Nature energy
Volume 5 Issue 8, August 2020
Offshore wind not at sea
Offshore wind power has been declining in price but is still considered expensive compared to other non-renewable and renewable energy sources. Jansen et al. use extensive energy auction data from five European countries to show that offshore wind energy may now be cheaper than fossil energy in many cases without subsidy.
See Jansen et al.
Image: Malte Jansen Cover Design: Thomas Phillips.
Editorial
Editorial | 14 August 2020
Energy justice towards racial justice
Black and African American people face systematic disadvantages in energy costs and limited access to renewable energy benefits. Addressing these disparities is an important part of achieving racial justice.
Comment & Opinion
- Michael J. Fell
- & Alexandra Schneiders
Comment | 06 May 2020
Make fun of your research
Digital and physical games are now widely used to support learning and engagement, including in the domains of climate change and energy. We believe games have a further, underappreciated role: helping us as researchers to reflect on our own research, generating deeper understanding and, hopefully, more impactful research projects.
News & Views
- Ian D. Broadbent
- & John Aldersey-Williams
- Lauren F. Greenlee
- Jonathan Major
News & Views | 27 July 2020
Leaving the competition in its wake
Offshore wind projects are being deployed at an increasing rate, and as the scale of these projects has grown, costs have tumbled. A new study indicates that some new European projects may no longer require support from state subsidy mechanisms to be competitive.
News & Views | 27 July 2020
Recycling fertilizer
Efforts to electrochemically produce ammonia have mainly focused on dinitrogen as a feedstock. Now, an electrocatalyst composed of Cu embedded in an organic molecular solid is designed, which efficiently and selectively converts nitrate ions to ammonia, paving a way to nutrient recovery and recycling.
News & Views | 23 July 2020
Step up in performance
Antimony selenosulfides are promising photovoltaic materials but obtaining high-quality absorber layers is challenging. Researchers now show that layers deposited using a hydrothermal method have optimal bandgap, good morphology and favourable growth orientation, enabling solar cells with 10% efficiency.
Reviews
- Jie Xiao
- Qiuyan Li
- & M. Stanley Whittingham
- Sanya Carley
- & David M. Konisky
Perspective | 25 June 2020
Understanding and applying coulombic efficiency in lithium metal batteries
Coulombic efficiency (CE) has been frequently used to assess the cyclability of newly developed materials for lithium metal batteries. The authors argue that caution must be exercised during the assessment of CE, and propose a CE testing protocol for the development of lithium metal batteries.
Review Article | 12 June 2020
The justice and equity implications of the clean energy transition
The costs and benefits of clean energy transitions will not be equally distributed. This Review of the literature on potential adverse impacts for specific communities highlights opportunities for future research to contribute to the design of policies and programmes that address these disparities.
Research
- Bohua Wen
- Zhi Deng
- & Yet-Ming Chiang
- Rongfeng Tang
- Xiaomin Wang
- & Tao Chen
- Zonghao Liu
- Longbin Qiu
- Gao-Feng Chen
- Yifei Yuan
- & Haihui Wang
- Malte Jansen
- Iain Staffell
- & Felix Müsgens
- Haiping Xu
- Dominic Rebollar
- & Tao Xu
Article | 29 June 2020
Ultrafast ion transport at a cathode–electrolyte interface and its strong dependence on salt solvation
Understanding Li transport is important in the development of fast-rate batteries. Here the authors uncover an ultrafast charge transfer across a cathode–electrolyte interface with the aid of single-particle measurements and ascribe the solvation of electrolyte salts to be key for the interfacial kinetics.
Article | 20 July 2020
Hydrothermal deposition of antimony selenosulfide thin films enables solar cells with 10% efficiency
Antimony chalcogenides are emerging photovoltaic materials, yet difficulties in fabricating high-quality films limit device performance. We show that hydrothermal synthesis affords good morphology and reduced defects in antimony selenosulfide films, enabling solar cells with an efficiency of 10%.
Article | 20 July 2020
A holistic approach to interface stabilization for efficient perovskite solar modules with over 2,000-hour operational stability
The upscaling of layer treatments and processing that afford high efficiency and stability in small-area perovskite solar cells remains challenging. Liu et al. show how the efficiency and stability of perovskite modules can be improved using an integrated approach to interface and layer engineering.
Article | 27 July 2020
Electrochemical reduction of nitrate to ammonia via direct eight-electron transfer using a copper–molecular solid catalyst
Electrochemically reducing nitrogen-containing molecules could provide less energy-intense routes to produce ammonia than the traditional Haber–Bosh process. Here the authors use a catalyst comprising Cu embedded in an organic molecular solid to synthesize ammonia from nitrate ions.
Article | 27 July 2020
Offshore wind competitiveness in mature markets without subsidy
Offshore wind power has often been assumed to be costly and dependent on subsidies to survive. Using the latest auction data from five European countries Jansen et al. show that in mature markets offshore wind is already competitive without subsidies.
Article | 27 July 2020
Highly selective electrocatalytic CO2 reduction to ethanol by metallic clusters dynamically formed from atomically dispersed copper
Electrocatalytically reducing CO2 to ethanol can provide renewably generated fuel, but catalysts are often poorly selective for this conversion. Here the authors use a Cu catalyst to produce ethanol with high selectivity. Cu dispersion is key to the performance and operando studies indicate that it changes under reaction conditions.
Amendments & Corrections
- Yiou Wang
- Anastasia Vogel
- & Junwang Tang
Publisher Correction | 19 June 2020
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