If you had $100 million to donate toward innovative energy research in the fields of hydrogen, batteries, and tidal/wave energy, how would you distribute it? Join us for Round 3 of the ND Energy Bouts series, exploring current research and considering how to prioritize limited financial resources in the fight against climate change. Participants will vote for their preferred area of research in real-time at the end of the event. There also will be time to meet the speakers for additional questions.

The contenders are Notre Dame professors Jennifer Schaefer (batteries), William Schneider (hydrogen), and Alexandros Taflanidis (tidal/wave energy) with the current champion (nuclear) Peter C. Burns, Henry J. Massman Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering and Earth Sciences and Director of ND Energy, moderating the discussion.

Biographies

Jennifer Schaefer is a Sheehan Family Collegiate Associate Professor in the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at the University of Notre Dame. The Schaefer Research Group studies ion transport and electrochemical processes towards a more sustainable future focusing on developing novel polymer materials and membranes for separations and advanced electrochemical energy storage and generation devices that have potential for improved safety, sustainability, and reduced size or weight. Schaefer received her Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from Cornell University and her M.Eng. and B.Ch.E. in Chemical Engineering and her B.S. in Chemistry from Widener University.

William Schneider is the Dorini Family Chair in Energy Studies and the Department Chair for Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at the University of Notre Dame. The Schneider group aims to develop molecular-level understanding, and ultimately to direct molecular-level design, of chemical reactivity at surfaces and interfaces. This heterogeneous chemistry is a key element of virtually every aspect of the energy enterprise and is fundamental to environmental processes on the earth and in the atmosphere. Schneider received his Ph.D. in Chemistry from The Ohio State University and his B.S. in Chemistry from the University of Michigan-Dearborn.

Alexandros Taflanidis is a Professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering and Earth Sciences and holds a concurrent faculty position in the Department of Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering at the University of Notre Dame. His research focuses on uncertainty quantification and uncertainty conscious design, with applications to disaster risk reduction, Bayesian model updating, dynamical system design, and enhancement of sustainability/resilience of civil infrastructure systems. A special area of interest for his group is the integration of computational statistics techniques in natural hazard risk assessment/mitigation and real-time emergency response management. This work leverages both reduced order and surrogate modeling tools to accommodate faithful predictive modeling for complex engineering system and physical processes. Taflanidis received his Ph.D from the California Institute of Technology and his M.S. and B.S. in Civil and Environmental Engineering from the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki.

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