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INNOVATION IN SOLAR FUELS, 

ELECTRICITY STORAGE, 

AND ADVANCED MATERIALS 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON ENERGY 

COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE, SPACE, AND 

TECHNOLOGY 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

ONE HUNDRED FOURTEENTH CONGRESS 

SECOND SESSION 

June 15, 2016 

Serial No. 114–82 

Printed for the use of the Committee on Science, Space, and Technology 

( 

Available via the World Wide Web: http://science.house.gov 
(II) 

COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE, SPACE, AND TECHNOLOGY 

HON. LAMAR S. SMITH, Texas, Chair 

FRANK D. LUCAS, Oklahoma 

F. JAMES SENSENBRENNER, JR., 

Wisconsin 

DANA ROHRABACHER, California 

RANDY NEUGEBAUER, Texas 

MICHAEL T. MCCAUL, Texas 

MO BROOKS, Alabama 

RANDY HULTGREN, Illinois 

BILL POSEY, Florida 

THOMAS MASSIE, Kentucky 

JIM BRIDENSTINE, Oklahoma 

RANDY K. WEBER, Texas 

JOHN R. MOOLENAAR, Michigan 

STEVE KNIGHT, California 

BRIAN BABIN, Texas 

BRUCE WESTERMAN, Arkansas 

BARBARA COMSTOCK, Virginia 

GARY PALMER, Alabama 

BARRY LOUDERMILK, Georgia 

RALPH LEE ABRAHAM, Louisiana 

DARIN LAHOOD, Illinois 

WARREN DAVIDSON, Ohio 

EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON, Texas 

ZOE LOFGREN, California 

DANIEL LIPINSKI, Illinois 

DONNA F. EDWARDS, Maryland 

SUZANNE BONAMICI, Oregon 

ERIC SWALWELL, California 

ALAN GRAYSON, Florida 

AMI BERA, California 

ELIZABETH H. ESTY, Connecticut 

MARC A. VEASEY, Texas 

KATHERINE M. CLARK, Massachusetts 

DON S. BEYER, JR., Virginia 

ED PERLMUTTER, Colorado 

PAUL TONKO, New York 

MARK TAKANO, California 

BILL FOSTER, Illinois 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON ENERGY

HON. RANDY K. WEBER, Texas, Chair 

DANA ROHRABACHER, California 

RANDY NEUGEBAUER, Texas 

MO BROOKS, Alabama 

RANDY HULTGREN, Illinois 

THOMAS MASSIE, Kentucky 

STEPHAN KNIGHT, California 

BARBARA COMSTOCK, Virginia 

BARRY LOUDERMILK, Georgia 

LAMAR S. SMITH, Texas 

ALAN GRAYSON, Florida 

ERIC SWALWELL, California 

MARC A. VEASEY, Texas 

DANIEL LIPINSKI, Illinois 

KATHERINE M. CLARK, Massachusetts 

ED PERLMUTTER, Colorado 

EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON, Texas 
(III) 

C O N T E N T S 

June 15, 2016 

Page 

Witness List ............................................................................................................. 2 

Hearing Charter ...................................................................................................... 3 

Opening Statements 

Statement by Representative Randy K. Weber, Chairman, Subcommittee on 

Energy, Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, U.S. House of Representatives ........................................................................................................... 4 

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 6 

Statement by Representative Lamar S. Smith, Chairman, Committee on 

Science, Space, and Technology, U.S. House of Representatives ..................... 8 

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 9 

Statement by Representative Alan Grayson, Ranking Member, Subcommittee 

on Energy, Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, U.S. House of 

Representatives .................................................................................................... 11 

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 13 

Witnesses: 

Dr. Nate Lewis, Professor, California Institute of Technology 

Oral Statement ................................................................................................. 15 

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 18 

Dr. Daniel Scherson, Professor, Case Western Reserve UniversityI23Oral 

Statement 33 

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 35 

Dr. Collin Broholm, Professor, Johns Hopkins University 

Oral Statement ................................................................................................. 43 

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 45 

Dr. Daniel Hallinan Jr., Assistant Professor, Florida A&M University—Florida State University College of Engineering 

Oral Statement ................................................................................................. 86 

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 88 

Discussion ................................................................................................................. 96 

Appendix I: Additional Material for the Record 

Statement submitted by Representative Eddie Bernice Johnson, Ranking Minority Member, Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, U.S. House 

of Representatives ................................................................................................ 116 

(1) 

INNOVATION IN SOLAR FUELS, 

ELECTRICITY STORAGE, 

AND ADVANCED MATERIALS 

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 15, 2016 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, SUBCOMMITTEE ON ENERGY, COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE, SPACE, AND TECHNOLOGY, Washington, D.C. 

The Subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 10:07 a.m., in Room 

2318 of the Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Randy Weber 

[Chairman of the Subcommittee] presiding. 
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Chairman WEBER. The Subcommittee on Energy will come to 

order. Without objection, the Chair is authorized to declare recesses 

of the Subcommittee at any time. 

Welcome to today’s hearing entitled ‘‘Innovation in Solar Fuels, 

Electricity Storage, and Advanced Materials.’’ I recognize myself for 

an opening statement. 

Good morning. Today, we will hear from a panel of experts on 

the status of America’s basic research portfolio, which provides the 

foundation for development of solar fuels, electricity storage, and 

quantum computing systems. Hearings like today help remind us 

of the Science Committee’s core focus: the basic research that provides the foundation of technology through breakthroughs. 

We’re going to discuss the science behind potentially 

groundbreaking technology today. But before America ever sees the 

deployment of a commercial solar fuel system or we move to quantum computing, a lot of discovery science must be accomplished. 

For the solar fuel process, also known as artificial photosynthesis, 

new materials and catalysts will need to be developed through research. If this research yields the right materials, scientists could 

create a system that could consolidate solar power and energy storage into one cohesive process. This would potentially remove the 

intermittency of solar energy and make it a reliable power source 

for chemical fuels production. That is a game-changer. 

In the field of electricity storage research, there is a lot of excitement—or as I like to say there’s electricity in the air—about more 

efficient batteries that could operate for longer durations under decreased charge times. But not enough people are asking just how 

could we design a battery system that moves more electrons at the 

atomic level, a key aspect to—excuse me—drastically increasing 

the efficiency or power of a battery. This transformational approach, known as multivalent ion intercalation, will use 

foundational study of electrochemistry to build a better battery 

from the ground up. 

And then finally, there is quantum computing, which relies on a 

thorough understanding of quantum mechanics, a challenging concept that is a longer discussion for a different hearing. For today, 

I hope we can discuss how a quantum computing system could 

change the way computers operate. In order to achieve this kind 

of revolutionary improvement in computing, we’re going to need 

foundational knowledge in the materials needed to build those systems also known as quantum materials. 

I look forward to hearing from Dr. Broholm—have I got that 

right, Doctor—— 

Dr. BROHOLM. Yes. 

Chairman WEBER. —in his research—your research in that field. 

Today, we hear a lot of enthusiasm for solar power, batteries, 

and high-performance computing technology, yet few innovators 

are talking about how these technologies could be transformed at 

the fundamental level. In Congress, we have to take the long-term 

view and be patient, making smart investments in research that 

can lead to the next big discovery. 

When it comes to providing strong support for basic research, 

this Science Committee won’t get any major accolades or headlines 

today. But someday, someday, when the next disruptive technology 
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changes our economy for the better, I firmly believe that discovery 

science will play that central role. 

DOE must prioritize basic research over grants for technology 

that is ready for commercial deployment. When the government 

steps in to push today’s technology in the energy market, it’s actually competing against private investors and it uses limited resources to do so. But when the government supports basic research 

and development, everyone has the opportunity to access the fundamental knowledge that can lead to the development of future energy technologies. 

I want to thank our accomplished panel of witnesses for testifying today, and I look forward to a productive discussion about the 

DOE basic energy research portfolio. 

[The prepared statement of Chairman Weber follows:] 
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Chairman WEBER. I now recognize the Ranking Member. 

Mr. GRAYSON. Sorry, would the Committee Chair like to precede 

me? Would the Committee Chair like to precede me? 

Chairman SMITH. I’d be happy to. I thank the gentleman. And 

let me thank the Chairman as well. 

Today, we will examine American innovation in solar fuels, electricity storage, and advanced materials. The Department of Energy’s Office of Science is the nation’s lead federal agency for basic 

research in the physical sciences. This type of fundamental research allows scientists to make groundbreaking discoveries about 

everything from our universe to the smallest particle. It has led to 

transformative breakthroughs in energy science that will allow the 

private sector to develop innovative energy technologies. 

Today’s hearing will provide a status update on the Department’s 

basic research in solar chemistry, energy storage, and advanced 

materials. Electricity storage is one of the next frontiers in energy 

research and development. Innovation in batteries could help bring 

affordable renewable energy to the market without costly subsidies 

or mandates. 

By investing in the basic scientific research that will underpin 

and lead to new advanced battery technology, we can enable utilities and others to store and deliver power produced elsewhere. This 

will allow us to take advantage of energy from the diverse natural 

resources available across the country. 

Another high-reward application of energy basic research is solar 

fuels, also known as artificial photosynthesis. Through the study of 

chemistry and materials science, researchers are developing systems that can use energy from sunlight to yield a range of chemical 

fuels. 

Our last topic for today’s hearing is advanced materials research. 

By examining substances at the atomic level, researchers can develop materials with the exact qualities necessary for an application, like thickness, strength, or heat resistance. These new materials could provide the capability for quantum computing systems 

that will fundamentally change the way we move and process data. 

Basic scientific research like the work funded by DOE’s Office of 

Science requires a long-term commitment. While this 

groundbreaking science can eventually support the development of 

new advanced energy technologies by the private sector, Congress 

must ensure limited federal dollars are spent wisely and efficiently. 

Federal research and development can build the foundation for the 

next major scientific breakthrough. 

As we shape the future of the Department of Energy, our priority 

must be basic energy science and research that only the federal 

government has the resources and mission to pursue. This will enable the private sector, driven by the profit motive, to develop and 

move groundbreaking technology to the market across the energy 

spectrum, create jobs, and grow our economy. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to thank the Ranking Member 

for letting me precede him as well. 

[The prepared statement of Chairman Smith follows:] 
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Chairman WEBER. I thank the gentleman. 

Now, the Ranking Member is recognized for a five minute opening statement. 

