Innovative Houston clean hydrogen company expands to Brazil

on the move

Cemvita aims to capitalize on Brazil’s regulatory framework around biodiesel blending and Sustainable Aviation Fuel. Photo via cemvita.com

Houston biotech company Cemvita has expanded into Brazil. The company officially established a new subsidiary in the country under the same name.

According to an announcement made earlier this month, the expansion aims to capitalize on Brazil’s progressive regulatory framework, including Brazil’s Fuel of the Future Law, which was enacted in 2024. The company said the expansion also aims to coincide with the 2025 COP30, the UN’s climate change conference, which will be hosted in Brazil in November.

Cemvita utilizes synthetic biology to transform carbon emissions into valuable bio-based chemicals.

“For decades Brazil has pioneered the bioeconomy, and now the time has come to create the future of the circular bioeconomy,” Moji Karimi, CEO of Cemvita, said in a news release. “Our vision is to combine the innovation Cemvita is known for with Brazil’s expertise and resources to create an ecosystem where waste becomes opportunity and sustainability drives growth. By joining forces with Brazilian partners, Cemvita aims to build on Brazil’s storied history in the bioeconomy while laying the groundwork for a circular and sustainable future.”

The Fuel of the Future Law mandates an increase in the biodiesel content of diesel fuel, starting from 15 percent in March and increasing to 20 percent by 2030. It also requires the adoption of Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) and for domestic flights to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 1 percent starting in 2027, growing to 10 percent reduction by 2037.

Cemvita agreed to a 20-year contract that specified it would supply up to 50 million gallons of SAF annually to United Airlines in 2023.

"This is all made possible by our innovative technology, which transforms carbon waste into value,” Marcio Da Silva, VP of Innovation, said in a news release. “Unlike traditional methods, it requires neither a large land footprint nor clean freshwater, ensuring minimal environmental impact. At the same time, it produces high-value green chemicals—such as sustainable oils and biofuels—without competing with the critical resources needed for food production."

In 2024, Cemvita became capable of generating 500 barrels per day of sustainable oil from carbon waste at its first commercial plant. As a result, Cemvita quadrupled output at its Houston plant. The company had originally planned to reach this milestone in 2029.

From Your Site Articles

The future of transportation fuels will be shaped by a mix of innovation, government policies, and what consumers want. Photo by Engin Akyurt/Pexels

Houston energy leader on why the future of fuels is more than electric vehicles

guest column

Gasoline, diesel, bunker fuel, and jet fuel. Four liquid hydrocarbons that have been powering transportation for the last 100-plus years.

Gas stations, truck stops, ports, and airport fuel terminals have been built up over the last century to make transportation easy and reliable.

These conventional fuels release Greenhouse Gases (GHG) when they are used, and governments all over the world are working on plans to shift towards cleaner fuels in an effort to lower emissions and minimize the effects of climate change.

For passenger cars, it’s clear that electricity will be the cleaner fuel type, with most countries adopting electric vehicles (EVs), and in some cases, providing their citizens with incentives to make the switch.

While many articles have been written about EVs and the benefits that come along with them, they fail to look at the transportation system as a whole.

Trucks, cargo ships, and airplanes are modes of transportation that are used every day, but they don’t often get the spotlight like EVs do.

For governments to be effective in curbing transportation-related greenhouse emissions, they must consider all forms of transportation and cleaner fuel options for them as well.

43 percent of GHG emissions comes from these modes of transportation. Therefore, using electricity to reduce GHG emissions in light duty vehicles only accounts for part of the total transportation emissions equation.

The path to cleaner fuels for these transportation modes has its challenges.

