Cambridge CARES leads two decarbonisation projects with SG universities

The projects will investigate non-fossil fuel-based pathways.

The Cambridge Centre for Advanced Research and Education in Singapore (CARES) is managing two projects under the CREATE Thematic Programme in Decarbonisation, backed by the National Research Foundation (NRF).

The two projects will investigate non-fossil fuel-based pathways for Singapore's chemical manufacturing industry and energy systems.

The projects will build on CARES' existing work to develop new technologies and ideas, supporting Singapore's business transition from petrochemicals to achieving net-zero emissions by 2050.

Heng Swee Keat, deputy prime minister and chairman of NRF, has toured the first three laboratories for the programme to view the technical capabilities required for the various project teams, including CARES' projects on the Sustainable Manufacture of Molecules and Materials in Singapore (SM3), and Hydrogen and Ammonia Combustion in Singapore (HYCOMBS).

Moreover, as part of the lab demonstrations on decarbonisation, CARES showcased an additional ongoing activity with City Energy investigating hydrogen-rich town gas for residential and commercial cooking stoves.

In a joint statement, Prof. Epaminondas Mastorakos (CARES), Prof. Fei Duan (NTU Singapore), Prof. Kaoru Maruta (Tohoku University), Dr. Nabiha Chaumeix (CNRS France), Asst. Prof. Zhang Huangwei (NUS), and Principal Investigators for HYCOMBS, said: “In the near future, Singapore may adopt hydrogen or ammonia as a possible carbon-free fuel for decarbonisation; however, this requires the development of new gas turbines and internal combustion engines.”

“In project HYCOMBS, universities from Singapore, the UK, Japan, France, and Norway will work together to investigate the underlying combustion process of hydrogen and ammonia to minimise pollutants and accelerate industry innovation,” they added.

Meanwhile, Prof. Alexei Lapkin (CARES), Prof. Chiba Shunsuke (NTU Singapore), Prof. Ning Yan (NUS), Assoc Prof. Ming Joo Koh (NUS), Dr. Philippe Schwaller (Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne, EPFL), and Prof. Matthew Gaunt (University of Cambridge), Principal Investigators for SM3, share also a joint statement: “Its (SM3) core goal is to address the dependency of the producers of performance chemicals on starting materials that typically come from fossil-based carbon sources.”

“The SM3 team will develop effective synthetic methods that best convert cheap and abundant fossil-free raw materials into high-value molecules,” they added.

Since 2013, CARES has been involved in research programmes with Nanyang Technological University (NTU) and the National University of Singapore (NUS) as the University of Cambridge's first overseas centre.

One of its early flagship programmes, the Centre for Carbon Reduction in Chemical Technologies, has investigated areas from sustainable reaction engineering, electrochemistry, and maritime decarbonisation, to digitalisation.