Mr. GRAYSON. Thank you, Chairman Weber. Thank you, Chairman Smith, for holding this hearing, and thank you to the witnesses for providing your testimony today. 

The Basic Energy Sciences program in the Department of Energy’s Office of Science supports fundamental research in materials 

science, physics, chemistry, and engineering with an emphasis on 

energy applications. BES is the largest program in the Office of 

Science, and it’s home to several state-of-the-art facilities that provide world-class capabilities to the scientific community. BES is 

home to five of the world’s Advanced Light Sources, to unique neutron scattering facilities, and five nanoscale research centers. 

All these BES facilities are considered user facilities meaning 

that they provide broad access not only to scientific government inquiry but also to university researchers and private industry. That 

being said, please do not try neutron scattering at home. 

Each year, over 14,000 scientists use these facilities, and the demand for access to facilities can exceed the time available. In many 

cases, the high demand for these facilities requires weightless and 

extensive efforts to fit as many interested users into the schedule 

as possible. 

The vast array of research and diverse collection of scientists 

that take advantage of these facilities make them fertile ground for 

scientific collaboration and also innovation cutting across scientific 

specialties. The knowledge gained through research supported by 

BES underpins the applied energy research supported by other 

DOE programs and by the private sector. Innovation and materials 

science, chemical analysis, geological imagery, and electrochemistry 

can have far-reaching impacts on renewable energy, energy efficiency, battery storage, and nuclear power to name just a few subjects. 

I look forward to hearing from our witnesses as to how they put 

benefited from federal support that we provided to build these user 

facilities, as well as other resources provided by BES. I’d particularly like to welcome Dr. Hallinan from Florida A&M and Florida 

State University’s College of Engineering to today’s hearing. His research has the potential to achieve considerable gains in battery 

storage, which would help the renewable energy sector play an 

even larger role in our economy in the coming years. 

Solving renewable energy’s day-versus-night challenge could 

allow for a faster transition to a low-carbon energy future for the 

United States and the world. Also, it would be good if you can 

make the sun shine at night, but that’s probably outside the scope 

of your research. 

Dr. Hallinan, as we will hear, has relied upon the Advanced 

Light Source and the Advanced Photon Source facilities to advance 

his work by testing new solid polymers that can be used as battery 

electrolytes. His work is an excellent example of what we can accomplish if we fund the vital research and facilities of the Office 

of Science amply. 

Last week, the Basic Energy Science Advisory Committee released a new report on the prioritization of upgrades to the major 
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BES facilities. One of the witnesses here today may have been directly involved in developing this report. I hope we can consider revisiting this topic in the near future with a closer look at the facility upgrades that are currently under consideration. These proposed upgrades represent major government investments and thus 

major opportunities. Prioritizing and funding the research that’s 

being highlighted today should certainly be a bipartisan issue and 

one in which we should make considerable progress on by working 

together. 

With that, I yield the balance of my time. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Grayson follows:] 
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Chairman WEBER. And I thank the gentleman. Again, I thank 

you for letting the Ranking—I mean, for our full Committee Chair 

go first. 

Let me introduce our witnesses today. Our first witness today is 

Dr. Nathan Lewis, Professor at the California Institute of Technology. Dr. Lewis is an inorganic materials chemist who is a globally recognized authority in artificial photosynthesis. Perhaps he’s 

the one that needs to make the space in the night. Dr. Lewis received his Ph.D. in chemistry from MIT. 

Our second witness today is Dr. Daniel Scherson, Professor at 

Case Western Reserve University. Dr. Scherson received his Ph.D. 

in chemistry from the University of California Davis. 

Our next witness today is Dr. Collin Broholm. Am I saying that 

correctly, Doctor? 

Dr. BROHOLM. Yes. 

Chairman WEBER. Yes. A Professor at Johns Hopkins University, 

Dr. Broholm received his Ph.D. from the University of Copenhagen. 

And I will now yield to the Ranking Member to introduce our 

final witness. 

Mr. GRAYSON. Thank you. Dr. Daniel Hallinan is unaccountably 

only Assistant Professor—I don’t get that at all; you should be a 

full professor—in the College of Engineering at Florida A&M and 

Florida State University. As an independent investigator, he researches the use of solid polymers as electrolyte membranes in batteries, which have the potential to offer a safer, longer-lasting battery. 

During his career, he has utilized both the Advanced Photon 

Source at Argonne National Lab and the Advanced Light Source at 

Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. His current research allows him 

to visit the Advanced Photon Source with his students regularly to 

explore the fundamental makeup of the materials that they’re testing and from time to time actually insert the students into the photon source and light them up. No, no, that’s not what he does. 

Never mind that. 

Dr. Hallinan has degrees in chemical engineering and philosophy 

from Lafayette College and a Ph.D. in chemical engineering from 

Drexel University. His passion for science and innovative research 

has certainly been an inspiration to his students, and his work is 

a perfect example of our conversation today about supporting basic 

energy sciences and why it is so important. Thank you for testifying. 

Chairman WEBER. Thank you, Mr. Grayson. 

I now recognize Dr. Lewis for five minutes to present his testimony. Dr. Lewis? 

TESTIMONY OF DR. NATE LEWIS, PROFESSOR, 

CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY 

Dr. LEWIS. Chairman Smith, Chairman Weber, Ranking Member 

Grayson, Members of the Subcommittee, thank you very much for 

the opportunity to discuss this very exciting and timely research 

area of artificial photosynthesis, which is the direct production of 

fuels from sunlight. 

Artificial photosynthesis has the potential indeed to be a gamechanging energy technology, cost-effectively producing fuels that 
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are compatible with our existing infrastructure, and providing us 

with both energy and environmental security. 

Artificial photosynthesis is inspired by plants except that it can 

be over 10 times more efficient than natural photosynthesis, avoiding the need to trade food for fuel and producing a fuel unlike 

lignocellulose that we can directly used to power our vehicles, to 

potentially make ammonia for fertilizer to feed people around the 

world, and for other uses that they may develop. 

Solar fuels production would also solve massive grid-scale energy 

storage so when the sun doesn’t shine at night, we can still provide 

power to whenever people need it and carbon-neutral transportation fuels, which are both critical gaps at present that research 

is needed to obtain a full carbon-neutral energy system. 

Artificial photosynthesis does not look like a leaf, nor does it look 

like a solar panel. Instead, imagine a high-performance fabric that 

could be rolled out like artificial turf, supply that with sunlight, 

water, and perhaps other feedstocks from the air like nitrogen or 

carbon dioxide, and produce a fuel that gets wicked out into drainage pipes and collected for use. It’s that simple in principle. 

Many approaches to solar fuels are being pursued. Some are taking biological molecules like the green pigment chlorophylls and 

using them coupled to manmade catalysts. Others use all inorganic 

materials like semiconductors at the nanoscale and couple them to 

catalysts like ones used in fuel cells. Still others use metal complexes as dyes and couple them to molecular catalysts. 

Laboratories like mine at Caltech have already demonstrated 

functional solar fuels systems through advances in nanoscience 

that have enabled us to fabricate nanofibers of semiconductors that 

can absorb light and couple them to catalysts all in a piece of plastic. So we know this is possible, but we need to continue to innovate and perform fundamental research to make it practical. 

A full system of solar fuels needs five components, two materials 

to absorb sunlight, one to capture the blue part of the rainbow, the 

other to capture the red part of the rainbow to make it very efficient. We need two catalysts, one to oxidize water from the air to 

provide electrons to make the reduced catalyst make the fuel that 

we want to harvest. We also need a membrane to separate those 

products to ensure that the system is safe and doesn’t explode. 

We actually have all of those pieces. What we don’t have is all 

of those pieces all working together seamlessly in one system 

where they all are stable and mutually compatible. Research opportunities include the use of high-performance computation to design 

new catalysts, to design new semiconductors, and to do modeling 

and simulation to help us understand how to make the system 

work as a whole, not just the pieces. 

Many approaches are useful, and many fuels could be produced. 

We might produce a liquid fuel directly. We might produce a gaseous fuel and then convert it to a liquid fuel. We might think about 

a solar refinery the way we have an oil refinery where in comes 

our solar crude and then we convert it to various fuels as the output using the stained chemical processes that we use today. 

In closing, I also would like to make two points. One is that 

many other countries now have burgeoning efforts in solar fuels. 

There are large efforts starting in Korea, Japan, China, Sweden, 
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Germany, and the EU. We should beneficially leverage those efforts. We’re well-positioned to do that given our historical leadership in solar fuels in the United States. 

The second point is that solar fuels is an intellectual challenge 

that stimulates our young scientists, our graduate students, our 

postdocs involving nanoscience, material science, and fundamental 

research and energy broadly to give us better options for energy 

technologies than the ones that we have now. Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Dr. Lewis follows:] 
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Chairman WEBER. Thank you, Dr. Lewis. 

Dr. Scherson, you’re recognized for five minutes. 

TESTIMONY OF DR. DANIEL SCHERSON, PROFESSOR, 

CASE WESTERN RESERVE UNIVERSITY 

Dr. SCHERSON. Thank you. 

Chairman Smith, Chairman Weber, Ranking Member Grayson, 

and Members of the Subcommittee, I thank you for the opportunity 

to testify in today’s hearing on innovation in solar fuels, electricity 

storage—— 

Chairman WEBER. Dr. Scherson, is your mike on? And put your 

mike—— 

Dr. SCHERSON. My apologies, sir. 

Chairman WEBER. There you go, right in front of you. 

Dr. SCHERSON. All right. Could I start again? 

Chairman Smith, Chairman Weber, Ranking Member Grayson, 

and Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity 

to testify in today’s hearing on innovation in solar fuels, electricity 

storage, and advanced materials. My name is Daniel Scherson, and 

I’m the Frank Hovorka Professor of Chemistry and Director of the 

Ernest B. Yeager Center for Electrochemical Sciences at Case 

Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, and until a few 

days ago, President of the Electrochemical Society. 

Electrochemistry, a 2-century-old discipline, has reemerged in recent years as key to achieve sustainability and improve human 

welfare. The scientific and technological domain of electrochemistry 

is very wide, extending from the corrosive effects of the weather on 

the safety and integrity of our bridges and roads, to the management of diabetes and Parkinson’s disease, and to the fabrication of 

three-dimensional circuitry of ever-smaller and more complex architecture. In addition, electrochemistry is becoming central to the 

way in which we generate, store, and manage electricity derived 

from such intermittent energy sources as the sun and wind. 