According to Ed Emmett, Fellow in Energy and Transportation Policy at the Baker Institute Center for Energy Studies (CES);

"Airplanes cannot be realistically powered by electricity, at least not currently, and handle the same requisite freight and passenger loads"
"The long-haul trucking industry [...] pushed back against electrification as being impractical due to the size and weight of batteries, their limited range, and the cost of adoption"
"Shipowners have expressed reluctance to scrap existing bunker fueled ships for newer, more expensive ships, especially when other fueling options, e.g. biofuels and hydrocarbon derivatives-for fleets can be made available"

Finding low-cost, reliable, and environmentally sound fuels for the various segments of transportation is complex. As Emmett suggests in his latest article;

"Hovering over the transition to other fuels for almost every transportation mode is the question of dependability of supply. For the trucking industry, the truck stop industry must be able to adapt to new fuel requirements. For ocean shipping, ports must be able to meet the fuel needs of new ships. Airlines, air cargo carriers and airports need to be on the same page when it comes to aviation fuels. In other words, the adoption equation in transitions in transportation is not only a function of the availability and cost of the new technology but also a function of the cost of the full supply chain needed to support fuel production and delivery to the point of use. Going forward, the transportation industry is facing a dilemma: How are environmental concerns addressed while simultaneously maintaining operational efficiency and avoiding unnecessary upward cost shifts for moving goods and people? In answering that question, for the first time in history, modes of transportation may end up going in multiple different directions when it comes to the fuels each mode ultimately chooses."

This is why many forecasts predict that hydrocarbon demand will continue through 2050, despite ambitious aspirations of achieving net zero emissions by that year. The McKinsey "slow evolution" scenario has global liquid hydrocarbon demand in 2050 at 92mmb/d versus 103 mmb/d in 2023. With their "continued momentum" scenario, oil demand is 75 mmb/d. Proportionally, global oil demand related to GHG emissions from transportation would decline 11-27 percent. The global uptake of EVs is the primary driver of uncertainty around future oil demand. In all the McKinsey scenarios, the share of EVs in passenger cars sales is expected to be above 90 percent by 2050.

The Good News

Despite the relatively slow progress expected for reducing GHG emissions in the global transportation sector, there are solutions emerging that lower the carbon footprint tied to traditional petroleum-based fuels. Emmett highlights some of the methods under study, noting that "sustainable biofuels sourced from cooking oils, animal fats, and agriculture products, as well as hydrogen, methanol, ammonia, and various e-fuels are among the options being tested. Some ocean carriers are already ordering ships powered by liquified natural gas, bio-e-methanol, bio/e-methane, ammonia, and hydrogen. Airlines are already using sustainable aviation fuel as a supplement to basic aviation fuel. Railroads are testing hydrogen locomotives. The trucking industry is decarbonizing local delivery by using vehicles powered by electricity, compressed natural gas, and sustainable diesel. Long-haul trucking companies are considering sustainable diesel as a drop-in fuel for existing equipment, and fuel suppliers are researching new engines fueled by hydrogen and other alternative fuels."

Most of these options will require a combination of increased government incentives, along with advancements in technology and cost reductions.

McKinsey's "sustainable transformation" scenario, which considers potential shifts in government regulations as well as advancements in technology and cost, suggests there is moderate growth in alternative fuels alongside growth in EVs. Mckinsey projects;

EV demand could grow to over 90 percent of total passenger car sales by 2050
EVs to make up around 80 percent of commercial truck sales by 2050
In aviation, low carbon fuels such as biofuels, synfuels, hydrogen and electricity are projected to grow to 49 percent by 2050.

According to McKinsey, the combination of these alternatives along with demand changes in power and chemicals could reduce global oil demand to 60 mmb/d in 2050. The shift to cleaner fuels, for modes of transportation other than EVs, is underway but the progress and adoption will take decades to achieve according to McKinsey’s forecasts.

Looking more closely at EVs, the story may not be as dire globally as it seems to be in the West. While the U.S. appears to be losing momentum on electric vehicle adoption, China is roaring ahead. New electric car registrations in China reached 8.1 million in 2023, increasing by 35 percent relative to 2022. McKinsey’s forecasts have underestimated global EV sales in the past, with China surpassing their estimates, while the U.S. lags behind. It’s clear that China is the winner in EV adoption; could they also lead the way to adopt cleaner fuels for other modes of transport? That is something governments and the transportation industry will be watching in the years ahead.

