Realizing a sustainable energy future is one of the most important problems facing our society. Completely novel technologies based on fluids capable of capturing, retaining, and releasing energy and heat have broad applications in large-scale and affordable solar power, in waste heat recovery, in energy-efficient home heating and cooling, and in efficient heat transfer. However, current liquid storage solutions are too low in energy capacity (either by weight or volume) or are too costly for large-scale deployment in these applications. Thus, new ideas and concepts are needed to break current barriers in energy storage.

This Postdoctoral Fellow will contribute to a project that will explore novel chemical storage technologies (i.e., not Li-ion or standard battery systems) guided by new principles for thermochemical storage as well as potential electrochemical storage. The position will use simulation-based (density functional theory and molecular dynamics) methods to evaluate the thermodynamic properties of novel liquid formulations for energy storage. The overall goal is to identify one or more novel classes of chemical reactions that can potentially serve as the basis for new storage technologies.

As part of a team, explore novel chemical storage technologies (i.e., not Li-ion or standard battery systems) guided by new principles for thermochemical storage as well as potential electrochemical storage:

• Explore new classes of reactions ideally suited for reversible energy storage through computation and simulation. A mix of methods (primarily DFT but also molecular dynamics) will be used to predict completely new formulations of fluids.
• Utilize high-throughput screening methods, i.e., using large supercomputers to compute the properties of tens of thousands of candidate formulations and performing data analysis to determine solutions and design principles.
• Apply data analysis techniques to better understand chemical structure-property relationships in the data sets.
• Communicate the results in presentations and publications.

https://lbl.taleo.net/careersection/2/jobdetail.ftl?job=82940