UGent: Laboratory for Chemical Technology

General expertise of the research group

The Laboratory for Chemical Technology (LCT) integrates chemical science and engineering in its research on catalysis, polymerization, kinetics, reactor design and process design. LCT is part of the Department of Materials, Textiles and Chemical Engineering within the Faculty of Engineering and Architecture at Ghent University in Belgium and member of the Centre for Sustainable Chemistry (CSC) of Ghent University. LCT aims at research excellence and bottom-up innovation in the framework of technological, industrial, and societal challenges.

Specific hydrogen- related expertise & research topics

• Production of e-fuels
• Economics of e-fuels
• Chemical looping
• Catalytic processes

Participating in FL/B/EU funded projects with H2 related research:

• MuSE (Energy Transition Fund, 2022-2025, 1 PhD)
• CATCO2RE (SBO, 2018-2021, 3 PhD)
• CO2PERATE (cSBO, 2018-2022, 1 PhD)
• C2O (MOT3 sSBO, 2021-2022, 2 PhD)
• Be-HyStore (Energy Transition Fund, 2023-2026, 1 PhD)

Available equipment/tools:

• Lab scale reactors for investigating thermal, catalytic, chemical looping and adsorptive reaction processes
• Chemical looping pilot plant with a production capacity in the order of kg/day
• Catalyst synthesis
• Materials characterization (redox/acid-base properties, porosity, …)
• Software for:
  • Mechanistic investigations
  • Fluid Dynamics calculations
  • Process design
  • (micro)kinetic modelling

Main relevant publications

1. V. Singh, L. C. Buelens, H. Poelman, M. Saeys, G. B. Marin, V. V. Galvita, Intensifying blue hydrogen production by in situ CO2 utilisation, Journal of CO2 Utilization, 2022, 61, 102014.
2. De Vrieze J, Urbina Blanco CA, Thybaut J, Saeys M. Autocatalytic role of molecular hydrogen in copper-catalyzed transfer hydrogenation of ketones. ACS CATALYSIS. 2019;9(9):8073–82.
3. Van Geem K, Galvita V, Marin G. Making chemicals with electricity. SCIENCE. American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS); 2019. p. 734–5.