Conclusion

While we are not on a trajectory to meet the aspirations to reduce global GHG emissions in the transportation sector, there are emerging solutions that could be adopted should governments around the world decide to put in place the incentives to get there. Moving forward, the future of transportation fuels will be shaped by a mix of innovation, government policies, and what consumers want. The focus will be on ensuring that the transportation sector remains reliable, secure, and economically robust, while also reducing GHG emissions. But, decarbonizing the transportation sector is much more than just EV's – it's a broader effort that will require continued global progress in each of the multiple transportation segments.

------------

Scott Nyquist is a senior advisor at McKinsey & Company and vice chairman, Houston Energy Transition Initiative of the Greater Houston Partnership. The views expressed herein are Nyquist's own and not those of McKinsey & Company or of the Greater Houston Partnership. This article originally ran on LinkedIn on October 9, 2024.

Pathway Energy has announced a major sustainable aviation fuel project in Port Arthur, Texas. Rendering courtesy of Pathway Energy

Houston company's $2B carbon-negative fuel project to rise in Southeast Texas

eyes on SAF

Houston developer of ultra carbon-negative fuels projects Pathway Energy announced a series of commercial-scale sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) facilities with the first being based in Port Arthur, Texas.

The project, estimated to be valued at $2 billion, will be one of the largest decarbonization projects in the world.

Pathway plans to bring commercial SAF to market with its years of experience in waste and biomass conversion processes and technologies that include biomass gasification, Fischer-Tropsch, biomass power generation, and complex biorefinery and industrial processes. Pathway will be working with companies like Sumitomo SHI FW, who will supply the project with gasification process technology packages and power production. Pathway Energy also announced a strategic partnership with Drax Global, which is a biomass feedstock provider.

"We are happy to debut with the best technology and industrial partners in the industry on a market opportunity with global significance," Steve Roberts, CEO of Pathway Energy, says in a news release. "With the ultra negative carbon intensity achieved through our process, Pathway Energy is poised to lead a global market for ultra negative fuels, driving large scale emission reductions across the aviation sector."

In the Port Arthur project, Pathway plans to leverage sustainable biomass feedstock and access to geological storage to sequester carbon and to produce its ultra carbon-negative SAF. The site location already is equipped with industrial scale import and export logistics including established truck, rail, barge, and pipeline access. Pathway will develop a platform of commercial-scale facilities in areas with a high potential for geological storage to utilize BECCS (Biomass Energy Carbon Capture and Storage) and gasification technology to capture and store carbon, according to a news release.

The market for sustainable aviation fuel uses imported, used cooking oil (UCO HEFA). UCO HEFA SAF can’t materially decarbonize aviation since its constrained supply and positive carbon intensity score. Pathway’s ultra carbon-negative fuel is synthetic drop-in jet fuel that achieves a 550% reduction of carbon compared to traditional jet fuel, which is an industry first. Pathway believes this can abate as much as 6,000 flights a year.

Pathway uses an ultra-negative SAF, which carriers require less SAF to achieve emissions reduction as HEFA, which translates to emissions reduction, and lower cost of operations. The aviation industry can potentially achieve up to 8 times more emissions reductions compared to HEFA SAF.

“We saw the opportunity to provide carriers a pathway to completely decarbonize their flights with our net zero blended fuel," Joshua Pearson, Pathway CTO, adds. "This is a new type of SAF production that is 7-9 (times) more carbon negative than the SAF on the market today and represents the most sustainable, cost efficient and de-risked path to decarbonize global aviation.”

