale research initiative addressing the efficient conversion of solar and wind energy into chemical form. It includes 13 partners across Europe (Technical University of Denmark, Max Planck Society, Ghent University, Polish Academy of Sciences, CEA, Czech Academy of Sciences, Utrecht University, ERIC aisbl, ETH Zürich, RWI, Technical University of Valencia, DECHEMA, and EERA aisbl), and is supported by a large group of industrial companies.

ENERGY-X claims that it addresses the essential missing component (X) in the future European energy and chemical production landscape: technologies to replace fossil resources. Energy-X aims to develop disruptive technologies that can replace fossil fuels and raw materials use in the European energy system and in the chemical industry. Anticipated technological innovations are situated in the areas of carbon capture and use (CCU), the green production of hydrogen through electrolysis and their use in the production of synthetic fuels and ammonia. To enable efficient energy conversion the discovery of new catalysts is needed as well as novel integrated conversion approaches. The enabling science is molecular and interfacial catalysis.

However, technology development never happens in isolation from society and its concerns. In cooperation with prof Guy Marin (Laboratory of Chemical Technology, Ghent University), CDO researchers Frederik De Roeck and Erik Paredis are responsible for a Work Package within Energy-X that analyses the socio-technical cross-cutting issues of its technology development, and for the development of a strategy to incorporate societal concerns in the Energy-X project.

The politics of the circular economy, Transitions and Future Studies, Science and Technology Studies and Politics