(659p) Towards an accelerated adoption of carbon neutral manufacturing

Transition to carbon neutrality requires changes across different industries to happen in a short period of time. The mission of my group is to work on accelerated adoption of new, more sustainable production methods by means of:

• Developing tandem technologies where CO₂ electrolysis (CO2R) is combined with more mature, well understood methods to reduce the manufacturing carbon footprint for specific applications,
• Exploring the possibilities of retrofitting of the existing infrastructure to realize large-scale carbon capture and utilization,
• Supporting the progress of the entire CO₂ utilization field by working towards standardization of the experimental reporting and CO2R reactors design.

The key technology that I will explore across these projects is CO₂ electrolysis (CO2R), that allows for a direct production of more complex chemicals such as ethylene, ethanol, propanol from abundant CO₂, using renewable electric energy as the only input to the process. The large-scale transition to CO2R-based manufacturing involves challenges across different parts of the new value chain, and I already proposed how to address several of them in my vision of the step-wise transformation of the chemical industry (2,3). I plan to leverage my current experience in CO₂ electrolysis characterization, scale-up, development of tailored separations for CO2R and techno-economic analyses (1), to embed CO2R into complex systems where CO2R use will yield both overall CO₂ emissions reduction and economic benefit, thus pioneer economically viable CO₂-based manufacturing.

Key component of the proposed projects is exploring the synergies: between the established chemical industry and novel technologies, existing infrastructure and arising needs for carbon removal. To explore these synergies, I will use my background in chemical engineering and the knowledge of how large-scale production processes operate, and what constraints limit their practical deployment, gain both in academia (PhD thesis and Postdoc) and in industry (pharmaceutical sector, Switzerland).

Leading the field towards the timely transition to carbon neutrality requires also establishing CO2R reporting and analysis standards that will support the reproducibility of the research results across the globe. I therefore plan to work towards the development of standards that can facilitate further investment into this field.

Postdoctoral Research: Table-top factory for CO₂-to-ethylene electroreduction

University of Cambridge/ Cambridge Center for Advance Research and Education in Singapore in collaboration with University of California, Berkeley

Professor Alexei Lapkin (U. Cambridge) in collaboration with Professor Joel W. Ager (UC Berkeley)

Bringing CO₂ electrolysis to higher technology readiness levels requires not only insights on the catalyst level, but also addressing the challenges of the design of an entire CO2R-based chemical plant, that produces ethylene of the same quality as the established petrochemical methods, but with a much lower carbon footprint, and at an acceptable price. As a part of a multidisciplinary team, I am responsible for designing such a plant and for the development of new separation technologies matching the requirements of CO₂ electrolysis-based ethylene production. I also guide other researchers working on CO2R components such as e.g. gas-diffusion electrodes or anode materials towards achieving metrics meaningful for the process scale-up and to support development of micro-kinetic and multiphase physic models that yield useful process knowledge.

My key findings within the project include development of new approach on how CO₂ electrolysis can be deployed in the chemical industry in a simplified and economically viable manner, based on use of CO2R a retrofit for specific chemical production processes. I illustrated this concept in recent papers that discuss technical details of CO₂ integration (3) and its global potential for the achievement of the 2050 Net Zero goal (2).

Postdoctoral Industrial Experience: Accelerated design of manufacturing processes

Pharmaceutical/fine chemistry manufacturing, Switzerland

During the industrial placement, I have been working primarily on the design of new production lines for personalized therapies. As a part of engineering design company (Backer Hicks) we have been developing production lines design for leading pharmaceutical companies located in Switzerland and have overseen the deployment of the proposed design at the production site. I also initiated an academic collaboration with a local research institution (Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts) specializing in the digitalization of design processes in order to further accelerate design processes deployed at the company.

PhD thesis: Systematic methodology for process design and retrofitting by means of intensified technologies

TU Dortmund, Germany

Professor Andrzej Gorak

My PhD thesis addressed a common problem in the chemical industry: lack of knowledge on how and when to use Process Intensification technologies, that despite of being capable to significantly improve reaction yields and process efficiencies, are still scarcely deployed in the industry. To address this challenge, I developed a step-wise process design methodology that enables to assess for an early-stage assessment if PI technologies can improve a given process and how their deployment will affect production costs, environmental impact and other process metrics (4,5). The methodology was developed in the context of mature, complex production processes such as e.g. monoethylene glycol production. Even though these processes have been intensively studied and optimized, proposed method enables to determine strategies for further process improvement by means of incorporation of intensified technologies. The method has been transferred to industrially applicable tools within my further placement in a process design company (Processium, France).