GGS Energy and Vast Renewables Limited announced their agreement to work together on Project Bravo, Vast’s first deployment in the U.S. Photo via vast.energy

Australian renewable energy company taps Houston partner for first US project

teaming up

Houston-based project developer focused on energy transition has signed a new agreement to work on a synthetic fuels project in the Southwest United States.

GGS Energy and Australian company, Vast Renewables Limited, a renewable energy company specializing in concentrated solar thermal power systems, announced their agreement to work together on Project Bravo, Vast’s first deployment in the U.S. The company's CSP v3.0 technology will be deployed to create carbon-free heat and electricity for a co-located refinery that will generate green methanol and/or electrically powered sustainable aviation fuel, or e-SAF.

“CSP has the potential to unlock low-cost green fuel production in the U.S., and it can play a significant role in helping decarbonise shipping and aviation," Craig Wood, CEO of Vast, says in a news release. "We are delighted to have GGS Energy as a development partner to advance our plans in the U.S., which is a key market for Vast’s technology.”

Vast is currently building Solar Methanol 1, a CSP-powered green methanol reference plant that will be located in Australia at the Port Augusta Green Energy Hub. Project Bravo will build upon that plant here in the U.S. The location is still to be decided but will be in the Southwestern part of the country.

GGS Energy, which is founded in 2020 as a subsidiary of Glacier Global Partners that was formed in 2020, has infrastructure development experience across technologies, including utility scale CSP, coal-to-liquids projects, PV solar, wind, and more.

“GGS Energy is excited to partner with Vast and work to develop Project Bravo," Tommy Soriero from GGS Energy says in the release. "This collaboration marks a significant step toward a sustainable future, harnessing advanced technology to produce low-cost green fuels. We are eager to combine our expertise and resources to ensure the success and impact of future innovative projects starting with Project Bravo.”

Unifuel’s technology consists of a series of chemical reactions that convert various sustainable materials into sustainable aviation fuels. Photo via Unifuel

California SAF co. raises $3M, plans to open Houston lab

moving in

Armed with a fresh $3 million round of seed funding, Los Altos, California-based Universal Fuel Technologies is establishing a lab in Houston for production of sustainable aviation fuel samples.

TO VC led the round, with participation from Alchemist Accelerator, Claire Technologies, and World Star Aviation.

Unifuel’s Flexiforming technology consists of a series of chemical reactions that convert various sustainable materials — such as ethanol, methanol, and liquified petroleum gas — into high-quality SAF that’s similar in chemical composition to traditional jet fuel.

“Today’s SAF production is challenged by feedstock limitations and expense, which are problems Unifuel’s Flexiforming solves,” Joshua Phitoussi, managing partner at TO VC, says in a news release. “Unifuel has engineered a more efficient SAF production method that dramatically cuts costs while getting the most out of limited resources.”

One of the key benefits of Flexiforming is that it creates the molecules needed for jet engines and other aircraft equipment to run smoothly. The addition of Flexiforming’s SAF allows for a fully synthetic jet fuel that airlines would be able to use without blending with conventional jet fuel once ASTM International (formerly the American Society of Testing and Materials) approves 100% SAF.

“Sustainable aviation depends upon developing SAF that is not only cost-effective but able to work within the aviation industry as it stands today,” says Alexei Beltyukov, CEO of Universal Fuel Technologies. “With Flexiforming, we can give SAF producers the ability to make affordable, high-quality SAF that has the characteristics needed for aircraft performance and the flexibility to scale at their own rate.”

The Carbon to Value Initiative kicks off this week at Greentown Houston. Photo via GreentownLabs.com

9 carbontech startups named to Greentown Labs accelerator program

new cohort

A carbon innovation initiative in collaboration with Greentown Houston has named its new cohort.

The Carbon to Value Initiative (C2V Initiative) — a collaboration between NYU Tandon School of Engineering's Urban Future Lab (UFL), Greentown Labs, and Fraunhofer USA — has named nine startup participants for the fourth year of its carbontech accelerator program.