Among the most ubiquitous electrochemical devices ever invented 

are batteries. Mostly hidden from sight, batteries convert chemicals 

into electrical energy used to power cell phones and portable electronics, which are critical to the way we communicate and store information, as well as electrical vehicles, which are expected to mitigate the dangers posed by the release of greenhouse gases into the 

atmosphere. 

I have been asked to focus my attention this morning on aspects 

of electrochemistry that relate to energy storage, which are expected to greatly impact not only the transportation sector but also 

the management and optimization of the electrical grid, which combined account for 2/3 of all the energy used in the United States. 

Scientific and technological advances in this area will bring about 

a reduction in operating costs, spur economic growth, and create 

new jobs and promote U.S. innovation in the global marketplace. 

The advent of ever more powerful computers and advanced theoretical methods have made it possible to predict with increased accuracy the behavior not only of materials but also of interfaces. The 

latter play a key role in the chemical industry where there is a 

strong pressure to develop effective catalysts to increase yields and 

lower energy demands. This is also true in the area of 
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electrocatalysis, which is critical to the optimization of electrolyzers 

and fuel cells, yet another class of electrochemical energy conversion devices. 

In the area of transportation, any new developments aimed at 

augmenting reliability, safety, and comfort must be made without 

compromising performance. Today, batteries for electric cars cannot 

match already-established standards for range per tank of gasolinepowered vehicles. In simple terms, the energy a battery can store 

depends on the charge capacity and its voltage. So whereas the energy is dictated by thermodynamics, the power batteries can deliver 

is given by the current times the voltage. 

To illustrate, lithium-ion batteries rely on only a single electron 

per atom of electrode material to store energy and deliver power. 

One obvious solution to increase the energy is then to double or, 

better yet, triple the number of electrons per atom of storage material without decreasing its voltage. Although the viability of such 

a concept has been demonstrated for the case of magnesium, a 

divalent metal, using a purely empirical approach, its performance 

is still below that required for meeting the demands of the largest 

markets. 

Theoretical work at the Joint Center for Electrochemical Storage 

Research, JCESR, DOE’s energy hub led by Argonne National Laboratory, has unveiled new yet-to-be synthesized materials that display promising characteristics. Results have shown that the primary bottleneck resides in the mobility of divalent magnesium ion 

within the host lattice, which is greatly enhancing materials where 

the ions sit in energetically and unfavorable sites as compared to 

the sites along the path of migration. Such design rules have been 

validated in the laboratory for known materials, and arrangements 

have been made with partners, laboratories to synthesize these 

new promising materials. 

Equally important is the search of new organic electrolytes exhibiting large voltage windows of stability, including ionic 

solvation. From an overall perspective, the problems that remain to 

be resolved towards achieving sustainability demand a fundamental understanding of the basic processes underlying energy conversion and energy storage at a microscopic level and the development of spectroscopic and structural probes with highly spatial and 

temporal resolution to monitor individual atomic and molecular 

events. Such knowledge can only come from new generations of scientists trained at our colleges, universities, and national laboratories, which will require increased research support from the government. 

Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Dr. Scherson follows:] 
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Chairman WEBER. Thank you, Dr. Scherson. 

Dr. Broholm, you are recognized for five minutes. 

TESTIMONY OF DR. COLLIN BROHOLM, 

PROFESSOR, JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY 

Dr. BROHOLM. Thank you very much. Chairman Weber, Ranking 

Member Grayson, and distinguished Members of the Subcommittee 

on Energy, thank you very much for the opportunity to testify 

today on the topic of quantum materials. 

Seventy years ago when amplification of an electrical signal by 

a transistor was first demonstrated, no one could have imagined 

that the average person in 2016 would employ billions of transistors in their energy and information-intensive lives. What will be 

the next materials-based technological revolution, and how can we 

ensure the United States once again leads the way? 

Since its 1947 discovery of the transistor, Bell Laboratories, now 

a part of Nokia, has shrunk and is no longer active in fundamental 

materials research. While the opportunities for groundbreaking 

progress from advanced materials have never been greater, the research now has a broad and fundamental character that no single 

company can sustain. 

The specific example that I’d like to focus on is quantum materials. Quantum mechanics has key effects in all materials, but the 

most dramatic departure from the familiar generally fade from 

view beyond the atomic scale. The Heisenberg uncertainty principle 

is, however, on display in elemental helium that fails to solidify 

upon cooling even to the absolute zero temperature. Instead, an astounding superfluid state occurs where atoms form a coherent matter wave that flows without any friction whatsoever. 

We now find it may be possible to realize such counterintuitive 

properties of matter in a new class of quantum materials, of which 

I shall provide a couple of examples. 

Superconductivity is a low-temperature property of many metals, 

including aluminum wherein electrons form a coherent wave much 

as the atoms in superfluid helium. But because electrons carry 

charge, an electrical current can then flow with zero resistance. 

While presently available, superconductors require cryogenic cooling, we know of no reason that superconductivity like ferromagnetism should not be possible at much higher temperatures. 

A practical superconductor would have enormous technological 

consequences, including the ability to generate, store, transport, 

and utilize electrical energy without resistive losses. There’s much 

recent progress in the scientific understanding of a new class of 

superconductivity enhanced by interactions between electrons. 

While we do not have a winner yet, this fortifies our belief that a 

practical superconducting material will eventually be discovered. 

The next topic is topological materials. The geometry of the wave 

function that describes electrons in these materials gives rise to 

revolutionary electrical properties. In a topological insulator, for example, all surfaces are electrically conducting even though the core 

or the center of the material is actually insulating. And this is a 

really appealing property considering that the surface transport 

must typically be engineered into electrical devices and is associated with significant resistive energy losses. In topological 
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insulators, a high-quality conducting surface occurs spontaneously, 

and there are many more fascinating properties of topological materials that indicate they will have transformative technological impacts. 

Digital archiving of events from those of individual families to 

those that define our times is generally based on magnetic information storage. While hard disc storage densities now exceed 1 terabit 

per square inch, each bit still involves a very large number of 

atoms. By using wrinkles on a prevailing order within a quantum 

material to store information, it may be possible to dramatically increase the information storage density. 

Finally, a new form of information processing called quantum 

computing has the potential to transform decision-making. One of 

the approaches now being pursued is to utilize so-called quasi-particles within a quantum material to carry and process information. 

While this is a long-term vision, it is as feasible now as an integrated circuit with 10 billion transistors must have seemed like in 

1947. 

Given the potential technological impacts, quantum materials are 

receiving huge worldwide attention. Dedicated research centers are 

proliferating, and I would argue that within the DOE as well, 

quantum material should be an area of high priority. The Basic Research Needs Report on quantum materials identifies four priority 

research directions that would accelerate scientific progress in 

quantum materials and their technological deployment. 

So as in much of the modern development of advanced materials, 

world-class tools are essential for this work. Such as the neutron 

sources at Oak Ridge Lab and the synchrotron and free electron 

laser-based light sources, these are absolutely essential to be able 

to sustain—to be able to do this kind of work. And while these are 

already excellent facilities that are having strong impacts, several 

are in urgent need of upgrades to sustain international leadership. 

In the continuing quest to bend materials to satisfy our needs, 

it is inevitable that we should eventually employ the wave-like nature of matter for new functional materials and electronic devices. 

To do so requires a deep fundamental knowledge of interacting 

electrons in the quantum realm, versatile abilities to synthesize 

new materials from the atomic scale to bolt single crystals, and an 

array of experimental tools that probe structure and motion over 

broad range of length and time scales. 

Sustained basic research efforts in quantum materials can ensure the United States leads the way as these materials transform 

a broad range of energy and information technologies. Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Dr. Broholm follows:] 
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Chairman WEBER. Thank you, Dr. Broholm. 

Dr. Hallinan, you’re recognized for five minutes. 

TESTIMONY OF DR. DANIEL HALLINAN JR., 

ASSISTANT PROFESSOR, 

FLORIDA A&M UNIVERSITY—FLORIDA STATE UNIVERSITY 

COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING 

Mr. HALLINAN. Good morning. Thank you for the opportunity to 

testify in today’s hearing. 

I’m here to speak to the importance of the Department of Energy’s national light sources to research and to the technological challenges of the nation. I will also briefly address the impact of the 

proposed upgrades on research capabilities and U.S. scientific competitiveness. I thank the Committee for its long-standing and robust support of national light sources and energy research. 

Synchrotron light sources are large-scale facilities. These clearly 

are not possible—practical for individual academic or industrial 

labs, let alone at home. However, they enable high-impact research 

that would not be possible otherwise, and they advance our scientific understanding of matter across length scales from the atomic to that which we can see with our own eyes. They provide insight 

into dynamics from ultrafast making and breaking of chemical 

bonds to structural relaxations that take longer than a year. They 

allow us to map in three dimensions the composition of materials 

that are poised to address energy and water needs of the country 

and the world. 

So my personal experience with synchrotron light sources began 

during my postdoctoral fellowship at Lawrence Berkeley National 

Laboratory where I used four of the beam lines of the Advanced 

Light Source, and I worked with beam line scientists there. Now 

as an Assistant Professor at Florida State University, my group 

continues to collaborate with scientists at Berkeley Lab, but we 

also use, due to uniquenesses, some beam lines at the Advanced 

Photon Source of Argonne National Lab. FSU, Florida State University, recognizes the value of the travel to do this research, and 

they support it. 

So this schematic that you see on the monitors I’m going to use 

just to explain to you briefly how the synchrotron light source actually works. So electrons are accelerated to near the speed of light 

around this ring, and in order to get them to curve around the ring, 

magnets are used. And when the magnets curve the electrons, xrays are released tangentially, and you can see those x-rays then 

go to experiment stations. And there are many experiment stations 

located all around this ring. So they are—and there are many different types of experiments that can be done with these x-rays. 

So you can categorize those experiments into three main types, 

and that’s scattering, microscopy, and spectroscopy. So with scattering, x-ray scattering allows us to do is to look at both length and 

time scales of a very wide range of length and time scales of complex materials. Microscopy allows us to look inside materials so we 

can get inside something you couldn’t see inside of with optical 

light and very small length scales and we can see the composition 

in there. And then spectroscopy specifically gives us the composition of materials. So, for example, we can watch the chemical 
87 

changes that occur as we charge and discharge a battery that occur 

in the electrode, for example. 

