Materials 2.0 Agenda
In addition to our strong agenda, we will be hosting a poster competition allowing for ideas to be shared in a more informal setting promoting collaboration and idea sharing. For more information on the poster competition click here
Day One
CrowdGenAI offers an innovative CPU-based AI training solution by reinventing computational methods, allowing AI models to be trained on CPU clusters instead of relying solely on power-hungry GPUs (like NVIDIA), which pose significant sustainability challenges.
Our approach results in substantial energy and environmental savings, including a 90–95% reduction in hardware costs, 30–40% lower infrastructure expenses, 50–70% reduced power consumption, and 30–40% lower operational costs. is a crowd-sourced platform that empowers global users to monetize, protect, and trace their data using blockchain technology.
Critical minerals like lithium, nickel, and cobalt are the building blocks of the 21st century economy and essential to the global energy transition. As demand has grown for phones, data centers, EVs, AI computing power, and other modern technologies, so has the demand for critical minerals to build and power them. Current production is insufficient, and supply chains are overwhelmingly controlled by one adversarial nation.
TechMet is an investment company whose mission is to increase and diversify the global supply of critical minerals. The company currently has a portfolio of ten projects across four continents that responsibly produce, process, and recycle the materials needed to supply the global energy transition.
TechMet's Chairman & CEO, Brian Menell, will discuss the current state of the sector, the innovative processes that TechMet's portfolio companies are developing, and the unique challenges associated with building these long-term, capital-intensive projects.
Waste recycling and resource preservation are two key challenges related to planetary limits faced by humanity. They encompass organic and inorganic materials such as CO2 produced from hydrocarbon combustion as well as strategic metals contained in end-of life technological devices. Practically, the challenge relies in eco-efficiently turning waste to resource, with the lightest footprint and cost.
Waste material is generally a complex molecular mixture whose conversion into resource requires mastering selective self-sorting in mild conditions.
This presentation will show how academic investigations at the interface between organic, organometallic, supramolecular, analytical chemistry and electrochemistry, by exploring self-assembling processes within complex organic and organometallic dynamic molecular system, has revealed that organic species generated by CO2 capture can be upcycled i.e. provide a high value service of eco-efficient metal extraction from lithium-ion batteries waste material.
This fundamental knowledge, and the underpinning disruptive concept, have led to the design of the first CO2-powered metal separation process which is currently scaled up by our spin-off company MeCaWaRe SAS (60 employees) at the ton scale and is intended to be deployed at horizon 2027 in the first eCO2-efficient battery recycling plant.
As the 2020-2023 VC boom around climate tech recedes into the distance there are some clear lessons and ways forward to consider around how to finance and develop key renewable technologies.
Drawing on his experience as Founder of Carbon13, the most active pre-seed climate tech investor in Europe during 2021-2023, Dr Coleridge will discuss how we urgently need to address certain aspects of the financing system for regenerative technologies, and propose some solutions.
Electrochemical energy storage devices can offer a number of great potentials for meeting future energy demands, such as of renewable energy, electric vehicles, portable electronics, that require high energy density, high power density and long cycle life.
Among the various electrode materials available for energy storage devices, graphene, a one-atom thick two-dimensional (2D) sp2 carbon structure, has attracted considerable interest as a next-generation carbon material owing to its large surface area, high electrical conductivity and good mechanical/chemical stability.
At first, high quality graphene should be synthesized to possess large specific surface area with high electrical conductivity similar to the pristine graphene. Then, the surface area of graphene should be maintained even after the electrode fabrication process, in order to achieve the large electrochemically active surface area. In addition, the conductive networks as well as pore channels between graphene nanosheets should be effectively developed in the electrode for fast ions/electrons transfer. Therefore, the graphene-based materials should be designed to possess suitable nano-/macro-structure in the electrode for achieving these aims.
In this presentation, we report on the strategies to effectively exploit graphene-based electrode materials for energy storage devices. More details will be discussed at the meeting.
Sigma Lithium have developed an advanced Li metal anode (3D-Li) technology utilising non-wove carbon scaffolds sourced from recycled carbon fibres.
Batteries with 3D-Li inside demonstrated better safety and cycle life along with higher energy and power density against current state-of-the-art.
Sigma Lithium is now working with Gen2Carbon to optimise the composition of the carbon fibre scaffold for improved battery performance, while creating a sustainable product from recycled carbon fibre materials which would otherwise have gone to landfill.
World’s major population growth until 2050 will be in the Southern Hemisphere, which has scarce soluble potassium sources, however, there are abundant insoluble potassium sources in the form of K-feldspar, the main mineral of igneous rock.
Feldspar is continental Earth’s crust most abundant mineral, about 60% by weight and huge K-feldspar deposits have been discovered that are often already close to agricultural areas that have transportation challenges for traditional fertilizer.
Therefore, access to potassium from insoluble K-feldspar is of strategic importance, especially for countries from the Southern Hemisphere and could deliver huge economic value and social benefit for poor countries with good agricultural land.
Food, air and water are essential for life, and notwithstanding the consequences of war, technology and science have enabled a population of some 8.2 billion humans to be nourished, in contradiction to the predictions of the Club of Rome. Dramatic increases in food production became possible with the introduction of agricultural machinery that relies on steel, as does the manufacture of medicines.
However, we currently are using indecent quantities of steel with the associated and pernicious CO2 cost which has the greatest consequences for the poorest in the world. I will explain how to reduce the consumption of steel by 25% over a period of four years, without causing pain to industry or society. And no research or development is needed to achieve this.
