Once again, we are thrilled to celebrate the innovative and important work being undertaken by graduate students across Canada with another round of grants. With over 60 applicants from 17 different Universities, this year’s selection process was highly competitive, showcasing the exceptional talent and creativity of students in the field of clean energy research. After a very challenging adjudication process, the Foundation is excited to announce for the first time ever, we will be awarding a $15,000 grant, in addition to a second $10,000 grant. This year’s worthy awardees are:
- Deborah Braide (Polytechnique Montréal)
- Shane Orgnero (University of Toronto)
The 2024 recipients represent a diverse group of passionate individuals whose projects promise to drive meaningful change in their fields. We look forward to seeing their research unfold and its impact on building sustainable solutions for communities across Canada and beyond. The Tyler Lewis Clean Energy Research Foundation is delighted to welcome these two outstanding individuals to the esteemed group of past awardees. Not only are they accomplished researchers advancing innovative clean energy solutions, but they also exemplify the Foundation’s mission through their dedication both within and beyond their research endeavors. Learn more about this year’s award recipients and their research below.
Deborah Braide – Development and optimization of a conceptual design for a plant converting CO2 into clean aviation fuels
Polytechnique Montréal (PhD, Materials Engineering)
Debbie received her Bachelor of Science in Chemical Engineering from Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Ghana in 2015. During this time, she was general secretary of the Chemical Engineering Students Association. Through the British Chevening Scholarship, she completed her Master of Science in Sustainable Energy and Entrepreneurship from the University of Nottingham, United Kingdom in 2019, under the supervision of Dr. Siddig Omer. She supported several students as an international student ambassador. She is now a doctoral candidate at Polytechnique Montréal under the co-supervision of Prof. Daria Boffito and Prof. Gregory Patience. Debbie has been involved in both student and professional leadership. Debbie served as a 2022/2023 executive of Polyexplore supporting students through events, support groups, and updated the association’s communication strategy. She founded Enercate networks which has since 2016 trained over 2000 beneficiaries in STEM and sustainable energy. She has led in various capacities as a World Economic forum global shaper including with a team on a climate reality leadership plastic bottle collection project; was an advisory board member for the 2024 One young world summit in Montreal; and is currently a Society of Women Ambassador for Canada. She has also worked on electrification planning and renewable energy projects for off grid communities and commercial clusters in Nigeria. Debbie is passionate about sustainability, technology, and equity. She enjoys travel, poetry, cooking, martial arts, festivals, spending time with friends and family. A summary of Deborah’s research is described below:
Aviation contributes 2% to global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and with a projected 3.5% annual increase in air passengers, the sector’s cumulative 2022 - 2050 emissions could reach 47 GtCO2. The Carbon Offsetting and Reduction Scheme for International Aviation (CORSIA) is estimated to mitigate 2.5 GtCO2 between 2021 - 2035 through measures including biofuel to liquid (BTL) and power to liquid (PTL) sustainable aviation fuel (SAF). Regionally, Canada’s 2022 – 2030 aviation climate action plan targets 10% SAF use by 2030 and net zero aviation by 2050 through green aerospace technologies.
PTL is a critical pathway accounting for about 19% of 2030 aviation decarbonization measures and up to 17 GtCO2 emissions reduction, without competition for biomass as in the BTL route. The PTL process converts captured carbon dioxide (CO2) and green hydrogen (H2) to SAF in a clean electricity system. PTL process steps include Reverse Water Gas Shift (RWGS) converting CO2 into syngas (or other CO2 to syngas pathways), and Fischer Tropsch (FT) fuel synthesis from syngas. PTL SAF reduces aviation emissions by up to 80% compared to conventional aviation fuel, and is a drop-in fuel, easy to integrate in existing airline fleets. However, CO2 conversion reactions involved in the PTL process yield water (H2O) by-product. Thus, the H2O by-product and reaction thermodynamics limit productivity, selectivity, and catalytic activity, which are essential contributors to optimum process efficiency, fuel output, and techno-economics, especially as SAF costs are currently 2-5x higher than conventional aviation fuel.