So just some statistics about these user facilities, there are many 

thousands of researchers that access the light sources across the 

nation each year at no charge, but this access is based on a competitive process. And the competitive process is to ensure that 

sound and impactful science is being conducted. The researchers 

come from a wide range of fields and generate thousands of research publications each year, contributing significantly to the nation’s innovation-based economy. 

And the most exciting thing to me is that these synchrotron light 

sources enable numerous scientific discoveries that wouldn’t be 

practical without the facilities. And this practical uniqueness of 

each facility is the primary reason that they continue to be an integral part of my research program. 

So I’ll mention two areas of my personal research that they impact. So the first is safer, longer-lasting batteries. With batteries, 

we could increase dramatically the efficiency of our transportation. 

These electric vehicles are much more efficient than internal combustion engines. But commercial lithium-ion batteries now are not 

inherently safe. They have a flammable liquid electrolyte. There 

are engineering controls to protect against that, but they’re not inherently safe, so that’s why we’re interested in polymer electrolytes. And these polymer electrolytes can not only enable safer batteries but they’re compatible with some advanced electrode materials. But their dynamics are somewhat limited, and so we’re 

studying the dynamics and the structure of polymer electrolytes for 

batteries. 

The other area that I’m really interested I’m just going to touch 

on for a moment is energy-efficient water generation. So polymer 

electrolytes, polymers with charge in them are actually promising 

materials for generating more energy-efficient water from desalination, for example. But in order to do that, the structure of the polymer is very important, and that structure is a function of the water 

content and the salt concentration in the polymer. So we’re using 

these—some of these x-ray facilities to study the structure as a 

function of salt and water in these polymers. 

So in closing, for those of you who have not had the opportunity 

to visit one of these facilities, I would like to impress upon you the 

scale. So as you saw in that schematic, these things can be the size 

of a baseball field or even larger than the size of a whole baseball 

stadium depending on the facility, and they have hundreds of personnel, highly trained personnel, who work as a team to keep these 

things operating consistently and safely. There are a lot of safety 

concerns. 

So this was really inspiring to me to see this many people working together on science. And I think it’s a testament to what we 

have achieved, but new opportunities do await with the most recent synchrotron breakthroughs, and I encourage you to continue 

to robustly support the operating budgets of these facilities, as well 

as the proposed upgrades. 

I thank you for your time, and I’m happy to answer any questions you might have. 

[The prepared statement of Dr. Hallinan follows:] 
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Chairman WEBER. Thank you, Dr. Hallinan. 

I now recognize myself for five minutes, although that’s not 

enough time for questions. 

Dr. Lewis, you mentioned in your testimony that multidisciplinary teams of researchers can serve as a useful mechanism to 

advance to artificial photosynthesis research. Do you think that 

that model is the preferred approach to this science compared to 

individual investigator labs? And then I’m going to have you weigh 

in on it also, too—well, I’ll come back to you. Go ahead, Dr. Lewis. 

Dr. LEWIS. Thank you for the question. I think we need both. We 

need individual investigators still exploring all sorts of possibilities, 

and then we need teams of people because solar fuels is much like 

building a battery. If you have one piece, a catalyst, or you have 

another piece, a light absorber, and they don’t work together or 

they’re not safe operating together, then you still don’t have anything that’s relevant in the end. 

So this is where you need the teams of people. You need the 

teams of people to think at the systems level to make sure that 

we’re all rowing our oars in concert toward the same end goal, and 

that’s best done by having engineers, chemical and mechanical engineers, by having applied physicists, by having chemists all at 

least talking to each other on a regular basis and working toward 

the same end goal, whether they’re all in one facility or distributed 

in different facilities by videoconferencing is less important than 

that they all are on the same page. 

Chairman WEBER. How often do they talk to one another and in 

what format? And I think you may have answer part of that question, videoconferencing. How often does that take place? 

Dr. LEWIS. It depends on the facility. In Energy Frontier Research Centers, and Energy Innovation Hubs that I’ve been affiliated with on some cases every day, in some cases every week, but 

certainly more often than every month. A lot of it is in person, and 

for remote sites, routinely by video. 

Chairman WEBER. Dr. Scherson, I have the same question for 

you regarding how to achieve those potential breakthroughs in 

electrochemistry. 

Dr. SCHERSON. Yes, well, certain aspects of my answer will follow 

what Professor Lewis was referring to. In a battery we have two 

electrodes and we have an electrolyte in between. Each of these 

components needs individual attention. Solving 2/3 of the problem 

does not solve the problem of coming up with a viable device. So 

it’s absolutely essential to engage people with knowledge in physics 

so that we can understand how ions migrate through lattices. We 

need to involve our chemists that are going to give us insight into 

how ions solvate and migrate through the electrolyte and engineers 

that will have to teach us how to assemble the device, and finally, 

I guess that technoeconomic models are also necessary in order to 

decide whether certain technology is viable or not in the marketplace. 

Chairman WEBER. I just want to know if you can explain that 

to my wife so she can keep her cell phone battery charged more 

often. If you could put that in layman’s language for her, that’d be 

helpful. 
97 

So let me follow up then for you both. So we’ve been scrutinizing 

the entire DOE research and development portfolio in this Congress, and I’ve never heard of EERE supporting any R&D in these 

areas. What are the research challenges to enable artificial photosynthesis in multivalent systems to transition into that technology 

that is ready for the private sector to commercialize? And could 

DOE’s EERE applied research programs support that work, Dr. 

Lewis? 

Dr. LEWIS. Thank you. That’s a very important question and also 

programmatic aspects. EERE does support work on not solar fuels 

but related systems where there’s corporate activity such as 

electrolyzers or fuel cells. That being said, they can leverage that 

investment they’ve already made where there’s common ground because a solar fuel system just works as a fuel cell in reverse. 

So the same kind of structures, the same kind of implementation 

that EERE is learning from and developing could well be applied 

and should be applied in translational research to build systems 

like the bubble wrap vision that we might have for a solar fuels 

generator to take the pieces that are developed by the Office of 

Science and to constrain them into the useful sets that are in a system that could be deployed. That would be very important as a role 

for EERE. 

Chairman WEBER. Dr. Scherson? 

Dr. SCHERSON. Yes. In fact, the same role would apply to the 

field of batteries. There are situations where developments are 

made and people get excited and then they go and try to make a 

viable device, and to find that certain questions were not answered 

properly. And so I think that the involvement of the government 

of the basic research becomes essential in order to migrate from the 

very basic research into industry. This is a role that EERE should 

play. 

Chairman WEBER. Thank you. I’m out of time. I’m now going to 

recognize the Ranking Member here with us, Dr. Mark Veasey. 

Mr. VEASEY. Well, thank you very much. 

And I wanted to ask some questions about energy storage for Dr. 

Hallinan and Dr. Scherson. I know that you’re both working on innovations in electrical energy storage. I wanted to know if you 

could speak about your research and how it may lead to breakthroughs in developing new battery technologies. 

Dr. SCHERSON. If I may start? 

Mr. VEASEY. Yes, please. 

Dr. SCHERSON. Well, the components of a battery are numerous. 

In fact, very simply, if you take a cathode of the lithium-ion battery 

that powers your cell phone, you will find that it is composed of little tiny particles that are all electrically interconnected by yet another component, and so the key is to be able to isolate each of the 

components of the battery and try to understand their properties, 

their intrinsic properties. So in my research group, we are looking 

at single particles of a cathode or anode and trying to investigate 

the dynamics, for example, of ion insertion into the materials. 

That’s important when you charge or discharge. We are taking particles of the anode and trying to understand how the anode reacts 

with the electrolyte, forming a passive film that is required for the 

operation of the battery. 
98 

So in essence, we need to understand the individual components 

and then understand how the assembly of these components will 

make a device that is going to fulfill the purposes for which it was 

intended. 

Mr. VEASEY. Another question I wanted to ask you was about energy storage. As we know, there are many challenges that we face 

when it comes to energy storage in the area of wind and solar, particularly if we want to be able to provide a certain amount for our 

energy grid and portfolio. Do you have—anything else of—just 

about the challenges that may remain that we may not be aware 

of? 

And then also I wanted to ask you, do you think that if we’re 

able to overcome some of the storage challenges and issues, will 

that allow us to be able to even use wind more efficiently? I don’t 

know if you’ve ever been to a wind farm in Texas. We provide a 

lot of wind in the State of Texas, but they do take up quite a bit 

of space to get the wind from West Texas into the Dallas-Fort 

Worth metroplex, for instance. You’re talking acres and acres and 

acres. If you could just briefly touch on that, I definitely would appreciate it. 

Dr. SCHERSON. Well, in fact, I have not been in Texas at those 

facilities, but I’ve been in Spain where there is a heavy use of 

wind. So the trick here is to convert the wind energy into, let’s say, 

another kind of energy, so one way is to store it electricity. So you 

may ask what kind of devices are there available in order to store 

this electricity for use when the wind is not blowing? 

So there are batteries, right? There are also some other devices 

that are called redox flow batteries, which is like a battery but 

then you have these enormous amounts of liquid that get passed 

through the electrodes and then you can store power in that fashion. In fact, the Swiss Government is investing lots of money in implementing such an approach. 

The other possibility is to convert that electrical energy into 

chemicals that can be stored and then used at a later time. 

So just to give you an idea of the numbers. In your car you have 

the lead acid battery, and that will give you, let’s say, 100 units. 

So if you were going to move the technology into lithium-ion, then 

you will get 250 units. So if we can transition that into magnesium, 

which is one of the divalent metals that is being explored at 

JCESR, then you can increase that number up to 700. 

And then lastly, if you go to the limit you could have three electrons per atom of charge storage, you can get easily to 1,000. So 

you can see by transitioning from today’s technology with lead acid, 

we can get about an order of magnitude more efficient energy storage by moving into these multivalent ion systems. 

Mr. HALLINAN. Could I make a comment? 

So there are other ways also to increase the capacity of energy 

we can store. And as has been mentioned, if we increase the voltage of—the energy that’s stored is the product of the capacity times 

the voltage. So we can—to increase the energy, we can increase the 

capacity, which we can do by going to multivalent ions or going to 

other electrochemistries. Lithium air batteries is this holy grail 

that takes us an order of magnitude higher in battery capacity en-
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ergy storage. But then we can also just go to higher voltage, make 

the voltage of the battery higher. 

