Tuesday, November 19, 8:00 – 9:00 am
Continental Breakfast (7:30 – 8:00 am)
M. Stanley Whittingham FRS, Ph.D.
Nobel Prize in Chemistry, 2019 Recipient
Distinguished Professor of Chemistry, Founding Director
NECCES and Chemistry Department
Binghamton University, SUNY
ASME 2024 Richard J. Goldstein Energy Lecture Award Recipient
Title: Li Batteries: 50 Years Old and the Future Challenges for an American Based Industry
Abstract: The Nobel Committee citation read: “They have laid the foundation of a wireless, fossil fuel-free society, and are of the greatest benefit to humankind.” Now the world needs to take action. Although lithium batteries celebrated their 50th anniversary in 2022, they still achieve only 25% of their theoretical energy density. Even at that level, they now dominate portable energy storage. The dominant anode and cathode today are graphitic carbon and the layered NMC oxides, LI[NiMnCoAl]O2. Both need improving. We must push the chemistry to its limits. Ten-year lifetimes demand 99.95% reaction selectivity.
Alternatives to Li-NMC cells will also be discussed, including the phosphates, with also a discussion of what is very technically and/or politically challenging and maybe not viable in an attempt to correct some of the exponential hype in the battery energy storage arena. A key challenge in the Western world is to build a sustainable supply chain and manufacturing capability that leapfrogs the present 30-year old technology. We need to stop building new “old gigafactories” in North America.
Thursday, November 21, 12:15 – 1:45pm
Lunch Served 12:15 – 12:45pm
Closing Lunch Keynote
Susan Margulies, Ph.D.
Assistant Director
U.S. National Science Foundation
Biography: Dr. Susan S. Margulies leads the U.S. National Science Foundation's Directorate for Engineering in its mission to transform our world for a better tomorrow by driving discovery, inspiring innovation, enriching education, and accelerating access. The NSF's Engineering Directorate provides over 40 percent of federal funding for fundamental research in engineering at academic institutions, leading to innovative technologies and sustainable impacts in health, agriculture, clean energy and water, resilient infrastructure, advanced manufacturing and communication systems, and many other areas. NSF support also builds the Nation's workforce capacity in engineering and supports the diversity and inclusion of engineers at all career stages. Projects span frontier research to generate new knowledge, problem-driven research to identify new solutions to societal challenges, and application-driven research to translate discoveries to uses that enhance prosperity, equity and quality of life for all Americans.
Margulies joined the NSF as the assistant director for the Directorate for Engineering in August 2021 after leading the Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology and Emory University. While on detail at the NSF, she is a professor and Georgia Research Alliance Eminent Scholar at Georgia Tech and Emory. Margulies is internationally recognized for pioneering studies to identify mechanisms underlying brain injuries in children and adolescents and lung injuries associated with mechanical ventilation, leading to improved injury prevention, diagnosis and treatments.
Margulies' transdisciplinary scholarly impact has been recognized by her election as fellow of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, the Biomedical Engineering Society, and the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering, and as a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering and the National Academy of Medicine.