This research project aims to achieve in-situ H2O removal via a membrane reactor which (1) shifts the equilibrium to the product side, (2) increases reaction rate by higher partial pressures, (3) mitigates catalyst deactivation, and (4) reduces energy, catalyst, and end-product separation requirements. The membrane selectively separates H2O molecules, preventing passage of larger gas molecules. In this process intensification, reaction and separation are integrated, as the membrane material deposited on a solid substrate is placed inside the reactor. The membrane synthesis is assisted by ultrasound which in contrast to conventional membrane synthesis methods, anchors particles to the surface of the substrate by forming chemical bonds/interactions and minimizes effects of process conditions such as temperature and synthesis solution concentration in the final membrane formation, resulting in defect free and high-quality membranes. Additionally, this synthesis method is faster, environmentally friendly, and energy efficient.
Shane Orgnero – Engineering Synthetic Microbial Consortia for Carbon-Efficient Waste to Chemicals ProductionUniversity of Toronto (PhD, Chemical Engineering and Applied Chemistry)
Shane received his Bachelor of Science degree in Molecular Genetics from Western University in 2018. From there, he went on get a Master of Science in Applied Biotechnology at Uppsala University in Sweden. Shane is currently pursuing a PhD in Chemical Engineering and Applied Chemistry at the University of Toronto under the supervision of Dr. Christopher Lawson. Outside of research, Shane is the vice president of the BioZone council, a volunteer-based student team that organizes academic and social events, outreach, and lab and professional development events. Shane is also a GSMP mentor in the UofT School of Graduate Studies, where he mentors incoming graduate students. Shane is an avid nature-seeker and athlete, spending his spare time playing in squash leagues, cycling and hiking to the top of as many summits as he can. When not conducting his research and athletic pursuits, Shane loves to cook and has also been known to enjoy singing Karaoke. A summary of Shane’s research is described below:
Chemical manufacturing urgently needs to be reimagined to be dramatically more sustainable, as more than half of global greenhouse gasses are generated by fossil fuel combustion and industrial chemical production. With virtually all chemical production originating from fossil fuels, producing chemicals from societal waste streams like food waste would significantly decarbonize the chemical industry. Unfortunately, these waste streams have thus far been challenging to utilize efficiently. Bioconversion of waste by microbes is a promising strategy for circular chemical production. Unfortunately, individual microbes face metabolic limitations and can carry out only a finite number of biochemical reactions, even with genetic modifications. In contrast, microbiomes can distribute complicated metabolic conversions across community members, improving performance by using a “division of labour” strategy. My research centers on designing, constructing, and genetically engineering synthetic microbiomes to produce value-added chemicals from food and organic waste.
My project aims to develop a synthetic microbiome that converts food waste to medium-chain fatty acids (MCFAs) at nearly 100% carbon efficiency. MCFAs are valuable platform chemicals that can be sold as-is or readily upgraded to produce jet fuels or commodity chemicals. We’re able to leverage automation to investigate hundreds to thousands of microbes for their unique metabolic abilities and create microbial teams most suited to carrying out the necessary bioconversion steps. For example, we can include microbes that naturally recycle CO2 gas, allowing for carbon efficiency, or microbes that eat complicated carbon sources that are hard to access. Once a microbiome is assembled, we will apply genetic engineering to generate novel “defence” strategies into the microbiome, allowing the consortia to persist in the foreign-microbe-rich environment of food and organic waste. By expanding the range of natural defence proteins via the introduction of novel ones, we expect to generate a highly carbon-efficient, resilient microbiome able to convert food waste into useful chemicals. The project overall will serve as a strong demonstration of a new way to manufacture our chemicals from renewable sources, and hopefully an example of the value of circular bioproduction.