And in order to do those things, in addition to moving electrons 

through the electrodes, we also need to move ions from one electrode to the other, and that’s where polymer electrolytes come into 

play because for—especially for lithium air batteries, we—it’s essential to have a solid electrolyte, that a liquid electrolyte is not 

even a possibility for these advanced technologies. 

But we need to address the slow dynamics of polymer electrolytes, and so I think if we can really make that breakthrough, we 

are really looking at either—between using multivalent ions and 

using new cathode chemistries, we’re looking at an order of magnitude or even more increase in energy density in theory. I mean, 

it is a challenging problem, but it’s theoretically possible. 

Mr. VEASEY. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I yield back. 

Chairman WEBER. Well, not only did you get a promotion to doctor, I got a promotion to speaker. 

Mr. VEASEY. That’s right. 

Chairman WEBER. So the Chair now recognizes Mr. Brooks of 

Alabama. 

Mr. BROOKS. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. 

Dr. Lewis, you pointed out that your lab has demonstrated a 

functional solar fuel system. Can you elaborate on the fundamental 

chemistry and materials research needed to discover new molecules 

and materials and why that research is needed if you have already 

demonstrated at least one version of a solar fuel system? 

Dr. LEWIS. Certainly. Thank you for that question. Demonstrating one version of a solar fuel system is, in our view, like 

the early flight of a Wright brother is we can get off the ground 

that we can’t fly very far. We need pieces, we need materials that 

are as to an aircraft a jet engine is to that Wright brother’s airplane in the first place. 

We need to simplify the system so that it doesn’t have many socalled junctions. We need to get catalysts that don’t use precious 

expensive metals like platinum or iridium. We’ve made lots of 

progress there, but we still have a ways to go in order to get all 

of these pieces and we need all out of easily manufacturable simple 

things that you or I can do in our garage as opposed to having to 

have very esoteric laboratory preparations of them using expensive 

materials. And they also all have to be compatible with each other 

and last for 20 years, not 20 minutes. So we’ve demonstrated it’s 

possible, but we still need to do a lot of fundamental materials 

science and chemistry development to get it to be practical. 

Mr. BROOKS. Okay. A follow-up in that regard, has the Department of Energy’s Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy Office 

provided adequate support for transitional or early-stage research 

and development for artificial photosynthesis or for that matter a 

functional solar fuel system? 

Dr. LEWIS. To my knowledge, EERE has not had a significant 

program yet in solar fuels. They do have related programs in consuming that fuel, and there are lessons to be learned. They should 

be trying out systems like our potential concept of bubble wrap 

that would concentrate the sunlight just like the bubble wrap we 
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receive onto small areas minimizing the amount of material that 

we would need, and letting us use more costly material. 

There are other designs that are much more amenable to reduction to practice that are beyond the Office of Science’s typical charter that would logically be built in EERE’s domain so that we can 

solve problems that are problems and not solve that are not problems, learning from experience in a synergistic effort. 

Mr. BROOKS. All right. This next question will be for each of you, 

and we’ll start with Dr. Hallinan and move to my left, your right. 

How is the United States faring against international competition 

in foundational energy research? And each of you have talked 

about different subject matter, so if we could, your answer be directed to your areas of expertise. Dr. Hallinan? 

Mr. HALLINAN. Thank you. So these upgrades—the proposal—the 

upgrade proposals, they address mainly being able to look at complex materials in much smaller length scales and much faster 

times. And this is a new breakthrough in synchrotron science. It’s 

already being implemented in Sweden, and there are plans to implement it in Brazil. So in that regard I would say regarding the 

upgrade to our synchrotron light sources, the United States is a little bit behind. 

I think that really to look at polymer dynamics at the scale and 

at the rate that we need to, which is smaller than we can do now 

and is faster than we can do with our existing facility, so I do think 

the upgrades are important in addition to maintaining our competitiveness from a research standpoint. 

Mr. BROOKS. Thank you. 

Dr. BROHOLM. In my area of quantum materials, I think that the 

United States has a very lively program, and it is—has been characterized I think now by a stronger component of materials synthesis, which is a really key part of development of quantum materials. I think comparing to other developed countries sometimes 

one sees that looking, for example, to Europe a more kind of organized approach to some of these topics, but I think sometimes it’s 

difficult to say whether the organizer as opposed to the thousand 

points of light is the better approach. I think things are going pretty well. 

If I could say about the facility upgrades, maybe we’ll return to 

it later, but the—in terms of the neutron facilities, the spallation 

source is presently the world’s most intense source of neutrons, 

pulse neutrons, but the European community is now building a 

spallation source in—also in Sweden, which will be a 5 megawatt 

source. And there’s quite some concern in the—in—among scientists who use neutron scattering that this facility will in fact surpass the spallation neutron source, and we believe that an upgrade 

is very important in order to sustain leadership in that area. 

Mr. BROOKS. I don’t know if the Chair will permit, but I’ve got 

two more witnesses. Can they respond? 

Chairman WEBER. Yes. 

Mr. BROOKS. Dr. Scherson? 

Dr. SCHERSON. Thank you. Yes, the only example that comes to 

mind that I’m fairly acquainted with is in Japan where they have 

tried to emulate the EFRCs and hubs programs that DOE is supporting in this country. The amount of financial support is lower 
101 

than the one that the government here provides for these multidisciplinary centers. 

One difference that perhaps may be considered is the integration 

of industry into the program. So now you have the beginning from 

the basic knowledge to the end user, and that has proven to be of 

value so that by going from one extreme to the other one, this conversation makes it possible to take the good ideas and then migrate 

them very quickly into the marketplace. 

Mr. BROOKS. Dr. Lewis? 

Dr. LEWIS. Thank you. Two points to speak to on this, one is I 

did mention that in solar fuels there are burgeoning efforts now, 

very substantial, in Korea, Japan, China, Sweden, Germany, and 

the EU, and I’d say either individually or collectively they’re definitely on par with what we are doing in the United States. 

The second perspective is I’m the editor-in-chief of the preeminent journal in this field, Energy and Environmental Science, 

and that’s a global journal. It’s turning down 90 percent of the articles that are submitted so it’s very selective, and over half of those 

articles that appear in this field are from China, Japan, Korea, and 

our competition. 

We still have leadership, intellectual horsepower, but I think 

we’re at a crossroads here, and we need to really understand that 

there are other nations who see opportunity for the scientific effort, 

and we have to make a decision as to whether or not we’re going 

to continue to lead, and I hope that’s a positive decision. 

Mr. BROOKS. Thank you for your insight. 

Mr. Chair—Chairman, thank you for the additional time. 

Chairman WEBER. Thank you. The Chair now recognizes the 

Ranking Member. 

Mr. GRAYSON. Thank you. Dr. Lewis, I want to ask you some 

questions about something that sort of sounds like an oxymoron, 

which is artificial biological photosynthesis. I realize that your own 

specialty is physical analogs to photosynthesis, but it sounds like 

you’re knowledgeable about biological alternatives as well. So I 

have a few questions for you. 

Biology is the most fruitful means of producing ends, concrete results that we know of. We can do far more with biology—or biology 

does far more for itself than we see through physical processes or 

chemical processes. The fact that I’m looking at you right now is 

an example of that. Biology created the eye and the brain. That 

process is what comes through the eye, both remarkable accomplishments that we have no physical or chemical analog for. 

So given that fact, is it reasonable to be hopeful that we can 

come up with artificial photosynthesis based upon biology itself? 

Dr. LEWIS. Certainly it’s reasonable to be hopeful. There are various methods by which this is practiced. One would be to de-bottleneck photosynthesis, which is fundamentally inefficient. The plant 

should be black, not green, to get all the colors of the spectrum. It 

actually saturates its productivity the tenth the light intensity of 

the sun to protect itself from radical damage in the shade of the 

canopy. 

There are lots of molecular links in biology that deregulate systems so that they can be stable and reproduce and do other things 

that a science approach to un-bottlenecking and making plants 
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more optimal for energy conversion as opposed to everything else 

could be very fruitful. 

There’s also people and scientists that are trying to take biological enzymes, pull them out of the biological system, and couple 

them to the manmade systems. And so you can see how a crosscutting effort that would try to take the best of both worlds should 

also be explored. And this would involve a strategic collaboration 

between many different parts of our biological, physical, and chemical research enterprise to find the best of all worlds in this end 

use. 

Mr. GRAYSON. All right. So one possibility is what you refer to 

as un-bottlenecking. What are some of the possible approaches 

there? Are you referring to genetic engineering? Are you referring 

to some kind of forced evolution? What are people actually doing 

on this? 

Dr. LEWIS. Right. They’re both. Traditionally, we called it breeding where we breed crops—— 

Mr. GRAYSON. Right. 

Dr. LEWIS. —for fitness, but it would be through genetic engineering and directed evolution toward—the molecular part is the 

coupling between Photosystem I and Photosystem II. That has to 

move a molecule, a quinone, and that’s a slow process. And so if 

you could instead introduce a wire, a molecular wire that would 

move the electrons without moving the molecule, you could de-bottleneck inherent photosynthesis, and there’s lots of interest in that, 

but probably should have much more attention at the research 

level. 

Mr. GRAYSON. Well, that’s an interesting question itself. Do you 

have any information about, let’s say, Exxon doing research like 

this? Are there private enterprise efforts that are being conducted 

along these lines, or is it being left to the government to try to develop this? 

Dr. LEWIS. My knowledge is that there are enterprises thinking 

about manipulating algae, for instance, but not so much in the private sector and the energy companies for certain. And I think it is 

now left to the government as very early stage maybe appropriately 

because it is a complex system, and we still have to do research. 

It’s not just taking tools that we understand and engineering them, 

but it’s somewhere in that mix. 

Mr. GRAYSON. Well, given the upside here, the fact that you’re 

basically talking about being able to create an artificial fuel, transportation fuel, artificial oil, maybe artificial natural gas, and that 

has an enormous effect on the economy. That’s roughly ten percent 

of the entire world economy right now. Given the upside here, why 

do you think that there isn’t more effort in the private sector to accomplish this? 

Dr. LEWIS. I think it’s pretty simple. The rate of return and the 

capital needed to invest in energy systems is typically 10 to 15 

years, and when you’re reporting to your stockholders every quarter, you can’t justify a long-term program to return capital when 

you have to report everything every quarter to your stockholders. 