"Once again, the C2V Initiative has been able to select some of the most promising carbontech startups through a very competitive process with a 7 percent acceptance rate," Frederic Clerc, director of the C2V Initiative and interim managing director of UFL, says in a news release. "The diversity of this cohort, in its technologies, products, geographies, and stages, makes it an amazing snapshot of the rapidly evolving carbontech innovation landscape."

The cohort was selected from over a hundred applications from nearly 30 countries. In the six-month program, the nine companies gain access to the C2V Initiative's Carbontech Leadership Council, an invitation-only group of corporate, nonprofit, and government leaders who provide commercialization opportunities and identify avenues for technology validation, testing, and demonstration.

The year four cohort, according to the release, includes:

Ardent, from New Castle, Delaware, is a process technology company that is developing membrane-based solutions for point-source carbon capture and other chemical separations.
CarbonBlue, from Haifa, Israel, develops a chemical process that mineralizes and extracts CO2 from water, which then reabsorbs more atmospheric CO2.
MacroCycle, from Somerville, Massachusetts, develops a chemical recycling process to turn polyethylene terephthalate (PET) and polyester-fiber waste into "virgin-grade" plastics.
Maple Materials, from Richmond, California,develops an electrolysis process to convert CO2 into graphite and oxygen.
Oxylus Energy, from New Haven, Connecticut, develops a direct electrochemical process to convert CO2 into fuels and chemical feedstocks, such as methanol.
Phlair, from Munich, Germany, develops a renewable-energy-powered Direct Air Capture (DAC) system using an electrochemical process for acid and base generation.
Secant Fuel, from Montreal, Quebec, Canada, develops a one-step electrocatalytic process that converts flue gas into syngas.
RenewCO 2, from Somerset, New Jersey, is developing an electrochemical process to convert CO2 into fuels and chemicals, such as sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) or propylene glycol.
Seabound, from London, England, builds carbon-capture equipment for new and existing ships.

"The depth and breadth of carbontech innovations represented in this applicant pool speaks volumes to this growing and dynamic industry around the world," adds Kevin Dutt, Interim CEO of Greentown Labs. "We're eager to support these nine impressive companies as they progress through this program and look forward to seeing how they engage with the CLC now and into the future."

The C2V Initiative will host a public Year 4 kickoff event on Sept. 19 at Greentown Houston and via livestream.

Ad Placement 300x100

Ad Placement 300x600

CultureMap Emails are Awesome

Property Showcase

UH's $44 million mass timber building slashed energy use in first year

building up

The University of Houston recently completed assessments on year one of the first mass timber project on campus, and the results show it has had a major impact.

Known as the Retail, Auxiliary, and Dining Center, or RAD Center, the $44 million building showed an 84 percent reduction in predicted energy use intensity, a measure of how much energy a building uses relative to its size, compared to similar buildings. Its Global Warming Potential rating, a ratio determined by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, shows a 39 percent reduction compared to the benchmark for other buildings of its type.

In comparison to similar structures, the RAD Center saved the equivalent of taking 472 gasoline-powered cars driven for one year off the road, according to architecture firm Perkins & Will.

The RAD Center was created in alignment with the AIA 2030 Commitment to carbon-neutral buildings, designed by Perkins & Will and constructed by Houston-based general contractor Turner Construction.

Perkins & Will’s work reduced the building's carbon footprint by incorporating lighter mass timber structural systems, which allowed the RAD Center to reuse the foundation, columns and beams of the building it replaced. Reused elements account for 45 percent of the RAD Center’s total mass, according to Perkins & Will.

Mass timber is considered a sustainable alternative to steel and concrete construction. The RAD Center, a 41,000-square-foot development, replaced the once popular Satellite, which was a food, retail and hangout center for students on UH’s campus near the Science & Research Building 2 and the Jack J. Valenti School of Communication.

