Executive Summary
- New technologies are improving clean energy generation through advancements in perovskite solar cells, green hydrogen, and sustainable biomass feedstocks.
- Storage breakthroughs in solid-state batteries, thermal storage, and supercapacitors are making renewable power more viable.
- Recycling and recovery improvements are helping close the loop on batteries, solar panels, and critical materials like lithium.
- Chemistry and materials science, aided by AI, are moving more technologies from a lab to commercial scale.
Generation: Cleaner ways to make power
Cleaner generation starts with better materials for capturing and converting energy. Perovskite solar panels are cheaper and more efficient than many conventional photovoltaics, though advances in materials and fabrication are still needed to make them commercially viable at scale. Hydrogen offers a complementary path as a clean fuel and energy carrier, and the green hydrogen economy is drawing significant research and investment, supported by a growing body of materials research and a rapidly expanding market. Production methods can also matter as much as the fuel itself, and photocatalysis is emerging as a cleaner route to hydrogen. Renewable feedstocks round out the picture: although biomass currently supplies only a fraction of energy sources, improved feedstocks and conversion processes could make biomass-based fuels common replacements for fossil fuel-based materials.
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Storage: Holding energy until it is needed
Because renewable generation is intermittent, storage is what makes clean power usable on demand. Solid-state batteries take lithium-ion technology further with greater energy density, longer lifespan, and improved safety. Beyond electrochemistry, thermal energy storage uses specialized materials to absorb, hold, and release heat and cold, helping renewable energy run more efficiently. For applications that require rapid charge and discharge, supercapacitors built on graphene are beginning to show where a material's surface area and conductivity can translate into device performance. Together, batteries and hydrogen fuel cells point toward the possibility of more flexible, lower-carbon energy systems.
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