Mr. GRAYSON. So in the short time that we have left, can you tell 

us specific examples of artificial biological photosynthesis that are 
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being conducted right now or at least efforts that are being made 

in that direction? 

Dr. LEWIS. Absolutely. There are laboratory experiments that 

have taken enzymes that feed on hydrogen that then convert them 

with carbon dioxide into selective liquid fuels like isopropanol. And 

so we have a recent demonstration of that, in fact, out of Harvard 

that has shown that this is possible. That’s an important first advance. We still have to then reckon with how long will those enzymes last. Will they be robust enough to be put into a system? 

How can we make them scaled up and cheap enough to deploy at 

large-scale? But there is this strategy of—at the research level taking the best pieces from wherever they are and then combining 

them into the best system, and that’s certainly a good approach. 

Mr. GRAYSON. Last question, is there any experiment so far to 

date regarding artificial biological photosynthesis that has actually 

resulted in the recovery of a fuel that had more energy content 

than what you put into it, what we call in the—in an analog of fusion we’d call that ignition. 

Dr. LEWIS. Exactly. 

Mr. GRAYSON. So is there something like that that exists already 

for artificial biological photosynthesis? 

Dr. LEWIS. Probably not yet. Maybe, maybe in some limited circumstances, but of course that’s the goal is to get the energy payback more than the system energy put in, but that’s certainly 

where we want to be. 

Mr. GRAYSON. All right. Thank you very much. I yield. 

Chairman WEBER. I’m going to follow up on that, Dr. Lewis, if 

I can. That’s a fascinating conversation. You said plants need to be 

black instead of green. Somebody earlier said they pick up the red 

rays and the blue rays and this is Democrat and Republican. It’s 

bipartisan, you know. 

And so in following up with your discussion with my good friend 

Mr. Grayson, you’re talking about algae that had a—a plant should 

be black and then you said that you needed a wire to like move 

the electrons in some of those plants? Are you seeing articles about 

this particular process in this very prestigious journal known as 

the Energy and Environmental Science? I happen to know the editor. Right. 

Dr. LEWIS. Yes, I’m seeing them, and I don’t have time to read 

every article, but—— 

Chairman WEBER. Okay. 

Dr. LEWIS. —we do see them in many constructs. The wire isn’t 

a wire like we think of a copper wire with insulation. It’s at the 

molecular scale. It’s molecules that—— 

Chairman WEBER. Something that moves the—— 

Dr. LEWIS. —electrons—— 

Chairman WEBER. Right. 

Dr. LEWIS. —between these sites in a way the biological system 

wouldn’t do itself. And you really do want a solar converter to look 

black to the human eye so that it does have a red component and 

a blue component and therefore harvests all of the sunlight. Plants 

are not optimal for energy conversion machines because they look 

green. That means that they’re wasting some photons. They had 

other evolutionary constraints and design that when you build an 
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aircraft you don’t make it out of feathers if you want it to fly faster. 

You’re inspired by that, but we know we can do better. 

Chairman WEBER. Right. And the landings are brutal. 

Dr. LEWIS. The landings are brutal. 

Chairman WEBER. Yes. All right. Thank you. I’m going to—I 

yield to the gentleman from California, Mr. Knight. 

Mr. KNIGHT. Well, you only get one landing if you make them out 

of feathers. 

Dr. Lewis, thanks for coming. I appreciate you being here. You 

mentioned that artificial photosynthesis could benefit from modeling and simulation using high-performance computation systems. 

Is that something that the research community has begun to discuss with DOE? 

Dr. LEWIS. I believe so but not in such an organized fashion as 

to establish a separate program for high-performance computing 

applied only to this problem. But there are specific examples. I’ll 

give you three briefly. We discovered a nickel gallium alloy just recently in our laboratory that selectively takes energy-efficient carbon dioxide and makes interesting carbon-coupled liquid and gaseous products. That was predicted by theory before we did it experimentally. 

Now, it turns out that the theory got the energy efficiency right 

but it got the carbon products wrong. They predicted methanol. 

Well, that’s because the theory was done in an ideal surface with 

perfect atoms, and the real sample we made had all sorts of nooks 

and crannies and edges that then we have to iterate back to tell 

the theorists, well, now you’ve got to predict what the real-world 

samples are. But they got it close enough to tell us where to look. 

The second point is that theory has predicted out of 19,000 metal 

oxides, 200 that might be stable light absorbers under our conditions. We don’t yet know how many of them can made—can be 

made outside of the computer and exist, but now we’re looking 

there to try to have a guide from high-performance computation 

into where the experimental work should begun and then refine it. 

So that would be the optimal way in my view to not have the world 

just abstracted in computer. We have to build it, we have to make 

it, and then we have to find out where the theory is right and 

wrong and then iterate back and forth until we get to where we 

need to be. 

Mr. KNIGHT. Just like any test or experiment, you’ve got to have 

a theory and then you’ve got to actually see the ability to see it 

practically work. 

I want to go to Dr. Hallinan about the batteries. And Mr. Veasey 

was talking about Texas. Well, in California we have quite a bit 

of photovoltaics and solar and wind and all kinds of renewable energy products there in the Mojave Desert. Our biggest problem is 

battery storage. Our biggest problem is the wind is not always 

blowing and the sun is not always shining. And so if we want to 

move to our new RPS, which is our renewable portfolio standard 

of 50 and then 60 and 70 percent, we might get to that line where 

we can’t go any higher. We’ve got to burn something because, like 

I said, the wind’s not blowing and the sun’s not shining, so we’ve 

got to burn something to keep the lights on. 
105 

At what point or how close do you think we are—and this might 

be a question for everyone. At what point do think we are that we 

can store something that comes from an 1,100-acre field out in the 

Mojave Desert that is producing a huge amount of energy but we 

are burning that—or we are using that energy very quickly, instantaneously? 

Mr. HALLINAN. Sure. So that’s a—it’s a challenging problem, and 

I think there are a number of constraints that we face. So one is 

we don’t want to be spending large amounts of money to make 

these batteries just to store this energy for a short period of time, 

right? So we have this cost constraint, but then we also want these 

batteries to last a long time. We don’t want to have to be replacing 

them regularly. We also need them to charge and discharge at a 

rate commensurate with either the production or the consumption 

of the energy. 

And so when you look at batteries, there’s a very wide array of 

different types of—we call them battery chemistries. Lithium-ion 

are very good for portable electronic devices, and they are now 

being used in electric vehicles. Nickel metal hydride are used in hybrid vehicles, so there are many different chemistries. 

I think what Dr. Scherson mentioned earlier about these redox 

flow batteries, they seem to be the most promising for what I would 

call stationary storage. So we’re—if we don’t need to move battery 

around, we really don’t care how much it weighs or how large it 

is to some limit. We care mainly about cost and satisfying the other 

needs of storage. 

And so for—I think for grid storage, really these flow batteries— 

and the reason they’re so interesting is once you’ve designed the 

electrodes, then if you need to scale them up, you just make a bigger tank of your liquid that you’re going to flow to the battery. 

Now, I would say, you know, they’re still at the research stage, but 

they seem the most promising from what I’ve seen. 

Mr. KNIGHT. So I’m going to—if the Chair will allow me just to 

ask one more question. I’m going to put this back to Dr. Lewis because I think he understands this. What we go through in California, what we go through in Texas, what we go through in some 

of the states is the issue is not—well, the land is an issue, but we 

have a lot of land that we can put these thousand-acre fields out 

there. And it does become an issue more politically than for the 

science community, but that will become a problem. 

If we cannot store this energy, if we cannot use this energy at 

a later time, then we might be on the wrong technology. And I say 

that just personally. We might want to look at something else because if we cannot store this, we are going to be using so much of 

our land that I think that it might be a problem. 

And the second question—I’ll give this to you, too—is we’ve got 

car companies coming out and they’re doing cars that can do about 

225 miles on a charge and exactly what Dr. Hallinan said, we 

would change out the batteries at changing stations instead of filling up your gas tank with gasoline, and that could be a problem 

because now we’re producing all of these batteries. We’re going to 

have a huge amount of batteries if we’ve got 50 million cars on the 

road and we have to have 100 million batteries out there just 
106 

changing stations. I think that that’s a problem with this technology. But it could just be me. 

Dr. LEWIS. I’ll at least try to address the first question. Storage 

is in my view—I agree with you—the number one problem to think 

about actually at scale deploying intermittent renewable sources. 

We have technologies that are reasonable at solar and wind, but 

if we can’t store, we can’t have power after 4:00. It’s pretty simple. 

We should do this broadly. You should think about ramping up 

and down nuclear power plants fast in certain designs, about natural gas-fired power plants, about demand management, about 

making fuel directly from the sun, about batteries. There are probably lots of ways to think about this. 

Storage of electricity has been realized as a gap since Thomas 

Edison noticed it in 1931, and we have to solve this problem. This 

is where, I think, a broad program not just in batteries but in all 

sorts of technology options that can help us meet load in the face 

of a dynamically changing energy market are critically important. 

With respect to the battery recycling, that solves one problem 

and introduces another. It solves a problem in that there won’t be 

a rapid recharge of a battery by electricity for a very long time because all batteries have what’s called an internal resistance that 

prevents them from shorting. If you try to charge them up, you dissipate so much heat through that resistor that you would boil all 

the liquid in your car if you tried to do that in five minutes. 

So instead, you swap a battery out with a previously charged 

battery, and the problem of course is now you have at least twice 

as many batteries on your hand you have to move around. This 

again points to what would be a dream solution of if instead you 

could make liquid fuel and store the energy that way, then you 

could convert that electricity into stored fuel and we know how to 

handle that. 

So there are lots of things we should be thinking about. These 

are incredibly important problems and we need to do a lot more research in order to try to make them into reality. 

Mr. KNIGHT. Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr. Chair, for 

the indulgence. 

Chairman WEBER. Thank you for yielding back. 

The gentleman from—is it Illinois—Mr. Lipinski is going to be 

recognized for five minutes as soon as he’s ready. 

Mr. LIPINSKI. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Thank you 

very much for stalling there for a second. I was at another hearing. 

I just finished my questioning there, so I thank the witnesses for 

being here today. 

