Established in 1909, the Bureau of Economic Geology (BEG) is the oldest research unit at The University of Texas at Austin. BEG’s mission is to serve society by conducting objective, impactful, and integrated geoscience research on relevant energy, environmental, and economic issues. With a staff of over 250 scientists, engineers, economists, and graduate students, they are spearheading basic and applied research projects of relevance to the H2 economy, including subsurface storage, leakage detection, and fracture growth in rocks.
Established in 2006 to capitalize on a half century of excellence in electrochemistry at The University of Texas at Austin, the Center for Electrochemistry (CEC) fosters collaborative research programs in the electrochemical sciences. The CEC is comprised of a multi-disciplinary group of more than 250 faculty, staff, and student researchers spanning the chemistry, materials, and engineering aspects of electrochemical science. CEC’s research area in electrocatalysis and electrochemical energy systems focuses on the discovery, characterization, and mechanistic understanding of new electrocatalysts and materials for electrochemical devices, such as fuel cells and water electrolyzers.
The Center for Electromechanics (CEM) is performing leading edge basic and applied research in electrical and mechanical engineering, with a special emphasis on applied engineering leading to prototype development in electromechanical devices and systems with high specific power, force, and/or energy storage or other unique attributes. Researchers at CEM have deployed Texas’ first H2-powered bus, retrofitted 15 UPS delivery vans with fuel cell hybrid power trains, and have built Texas’ first and only permanent H2 fueling station.
Center for Subsurface Energy and the Environment
The Center for Subsurface Energy and the Environment (CSEE) is an organized research unit with the mission to foster the development of interdisciplinary programs in subsurface energy and the environment. CSEE’s vision is to be the premier academic research organization in all facets of subsurface energy. Through leadership and technology innovation, CSEE will enable energy security that balances environmental impact and affordable resources to help enable a H2 economy.
Established in 2020 as part of the Texas Materials Institute (TMI), the new Electron Microscopy Facility (EMF) hosts advanced instruments for the analysis of materials and their preparation, including a new low-voltage aberration corrected JEOL neoARM Transmission Electron Microscope. Researchers are able to achieve state-of-the-art atomic scale characterization of new materials for H2 generation and utilization.
Oden Institute for Computational Engineering and Sciences
The Oden Institute is an organized research unit created to foster the development of interdisciplinary programs in computational sciences and engineering, mathematical modeling, applied mathematics, software engineering, and computational visualization. The Institute currently supports 12 research centers and alliances and nine research groups, including the Center for Computational Molecular Sciences and the Center for Subsurface Modeling. Researchers are developing computational methodology with the goal of understanding and creating new materials for energy applications, including H2 production and utilization.
Established in 1998 to ensure that The University of Texas at Austin achieves excellence in graduate education and research in the broad field of materials, the Texas Materials Institute (TMI) includes over 10,000 square feet of laboratory space and more than 65 pieces of research instrumentation. The development of clean energy materials is one of the major research areas of the institute and includes materials science and engineering for fuel cells and water electrolysis.