PhD: Electrified heating in COconversion – optimization & economics

Position: PhD: Electrified heating in CO2 conversion – optimization & economics
PhD:
Electrified heating in CO2 conversion – optimization & economics
Join the HyCARB programme and contribute to the future of sustainable chemistry by developing and optimizing electrified CO2 conversion processes together with leading academic and industrial partners.

This PhD position is part of the large Dutch research project “HyCARB:
Green Hydrogen and Electrons for Carbon-based Chemistry” set up with Industry, the Dutch research council (NWO), Groenvermogen

NL, and academia. HyCARB brings Netherlands-based companies, SMEs, and knowledge and research institutes together to develop the technology base for industrial end users worldwide for carbon‑based chemicals production using hydrogen, green electrons and captured carbon dioxide. Research using the latest generation of analytical equipment is combined with techno‑economic and lifecycle assessments of a range of technologies to help the chemical industry decarbonise.

Research Focus
Within HyCARB, this PhD position focuses on process design, optimisation, and techno‑economic assessment of technologies that directly use electrons to heat up chemical conversion processes. Three different heating technologies will be researched and compared: resistive, impedance/inductive, and plasma heating. A specific challenge is to develop flexible heating technologies that can adapt to energy supply fluctuations. The overarching objective of the PhD project is to facilitate and accelerate the development of novel electrified technologies by providing key techno‑economic insights from process and system‑level perspectives.

This will be achieved by developing and applying a model‑based process and system optimisation framework. The PhD candidate will apply, and where required develop, mathematical methods to support the design and to gain an understanding of critical phenomena inside and outside the proposed technologies. The process design will identify the spectrum of technologies that must be coupled to the core electrified technologies.

The system design will co‑optimise size and operation of the envisioned processes when connected to external electricity and material feed stocks (CO2, H2), while also identifying the associated energy system for the different production routes. Finally, a detailed techno‑economic assessment will integrate technical mass and energy balances, equipment lists, and production cost information into a detailed bottom‑up engineering‑economic analysis. The optimal process synthesis and techno‑economic analysis will be bridged to broader, time‑discretised system‑level evaluations.

Societal Relevance
The transition to a CO2 net‑zero society requires a major rethinking of the energy system with coordinated, timely deployment of several technologies. The chemical industry must produce large amounts of carbon‑based platform molecules from renewable energy and non‑fossil feed stocks. Electrification of process heating is expected to play a major role in enabling the transition from fossil‑based to renewable‑based primary energy input.

To ensure that HyCARB results are broadly applicable and help achieve sustainability goals as soon as possible, the research focuses on products with large volume potential such as fuel for hard‑to‑electrify applications and widely used platform chemicals.

Your Qualifications
We are seeking an outstanding and highly motivated candidate with interest in the fundamental and applied aspects of process synthesis and optimisation. The ideal candidate has a master’s degree in Engineering (possibly Chemical, Process, Mechanical, Energy or Electrical), Applied Physics, or a related field.

Moreover, the candidate should:

Possess excellent understanding of thermodynamics, reactor engineering, and chemical and energy conversion technologies coupled with good mathematical and programming skills (process system engineering).

Have experience in process synthesis and techno-economic evaluation (e.g. process design courses during master studies using Aspen Plus, gPROMS).

Have experience in programming languages such as Python, Matlab, Julia (Jump).

Have modelling experience with non-linear programming (nice‑to‑have).

Have…