And this may be a little bit of a repeat and that’s what we’re trying to avoid here, but I wanted to make sure that I directly had 

you address some of these things. Dr. Hallinan, the Basic Energy 

Sciences Advisory Committee, BESAC, recently released a report 

detailing which BES upgrade proposals should be prioritized, and 

I was pleased that BESAC recommended beginning construction on 

the Advanced Photon Source at Argonne National Lab, which is located in my district. 

It’s my understanding that your research has relied on APS, so 

could you talk a bit about your work that uses the APS and how 
107 

upgrading it would advance both your research in the field of highenergy light source research in general? 

Mr. HALLINAN. Sure. So the electron beam at APS is—and actually at all of our synchrotron light sources is actually this long, 

wide beam—sorry, not the electron beam, the light—the x-rays 

themselves. And so if we want to do some of these advanced experiments, some measuring dynamics, we’re essentially taking movies, 

very rapid movies, and we need to have a point source. And so 

what they do now is they just block off the vast majority of the 

light that’s generated by these light sources. Well, what the upgrades will enable is actually in—so this is not—the actual upgrades is not my area of expertise, so I can’t actually tell you a lot 

about the technical details of the science. But my—but as I understand it, they’re able to shrink that x-ray down to a point without 

having to block lots of it, and so they’re increasing the—what we 

call the brightness by 10 to 100, maybe even more times what it 

is now. 

And that’s what enables us then to—with this brighter beam we 

can basically take faster frames of the movie, of the dynamics of 

these structured materials whether—and it doesn’t only need to be 

applied to polymers. I don’t want to give you that impression. 

That’s—my research uses polymers. And the theory predicts that 

there are these segmental motions that are on very small length 

scales and are very rapid that we want to be able to look at experimentally to verify that the theory is predicting correctly. And then 

if we understand the fundamentals from this theoretical and experimental standpoint, then we may be able to design faster or better 

transporting polymer electrolytes. 

I think the impact is going to be much broader than just polymer 

electrolytes for batteries. I mean, there are people doing research 

in biological systems looking at DNA, looking at ribosomes. There 

have been Nobel Prize—the Nobel Prize in chemistry in 2009 apparently was awarded for work at the APS. 

And—but—so what is it—essentially what it’s going to allow us 

to do is look at faster and smaller with all the different capabilities. So I think I answered your question. 

Mr. LIPINSKI. Yes. What about the—in general the impact on 

international competitiveness for the U.S. to do this upgrading? 

Mr. HALLINAN. I think it’s essential. I mean, this is a new breakthrough in synchrotron science, and it’s really going to push the 

limits of what we can do—of the research questions that—the scientific questions that we can answer. Any scientific questions, I 

think, are important for several of our technological challenges of 

the country. And we don’t—you know, I mentioned earlier that the 

personnel, the people behind the science, it’s like if you gave a vehicle to a monkey, he wouldn’t really make much of it, and so these 

beam line scientists are also crucial, and so if we don’t upgrade, 

we’re going to start losing some of our really great talent to these 

other countries would be my concern. 

Mr. LIPINSKI. Thank you. One other question I want to throw out 

there, I know you talked already about energy storage. JCESR is 

also centered at Argonne. Is the Energy Innovation Hub model the 

best way to pursue this type of research and other research? I just 
108 

want to get a reaction to that if that’s the best way to do this and 

to continue on with other research challenges that we face? 

Dr. SCHERSON. Well, I’m fairly well-acquainted with JCESR. I 

belong to their advisory board. And this is some sort of a largescale experiment in trying to do the basic science and then migrate 

all the basic science through all the steps that are required to put 

the final product out the door of commercial companies that may 

want to take that technology and bring it to the marketplace. 

It is a remarkable thing that’s working very well from what I can 

tell. It encompasses activities from the chemical engineering but it 

goes into the design of the system to the very basic teaching so far 

what one particle can do when the electrode gets charged and discharged. So it’s the entire spectrum of activity that is concentrated 

into one organization under one head. 

Mr. LIPINSKI. My time is expired so I will yield back. Thank you. 

Chairman WEBER. Thank you, Mr. Lipinski. 

The Chair now recognizes Mark Takano from California. 

Mr. TAKANO. Well, I’d like to thank the Chairman of the Energy 

Subcommittee for allowing me to be here today due to my specific 

interest in this sector, so I really appreciate that, Mr. Chairman. 

I am co-Chair of the Battery Energy Storage Caucus and have 

a particular interest in energy storage and what we can do as policymakers to support and spur innovation in this industry. 

California is making large investments in energy storage, and in 

my district at the University of California Riverside at the Center 

for Environmental Research and Technology they are working on 

the local—they’re working with the local utility to integrate battery 

storage, as well as combining it with electric transportation. 

We have heard from scientists and policymakers alike that 

there’s often a false boundary between basic and applied science. 

To some, supporting basic research is an important role of government, while applied research should be left to the private sector. 

Yet this idea that there is a line that neatly divides the two separate levels of research is not realistic, and it goes against our general understanding of scientific discovery and innovation. Would 

you agree with this characterization, this last characterization? 

And I want to ask that question first and if you can briefly just 

address that, each one of you. 

Dr. LEWIS. Certainly. To efficiently utilize our researches and our 

capital, our intellectual capital, we have to focus on the seamless 

transition of end use. We don’t want to be wasting our time making 

discoveries of materials that end up when they’re combined into a 

battery are explosive and unsafe. We don’t want to be doing that 

with solar fuels generators either. 

And the only way you can do that is if you actually build a system and then understand from the system-level what the constraints are on the materials that go into that system, whether it’s 

a solar fuels generator or a battery or a flywheel or any other type 

of consumer or industrial product. 

So to the extent that the use-inspired fundamental research has 

an outlet into practical implementation, there should be no boundary. On the other hand, there is a discussion about whether or not 

taking it further than a demonstration and constraining it is the 

role best served by the government or is that for all best handed 
109 

off to private industry? And I think that boundary is something 

that is beyond where the technical expertise—that’s more a policy. 

Mr. TAKANO. Okay. Great. Dr. Scherson? 

Dr. SCHERSON. Yes. I will just simply complement the answer 

given by Nate. I just learned that about ten percent of the cost of 

an actual battery goes into materials, 90 percent into manufacturing. So, you know, we have to be able to bridge the gap between 

what we regard as fundamental research and applied research. I’m 

afraid that companies may not want to take the risk of trying to 

take something from the laboratory and try to produce something 

under their cost into a final product. So in my view, JCESR has 

managed to be able to bridge this gap in trying to make these 

boundaries disappear. 

Mr. TAKANO. Great. Dr. Broholm? 

Dr. BROHOLM. I think the—we—it is important to focus on the 

key role that the government has in supporting discovery-driven research, and let me give an example, which is that in the pursuit 

of superconducting material that might in fact solve some of these 

storage and transmission problems that we have been talking 

about, there comes a time when perhaps one does need to look at 

a material which superconducts at 100 millikelvin. And this material may in fact provide the intellectual breakthrough that allows 

you to then compose a material that will become a practical superconductor. 

So I would—so on the other hand I think that the cross-fertilization of the motivation from discovery-driven research to use-inspired research is very important such that those who are working 

in the discovery realm need to have the ability to view some of the 

challenges that exist in the real world as well. So this artificial barrier is in fact very unfortunate if it exists. On the other hand, we 

have to really remember to also support the discovery-driven part 

of it, not to have it cast aside for not being practical. 

Mr. TAKANO. Yes. 

Mr. HALLINAN. So, yes, and I’d like to just emphasize that with 

a quick example, that there needs to be a balance between supporting these for-profit entities and basic science. And so I think 

a great example is the discovery of the MRI, which is widely used 

in the medical industry now, was originally completely driven only 

by a fundamental science question. There was no perceived application of that research. 

And so I think, you know, I just want to—I would like to moderate the responses with the statement that I think it shouldn’t— 

while taking things to market is extremely important, it shouldn’t 

be at the expense of basic science. 

Mr. TAKANO. Might I ask just a follow-up? 

Chairman WEBER. Yes. 

Mr. TAKANO. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

The work supported through the Basic Energy Sciences program, 

would you agree that it’s a major example of how there is really 

no clear boundary between basic and applied science even if basic 

is in its title? 

Dr. LEWIS. I think that’s a fair characterization in the sense that 

we don’t know what the applications will be of many of the materials made or fundamental concepts that are supported by basic en-
110 

ergy sciences will end up specifically into an energy system in a 

consumer or in a generator’s kind of infrastructure. So that’s 

foundational research, and its outcome and where it goes should be 

unconstrained. 

There are separate parts that are use-inspired that I think 

should be properly constrained into things that could be implemented and are devoted to, say, using elements that are not so expensive or so rare that you could never actually use them at scale 

for energy applications. There are still fundamental research questions, but it’s constrained into don’t give me an answer on a material that I can’t possibly think about ever using. Give me an answer that’s relevant to ones that I could think of using. And I think 

they’re both important to founder. 

Mr. TAKANO. Dr. Scherson? 

Dr. SCHERSON. If I could address the importance of theoretical 

research. Nowadays, we have the ability of throwing at a computer 

all the elements in the periodic table and begin to ask questions. 

And we said what kinds of materials could possibly be designed in 

the computer that are going to end up giving us the ideal material 

for an actual application? And, you know, I have been many times 

and I’m sure that my colleagues are the same that the computer 

produces something that we never thought of. And there is a case 

at the moment of the material discovered by the computer that is 

very good in terms of allowing magnesium two plus to migrate 

through the cathode. 

And so people at JCESR are contacting one laboratory in the 

world which happens to have that capability, and then you can 

then validate what the computer predicted and then do the experiment to find out whether that is a good one or not. So this interchange between theory and experiment is becoming to be crucial in 

order to discover new and more efficient materials for all sorts of 

applications. 

Mr. TAKANO. Fascinating. Dr. Broholm? 

Dr. BROHOLM. Yes, I—let me return to a topic that I opened 

with, which was the nature of AT&T Bell Labs or Bell Laboratories, which was a very interesting institution where you have this 

connection between truly fundamental science and very specific applications. And so I think I actually worked at a time and I think 

there was a tremendous inspiration in fact even though we were 

working on topics that were truly discovery-driven science, we had 

the opportunity to talk to individuals who are working in a very 

applied end of it. And this actually—it can become a motivating 

factor. 

And so I think basic energy sciences has the opportunity to be 

the place where these strands of research actually connect to each 

other, both the fundamental and the applied side. 

