Daniela Marin

TomKat Graduate Fellow for Translational Research

Research Lab: Thomas Jaramillo

Year Awarded: 2022

Daniela is a PhD candidate in the Department of Chemical Engineering advised by Professor Thomas F. Jaramillo. Growing up in Western Colorado, she saw the impacts extreme temperatures exacerbated by climate change have on farm workers, like her father, and decided to pursue a career in the sphere of sustainability.  She is the first in her family to attend college and now holds a B.S. in Chemical Engineering and a B.A. in Physics through a dual-degree program with Columbia University and William Jewell College. Prior to Stanford, she was a post-undergraduate researcher at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory and worked toward advancing the commercialization of bio-derived materials and methods of plastics recycling. In addition to her research, Daniela is excited for her new role as a co-president of the Stanford Hydrogen Club. In her free time, she is a scanning electron microscopy trainer at the Stanford Nano Shared Facilities (SNSF) and an intramural sports referee. Daniela is enthusiastic about using her technical abilities and interest in the environment to contribute to Stanford Chemical Engineering's mission of developing technologies that will improve society and maintain environmental health.

Google Scholar Page

Intermittent Operation of Bipolar Membrane Electrolyzers for Green Hydrogen Generation from Impure Water

The world currently heavily relies on fossil fuels for energy, but due to greenhouse gas emissions causing climate change, transitioning our reliance to renewable energy resources such as wind and solar is crucial. For this shift to occur to the extent needed to achieve carbon neutrality, several challenges must be addressed. One critical challenge is the development of transformational technologies that can withstand the intermittent nature of renewable power-inputs. Hydrogen (H₂) from renewable electricity as an energy storage vector is a transformative solution to the aforementioned challenge. However, conventional electrolysis requires high-purity water streams as a feedstock, making it an unreasonable technology to communities that lack access to clean water. This also necessitates a high capital cost on the front end that makes it difficult for green H₂ to compete with fossil-derived H₂. This project focuses on addressing this critical barrier to green H₂ production with new electrolyzer designs that are capable of intermittent operation with impure water streams (e.g., ground/sea/waste water) and — thereby offering a path toward greater energy access, security, and global decarbonization.

Publications:

Hydrogen production with seawater-resilient bipolar membrane electrolyzer, Joule, 11 April 2023