Using a materials chemistry lens, Geoffrey Ozin’s new textbook explores the myriad of materials that make renewable energy technologies work.

Co-authored by Joel Loh, Energy Materials Discovery: Enabling a Sustainable Future is now available to pre-order for June 2022. Ozin is currently a three-term Tier 1 Canada Research Chair in Materials Chemistry, a distinguished university professor at the University of Toronto, and an executive member of the Acceleration Consortium (AC) team.

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About the book

The book explores the transition of non-renewable and unsustainable energy systems of the past into renewable and sustainable energy systems of the future. It is a story that often begins in chemistry laboratories with the discovery of new energy materials. Yet, to displace materials in existing energy technologies with new ones, depends not only on the ability to design and engineer a superior set of performance metrics for the material and the technology but also the requirement to meet a demanding collection of economic, regulatory, social, policy, environmental and sustainability criteria.

The book includes a foreword by AC director Alán Aspuru-Guzik and a focus on a topic of great importance to the AC: The current disruption to the field with the emergence of artificial intelligence, machine learning and robotic automation that is accelerating the well-established discovery process, allowing massive libraries of materials to be evaluated. The possibilities are endless!

Who should read it?

This book provides a perspective on the application of new technologies as well as an overview of energy materials discovery in the broader techno-economic and social context. Any budding researcher or more experienced materials scientist will find a guide to a fascinating story of discovery and a vision for what is next.

About Geoffrey Ozin

Professor Geoffrey Ozin’s pioneering nanochemistry research has paved the way for the development of renewable-energy technologies to synthesize innovative chemicals, polymers, medicines, and fuels. His work is enabling the advancement of lithium-ion batteries, supercapacitors, fuel cells, photovoltaics, and photocatalysts – all of which are critical for the transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources.

His current research focus is driven by the climate crisis and is aimed at the discovery of materials capable of transforming water and carbon dioxide into sustainable chemicals and fuels using sunlight. Ozin is also a recent recipient of the prestigious Killam Prize in Natural Sciences for his work in nanochemistry, a prize awarded annually by the Canada Council for the Arts in recognition of researchers who have achieved scholarly eminence in their fields.

Ozin is also an editor for Advanced Science News, where he writes regularly on hot button topics across the materials chemistry, science, engineering disciplines.