During my thesis, I maintained a close collaboration with Lodz University of Technology (LUT), Poland, where I was a part of a project working on life cycle assessment for novel products (6), developed in framework of EU Horizon2020 call together with e.g. University of Bath (UK), University of Eindhoven (Netherlands). As a result of the collaboration with LUT, and also supporting the teaching activities on part-time basis, I obtained a double PhD diploma from both TU Dortmund University in Germany and LUT (Poland).

Teaching Interests:

Teaching is in my opinion a privilege to share learnings and a unique opportunity to interact with students, receive feedback and constantly improve the ways in which we educate and inspire future generations. Given the current need to accelerate the carbon neutrality transition, I would be particularly interested in working towards a constantly updated portfolio of classes on sustainability, energy transition, carbon capture and utilization that are of interest (on different level of details) to students across different fields. I believe that incorporating these subjects into the educational curriculum will rise awareness of the emerging problems across different arenas of science and contribute to solving global problems. To gather experience in teaching these complex subjects, I sought opportunities for delivering guest lectures and scheduled for the Spring semester 2022 lectures on Carbon Capture and Utilization at the Nanyang Technological University (Singapore), Newcastle University (center in Singapore), TU Dortmund (Germany) and also on Mimicking photocatalysis at KU Leuven (Belgium).

Throughout my career, I experienced teaching activities as a laboratory/class instructor, lecturer, and privately as a tutor. I have given classes on Separation Processes (MSc), Design of Chemical Plants (MSc), Heat and Mass transfer (BSc) (all in Lodz University of Technology), and also offered tuition in French and Spanish language.

Commitment to Leadership and Inclusivity

To increase my awareness of diversity and inclusivity, I sought to experience and understand different cultures and communities, to finally realize how biases are embedded in the way we communicate, act, and choose for future. My mission as educator, group leader and colleague is to work towards a reality where these biases do not exist.

I voluntarily served international organizations (IAESTE, Baltic University Programme), experienced living in foreign countries (Singapore, Switzerland, France, Germany, Spain), helped foreign students in my own country; all with a motivation to develop a profound understanding of socio-cultural differences. To bring this experience to the next level, I am currently participating in a practical course on Leadership Resilience and Diversity. I am looking forward to using my experience and taking diversity-supportive actions within all University activities: teaching, group building, creating the environment for research, leading group members through their professional development; to supporting *all minorities, ethnic groups and communities*. I am also interested in the promotion of mental health awareness.

Selected Publications

• Barecka, M.H., J.W, Lapkin, A.A. Techno-economic assessment of emerging CO2 electrolysis technologies. STAR Protocols (Cell Press), 2021, accepted for publication.
• Barecka, M.H., J.W, Lapkin, A.A. Carbon neutral manufacturing via on-site CO2 recycling. iScience (Cell Press), 2021, 24, 6, 102514.
• Barecka, M.H., J.W, Lapkin, A.A. Economically viable CO2 electroreduction embedded within ethylene oxide manufacturing. Energy and Environmental Science, 2021,14, 1530-1543
• Barecka, M.H, Skiborowski, M., Górak, A. Process intensification in practice: ethylene glycol case study. Practical aspects in Chemical Engineering (Springer), 2018, M. Ochowiak, S. Woziwodzki, M. Doligalski, P. Mitkowski, 17-34.
• Barecka, M.H., Skiborowski, M., Górak, A. A novel approach for process retrofitting through process intensification: ethylene oxide case study. Chemical Engineering Research and Design, 2017, 123, 295-316
• Barecka, M., Zbicinski, I., Heim, D. Environmental, energy and economic aspects in a zero-emission façade system design. Management of Environmental Quality, 2016, 27, 708-721
• Martinez-Haya, M.H. Barecka, P. Miro, M.L. Marin, M.A. Miranda, Photocatalytic Treatment of Cork Wastewater Pollutants. Degradation of Gallic Acid and Trichloroanisole using Triphenyl(thia)pyrylium salts, Applied Catalysis B: Environmental, 2015, 179, 433-438.