Project partners

The Sun-To-X consortium is led by Toyota Motor Europe in collaboration with leading industry, research government organisations and academia in the solar fuel sector. The project gathers 9 partners from 5 different countries.

TOYOTA MOTOR EUROPE

The Toyota Technical Centre is home to the European R&D of Toyota Motor Corporation, Japan – a global automotive company. The R&D team works on the design of body, powertrain, chassis, electronics and advanced technologies such as new energy vectors (fuel cells, batteries, solar energy).

Solar fuel production has been researched in the company since 2017 through both in-house testing and collaboration with members of the Sun-to-X consortium.

CEA

Research in CEA will be carried out in 3 laboratories located in two institutes:

1) the laboratory of Chemistry and Biology of Metals (LCBM), co-operated by the University Grenoble Alpes, the CNRS and the Fundamental Research Division of CEA
2) the laboratory “Systèmes Moléculaires et nanoMatériaux pour l’Énergie et la Santé (SyMMES)”
3) the laboratory of Catalysis and Molecular Chemistry for Energy (LCMCE) group based in the CEA Saclay and included within the University Paris Saclay.

LCBM and SYMMES gather biochemists, synthetic, spectroscopic & theoretical chemists as well as materials scientists with a shared interest in providing new insights into the function, structure and chemical reactivity of complex architectures for energy conversion. This research results in new concepts and applications in electrochemical energy storage, photovoltaics, electro and photocatalysis for hydrogen production and uptake.

DIFFER

The Dutch Institute for Fundamental Energy Research NWO-I is one of nine research institutes of the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research NWO funded by the Dutch Ministry of Education, Culture and Science.

The Mission of NWO-I is to perform leading fundamental research on materials, processes and systems for a global sustainable energy infrastructure in close partnership with Academia and Industry. The NWO-I program contains two program lines: Fusion and Solar Fuels. Both programs are designed to meet the challenging EU CO2 emission reduction targets by developing CO2 neutral energy technology solutions through basic, cross-disciplinary research.

ENGIE

ENGIE develops its business (electricity, natural gas, new energies and services) providing highly efficient and innovative energy and services solutions to residential, commercial and industrial customers.

Willing to take a lead within the Energy Transition in Europe, ENGIE is highly involved in the development of sustainable and renewable energies from their production to their uses in cities and territories. The Group provides efficient and innovative solutions based on its expertise in five key sectors: renewable energy, energy efficiency, energy storage, natural and renewable gas (including hydrogen) and digital technologies.

Hydrogen as a way to store and valorise at local scale large amounts of renewable energy and turning hydrogen into a hydrocarbon with CO2 as building block is studied within ENGIE through different pilot plants.

EPFL

The Ecole polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) is an engineering college active in education and research. It covers disciplines ranging from the Basic Sciences to Engineering, Architecture and the Life Sciences.

EPFL is a public institution founded in 1969, mainly funded by the Swiss Confederation. It welcomes students, professors and collaborators of more than 120 nationalities. EPFL collaborates with an important network of partners, including other universities and colleges, secondary schools and gymnasiums, industry and the economy, decision-makers and the general public, in order to have a real impact on society.

hysilabs

The company was created in 2015 from a chemical discovery at Aix-Marseille University. The researchers team at the university worked on the technology since 2008 before it was transferred to HySiLabs in 2015.

The company is mainly developing processes in the energy field:

  • chemical processes related to the charge and discharge of a hydrogen liquid carrier
  • mechanical devices executing the developed chemical processes

hZB

The Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin (HZB) is a member of the Helmholtz Association, Germany’s largest scientific organisation where more than 40.000 staff members work to solve society’s grand challenges in the fields of Energy, Aeronautics, Space and Transport, Earth and Environment, Health, Key Technologies, and Matter.

HZB’s research portfolio includes photovoltaic solar cells, solar fuels, quantum materials, and electrochemical energy conversion and storage materials. It also operates the BESSY II synchrotron facility, where the Energy Materials In-Situ Lab (EMIL) and the Berlin Joint Lab for Electrochemical Interfaces offer state-of-the-art facilities for research on energy materials. Every year around 3,000 scientists use the HZB infrastructure facilities.

LGI

LGI is a French consultancy, founded in 2005. It offers the following services:

  1. Project development and management
  2. Communication and dissemination through an in-house communications agency
  3. IT developments through an in-house IT dev team
  4. Strategy and innovation studies

LGI has a positioning in high tech sectors: energy, transport, security, and environment. The firm’s strategic marketing approach is based on insight into both advanced technological developments and novel business models, with innovation at the heart of the process. LGI has developed a recognized expertise on business modelling, technologies and market assessments, especially in the sectors of energy, environment, and ICT. LGI is used to lead the work packages in the EU projects on the company’s areas of expertise such as innovation management, market, exploitation, financial analysis and technology assessments.

LIGHT FUEL

Light Fuel’s photoanode technology enables sunlight to produce hydrogen from water with less or even no electricity. Light Fuel further develops and manufactures photoelectrochemical cells and solar-assisted electrolyzers that employ their photoanodes, or more broadly photoelectrodes, to produce solar hydrogen as well as other electrolysis products.

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