Addressing Grand Energy Challenges through Advanced Materials
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Addressing Grand
Energy Challenges through Advanced Materials M.S. Dresselhaus, G.W. Crabtree, and M.V. Buchanan
Abstract The following article is based on the plenary presentation given by Mildred S. Dresselhaus of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology on November 29, 2004, at the Materials Research Society Fall Meeting in Boston. Advanced materials offer new promise for addressing some of the grand societal challenges of our future, including that of global energy. This article will review opportunities that have opened up at the nanoscale, with materials of reduced dimensionality and enhanced surface-to-volume ratio. Some examples of research accomplishments and opportunities at the nanoscale will be described, with special attention given to the potential for advanced materials and nanoscience to have an impact on the grand challenges related to a sustainable energy supply for the 21st century and beyond. Keywords: advanced materials, catalysis, energy, fuel cells, hydrogen, nanoscience.
Introduction In the present century, we can expect major changes to occur in energy demand and in the form in which energy is supplied and utilized worldwide. The increasing demand and the concomitant diminishing availability of fossil fuel resources expected for the rest of the 21st century will create both a great societal problem on an international level and a challenge to the science community to find solutions that are technically viable and economically affordable. This article summarizes a plenary talk presented on November 29, 2004, at the Materials Research Society Fall Meeting in Boston that reviewed the grand energy challenges now facing society and discussed the role that advanced materials, nanoscience, and nanotechnology may play in addressing these challenges. The major conclusions of this article are that the grand energy challenges must be considered on a 50- to 100-year time frame, requiring major advances in both basic and applied materials research working hand-in-hand, blending
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physics, chemistry, materials science, and biology into an interdisciplinary experimental and theoretical goal-oriented mix. While the scientific and technological challenges are admittedly very great, strong societal demands and the motivation to maintain a desired quality of life will drive the search for societally acceptable, technically viable, and cost-effective solutions to be found within the critical time frame.1–3
The Grand Energy Challenges Let us first delineate some of the grand energy challenges. Figure 1 shows data for the global demand for energy over the last 30 years of the 20th century and predictions into the first 25 years of the 21st century. This global energy-demand model shows a more than linear increase in overall demand as we look into the future.4,5 While the energy needs of the industrialized world increase somewhat in that time frame, the overall trend in Figure 1 is more seriously driven by a significantly
larger demand from the developing world, whose populations previously consumed ver
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