Day Two
The North Netherlands came up with the first hydrogen valley in Europe. Across the globe, almost 100 hydrogen valleys are now being developed.
While there is significant enthusiasm in coming up with hydrogen valleys at many places, several hydrogen initiatives are also struggling to make quick progress.
In this backdrop, the Hydrogen Valley Campus Europe is launched, in order to provide knowledge support for the speedy implementation of hydrogen valley related initiatives and programs. Activities taken up range from the establishment of multifunctional laboratories, training programs, entrepreneurship programs, and global partnership development initiatives. Interdisciplinary studies encompass Science and Technology activities to regulatory studies and acceptance studies. The full range of such activities will be presented, detailing the rationale behind them, and introducing the key players.
Inspired by the EPR argument that "quantum mechanics is not a complete theory," we outline the completion of quantum into hadronic mechanics for the representation of extended particles in conditions of mutual penetration with ensuing contact non-Hamiltonian interactions represented via the new operator S in the axiom-preserving isotopy of the associative algebra of operators with millenary product A B and trivial unit 1 into the isoproduct A^ B = ASB with isounit ^1 and ensuing new isoimathematics and isomechanics.
We show the consequential progressive recovering of Einstein’s determinism permitting the first known exact representation of nuclear data, and indicate some
of the new technologies that are predicted by a quantitative representation of extended
constituents and their non-Hamiltonian interactions, including: the new HyperFusion of
light natural elements without the Coulomb barrie, harmful radiations and radioactive
waste [5]; the new HyperCombustion of fossil fuels with non detectable CO and HC in the
exhaust the new Directional Neutron Source synthesizing a flux of thermal neutrons
from the Hydrogen to trigger the decay of radioactive waste and others.
The global plastic market size is huge exceeding USD 600 billion (2023) and expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate of > 4% , preliminary driven by the packaging, construction, automotive, and electronics sectors.
Every year, several million tons of plastic reach the end of their life, including over 400 billion primarily single-use drink bottles.
This creates a significant environmental burden due to the non-degradability of most high-performing plastics in natural environments. Recycling methods for such waste need to be low-cost and environmentally friendly, though achieving this remains a major challenge. This talk provides an overview of the current technologies available of recycling of waste plastics with a focus on polyethylene terephthalate (PET), one of the most widely used plastics.
The speaker will discuss technologies developed in his laboratory for valorising waste plastics into high-value materials.
With its patented PoroGaN® Platform Technology, Porotech has advanced semiconductor manufacturing by introducing sub-surface nano-pores in epitaxial films at wafer scale, up to 12 inches. PoroGaN® has enabled novel approaches to fine-tune the electrical, optical, mechanical, and thermal properties of compound semiconductors, offering a new design framework and a broader process window for high-performance electronics
In collaboration with NPL over the past five years, the Porotech team has strengthened semiconductor manufacturing through multi-scale metrology. Our multi-lens inspection system—incorporating wafer-level hyperspectral imaging, micron-scale in-situ microscopy, and dislocation-level spectroscopy—utilises AI-assisted machine vision for real-time defect detection, significantly enhancing yield and precision.
LanzaTech’s pioneering technology harnesses the power of biology to transform carbon-rich waste gases into ethanol and other valuable chemicals. These materials are crucial components in the production of essential products such as textiles, plastics, and sustainable aviation fuel.
The LanzaTech process empowers hard-to-abate industries and waste sectors to extract economic and sustainable value from their off-gases and wastes. By recycling and utilizing carbon that has already been used once—such as in steelmaking—this approach not only generates raw materials for other sectors from emissions but also reduces dependence on fossil extraction across the entire value chain for these same raw materials.
This methodology establishes a more resilient energy paradigm and advances the concept of a circular carbon economy, where carbon is continually reused and recycled, thereby minimizing environmental impact.
Applications for carbon fibre have evolved from those where its exceptional mechanical properties and low density enable lightweight, high-performance in the aerospace, automotive and sporting goods industries to those where its corrosion resistance, electrical and thermal properties are used to enable clean energy solutions.
However, unlike transportation applications where the high environmental impact of producing virgin material is offset by in-life fuel savings, there is no offset and so using carbon fibre comes with a high-environmental price.
There is a large and ever increasing amount of carbon fibre waste produced each year which today is consigned to landfill. In this presentation, we show how new, efficient recycling solutions allow this carbon fibre to be recovered and converted into materials that form the basis of advanced clean energy solutions—bring environmental, cost and supply chain security benefits.
Quantum dots (QDs) revolutionize display and lighting technologies with their exceptional optical properties and tunability. In LCD backlighting, they enhance color accuracy and energy efficiency by emitting pure red and green light when excited by blue LEDs, leading to improved brightness and a wider color gamut. QDs also play a crucial role in advanced lighting, including QD-LEDs and microLED backlights, offering superior resolution and efficiency.
Electroluminescent QLEDs (EL-QLEDs) further push QD applications forward, delivering highly saturated colors, better energy efficiency, and greater stability compared to OLEDs. Their durability makes them ideal for ultra-high-definition displays, flexible screens, and energy-efficient lighting.
The development of QD materials, particularly the transition from CdSe to environmentally friendly alternatives like InP, is a key focus in materials science. Researchers aim to optimize synthesis methods, improve quantum yield, and enhance stability to meet industry demands.
However, challenges remain in large-scale production, including cost efficiency, material uniformity, and integration into existing manufacturing processes. This report reviews recent advancements in QD technology, emphasizing their impact on displays and lighting while addressing the materials science and production challenges shaping their future commercialization.