Mr. TAKANO. Dr. Hallinan? 

Mr. HALLINAN. Yes, I would agree. I think that the questions 

that we need to answer are well-defined by the applied side, and 

then we can approach them from a fundamental perspective. So, 

for example, as an engineer, the reason that I’m interested in 

studying polymer electrolytes is that I recognize the massive energy efficiency gains we can achieve by transitioning to electric vehicles from conventional internal combustion vehicles, for example. 
111 

But my research does not cover trying to put these batteries into 

a car. That’s for someone else to do. 

So I think that I agree with you that there is not really a clear 

line between basic and applied, and that we get the important 

questions from the applied side and then we figure out how to answer them, I think, from the basic side. 

Mr. TAKANO. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate the extra 

time. 

Chairman WEBER. You’re welcome. Doctor—the Chair recognizes 

himself for five minutes for a couple more questions. 

Dr. Broholm, could you give us a general sense of how far we are 

from being able to—I know I’m asking you to predict the future 

now. How far are we from being able to really develop useful quantum computing systems and explain the materials challenges? 

Dr. BROHOLM. So there are many different forms of quantum 

computing that are now being pursued, and I think that already 

shows you that we don’t know now which approach is actually 

going to become the one that functions or which approach is—the 

general challenge that one is facing there is that it is necessary in 

the quantum computer to allow a physical quantity such as a nucleus in or a photon or a patch of a superconducting material to 

respond quantum mechanically to specific conditions that are imposed. 

And it’s important that the wave mechanics associated with 

quantum physics can unfold without loss of coherence until the 

quantum computation has actually been completed. And so having 

a quantum material that can respond quantum mechanically for a 

sufficient period of time is actually a first step towards quantum— 

to having a quantum computer. 

And as I said, there are a number of different materials, platforms that are now being explored, and I would say that I’m optimistic because of the excitement that surrounds the topic and the 

talent that’s being applied to it at this time. But I think the 

timescale is—one would be—it’s a folly to try to really pin down a 

timescale on that, and I think we should be thinking of that as a 

vision that needs a sustained level of research of the type that I 

think predominantly the government will be able to support. 

Chairman WEBER. I think you just said you don’t know. 

Dr. BROHOLM. I’ll take that. 

Chairman WEBER. Okay. Thank you, Doctor. And I want to follow up with that. What role can the DOE research program in BES 

and even in the ASCR program within the Office of Science play 

in advancing this research? 

Dr. BROHOLM. As you pointed out, this is really early stages, and 

it’s very important to take that approach. And so I think we’re 

talking about the development of new classes of materials, quantum materials that sustain quantum coherence for sufficient 

timescales to allow quantum computing. And so one of the key approaches that we need to take is to combine the theory of materials 

with the synthesis of materials and the ability to measure those 

materials in order to examine the viability of different class of materials to function in a quantum computing system. 

And if I may, I would say that one of the key roles that I see 

of Department of Energy in basic energy sciences is the provision 
112 

of world-class facilities that can actually probe the structure and 

the dynamics of quantum materials to determine their viability in 

these purposes. 

And in my own research I’m using the technique of neutron scattering to actually visualize the quantum mechanical electronic 

wave function of these—some of these materials, and in fact it’s in 

many cases the only method that we have to inquire the quantum 

physics of these materials at the appropriate length scale. So I 

think that the provision of world-class facilities for this kind of research is one of the important roles of the Department of Energy. 

Chairman WEBER. Thank you. In your exchange with Congressman Takano, you mentioned looking for a superconductor fabric of 

100 million—— 

Dr. BROHOLM. MilliK. 

Chairman WEBER. MilliK. 

Dr. BROHOLM. That’s a very low temperature, 0.1 above the absolute zero. And my point was that that is something that we do in 

the lab, and it teaches us about the fundamental behavior of electronic systems. But we can then take that knowledge and develop 

materials that are practical at higher temperature based on the 

same principle. And the connection there is trying to make to storage and transmission of energy. I did—while there was a discussion, I didn’t quite have the opportunity to make that, but superconducting—a practical superconducting material is a potential 

component in a large-scale energy storage system where you could 

in fact take the energy being generated by a photovoltaic station 

and put it into a current in a superconducting solenoid system that 

will hold the energy for a long period of time without loss and can 

then disperse energy when it is required. So this is another example of there being a range of different potential technologies that 

we have to be pursuing. 

Chairman WEBER. Is that because it’s so low temp, number one; 

and number two, when it releases that energy, doesn’t it generate 

heat? 

Dr. BROHOLM. No. In fact, it doesn’t have to be low temp. And 

so this is what we’re pursuing as to materials that will allow superconductivity to persist at very high temperatures. And once you 

have superconductivity, you have absolutely zero resistance. And so 

imagine you can simply put the current into the superconducting 

ring and then just close the ring and the current will persist—— 

Chairman WEBER. Well, then when you charge it, it doesn’t 

produce heat, zero resistance. 

Dr. BROHOLM. Zero resistance. It just sits there. So as long as it 

is in the superconducting state and then you—when you want to 

release that energy for use, that can then be done as well. So it’s 

a really quite interesting potential way of storing energy particularly for these intermittent distributed energy—renewable energy 

resources. 

Chairman WEBER. Okay. And one last question and then I’m 

going to yield to my good friend from Florida. Dr. Lewis, are you 

seeing discussions—I think in your earlier comments you said most 

of the comments were coming from Japan, China in your publication, about half of them. I didn’t hear you mention Russia in there. 
113 

Russia is noticeably absent. But are you seeing these kinds of discussions in your publication? 

Dr. LEWIS. We don’t see much from Russia. 

Chairman WEBER. Not Russia specifically but the quantum part 

that Dr. Broholm is discussing. 

Dr. LEWIS. Not particularly much. Most of the discussions are focused toward solar, wind storage—— 

Chairman WEBER. Right. 

Dr. LEWIS. —and more use-inspired things that would be true to 

the energy and environmental science—— 

Chairman WEBER. Absolutely. 

Dr. LEWIS. —is vital. 

Chairman WEBER. So, Dr. Broholm, do you know of publications 

that are discussing the superconductivity that you’re discussing in 

a quantum fashion? Are there—is that discussion being held worldwide? 

Dr. BROHOLM. Yes, it’s a very—countries around the world are 

putting in effort to try to discover a practical superconductor, and 

there are advances being made, and we’re very optimistic that we’ll 

be successful. 

Chairman WEBER. Okay. And then, Dr. Hallinan, and lastly for 

you since I come from the district that has a lot of what we call 

petrotech chemical industry, petroleum and other chemical industries, when you’re talking about polymers of course you’re talking 

about something that kind of gets my attention. Are you also hearing that discussion on a worldwide basis? 

Mr. HALLINAN. Regarding polymer—— 

Chairman WEBER. Yes. 

Mr. HALLINAN. —electrolytes and—yes, absolutely. And we have 

been for decades because they can fill many different roles. They 

can fill hydrogen fuel-cell roles. They can fill artificial photosynthesis role. They’re batteries, water purification, and so there are 

definitely publications from all around the world. Yes. So I—— 

Chairman WEBER. Okay. Who would you—what country is our 

runner-up if you will, is doing the most—you’re hearing the most 

from? 

Mr. HALLINAN. I would say probably Italy actually is the runnerup to the United States in terms of polymers and for membranes, 

all kinds of polymer membrane applications. 

Chairman WEBER. Okay. Thank you. And I yield to my good 

friend from Florida. 

Mr. GRAYSON. Thanks. A few questions for Dr. Broholm regarding superconductivity. Doctor, join me in our time machine. We’re 

jumping back to 1986 and the discovery of the possibility that you 

could have much higher temperature superconductivity that anybody had ever realized before. People thought that anything above 

30 K, 30 kelvin was impossible, and now suddenly 70, 80, 90 is possible. And nobody knows exactly how high you can go, maybe as 

far as even room temperature. Nobody knew 30 years ago. Well, 

here we are 30 years later and we still don’t know. What should 

we have done 30 years ago to try to pin down the possibilities and 

get that science done? 

Dr. BROHOLM. I think the point here is that these are extremely 

difficult problems. Despite the supercomputers, despite the ad-
114 

vances in theory of electronic systems, really no one would have 

predicted that materials such as iron and selenium, those two elements joined together can actually be a superconductor in that case 

at relatively low temperatures. No one would either have been able 

to predict that when you place a single atomic layer of iron and selenium onto strontium titanate you actually can greatly enhance 

the superconducting transition temperature to 50 kelvin in that 

system. And again, it’s something that even the smartest theorists 

at this point are not able to really predict as an issue, kind of as 

a basic prediction. 

So I think that the statement is that these are simply extremely 

complicated problems because they involve the interaction of a very 

large number of electrons amongst each other. On the other hand, 

there also very, very rich sets of materials that give the ones of us 

who are working in them a sense of amazement and a sense of optimism in terms of the kinds of properties that we will be able to 

extract from these materials as we advance our understanding. So 

I think we have to take the long view as we look at these properties. It’s as true today as it was in ’86 that there is potential for 

us to create superconducting—practical superconducting materials, 

not necessarily at room temperature but practical for our use in energy and information. 

Mr. GRAYSON. So what should we do right now to bring the future forward and make that scientific discovery happen sooner? 

Dr. BROHOLM. I think a lot of things are being done. I think perhaps what I would advocate—we talked about a little earlier is the 

close interaction amongst scientists that have different perspectives 

on materials, different techniques and different ways of thinking 

about materials. This tends to be a very fruitful exercise. So what 

appears to be a brick wall for a Knudsen, a physicist, a chemist 

may have a different way of thinking about the material that allows you to really tunnel through that challenge. 

And so I think bringing together people who are experts in synthesis, people who are experts in theory of materials, and people 

who have innovative new methods to probe materials, that this is 

the way that we can best make progress on these very complicated 

but very promising areas of materials development. 

Mr. GRAYSON. Thanks. I yield back. 

Chairman WEBER. Well, I thank the witnesses for their valuable 

testimony and the Members for their questions. The record will remain open for two weeks for additional comments and written 

questions from the Members. 

This hearing is adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 11:49 a.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.] 
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Appendix II 

ADDITIONAL MATERIAL FOR THE RECORD
116 

STATEMENT SUBMITTED BY RANKING MEMBER

EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON

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