The RAD Center uses more than a million pounds of timber, which can store over 650 metric tons of CO2. Aesthetically, the building complements the surrounding campus woodlands and offers students a view both inside and out.

“Spaces are designed to create a sense of serenity and calm in an ecologically-minded environment,” Diego Rozo, a senior project manager and associate principal at Perkins & Will, said in a news release. “They were conceptually inspired by the notion of ‘unleashing the senses’ – the design celebrating different sights, sounds, smells and tastes alongside the tactile nature of the timber.”

In addition to its mass timber design, the building was also part of an Energy Use Intensity (EUI) reduction effort. It features high-performance insulation and barriers, natural light to illuminate a building's interior, efficient indoor lighting fixtures, and optimized equipment, including HVAC systems.

The RAD Center officially opened Phase I in Spring 2024. The third and final phase of construction is scheduled for this summer, with a planned opening set for the fall.

Experts on U.S. energy infrastructure, sustainability, and the future of data

Guest column

Digital infrastructure is the dominant theme in energy and infrastructure, real estate and technology markets.

Data, the byproduct and primary value generated by digital infrastructure, is referred to as “the fifth utility,” along with water, gas, electricity and telecommunications. Data is created, aggregated, stored, transmitted, shared, traded and sold. Data requires data centers. Data centers require energy. The United States is home to approximately 40% of the world's data centers. The U.S. is set to lead the world in digital infrastructure advancement and has an opportunity to lead on energy for a very long time.

Data centers consume vast amounts of electricity due to their computational and cooling requirements. According to the United States Department of Energy, data centers consume “10 to 50 times the energy per floor space of a typical commercial office building.” Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory issued a report in December 2024 stating that U.S. data center energy use reached 176 TWh by 2023, “representing 4.4% of total U.S. electricity consumption.” This percentage will increase significantly with near-term investment into high performance computing (HPC) and artificial intelligence (AI). The markets recognize the need for digital infrastructure build-out and, developers, engineers, investors and asset owners are responding at an incredible clip.

However, the energy demands required to meet this digital load growth pose significant challenges to the U.S. power grid. Reliability and cost-efficiency have been, and will continue to be, two non-negotiable priorities of the legal, regulatory and quasi-regulatory regime overlaying the U.S. power grid.

Maintaining and improving reliability requires physical solutions. The grid must be perfectly balanced, with neither too little nor too much electricity at any given time. Specifically, new-build, physical power generation and transmission (a topic worthy of another article) projects must be built. To be sure, innovative financial products such as virtual power purchase agreements (VPPAs), hedges, environmental attributes, and other offtake strategies have been, and will continue to be, critical to growing the U.S. renewable energy markets and facilitating the energy transition, but the U.S. electrical grid needs to generate and move significantly more electrons to support the digital infrastructure transformation.

But there is now a third permanent priority: sustainability. New power generation over the next decade will include a mix of solar (large and small scale, offsite and onsite), wind and natural gas resources, with existing nuclear power, hydro, biomass, and geothermal remaining important in their respective regions.

Solar, in particular, will grow as a percentage of U.S grid generation. The Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) reported that solar added 50 gigawatts of new capacity to the U.S. grid in 2024, “the largest single year of new capacity added to the grid by an energy technology in over two decades.” Solar is leading, as it can be flexibly sized and sited.

Under-utilized technology such as carbon capture, utilization and storage (CCUS) will become more prominent. Hydrogen may be a potential game-changer in the medium-to-long-term. Further, a nuclear power renaissance (conventional and small modular reactor (SMR) technologies) appears to be real, with recent commitments from some of the largest companies in the world, led by technology companies. Nuclear is poised to be a part of a “net-zero” future in the United States, also in the medium-to-long term.

The transition from fossil fuels to zero carbon renewable energy is well on its way – this is undeniable – and will continue, regardless of U.S. political and market cycles. Along with reliability and cost efficiency, sustainability has become a permanent third leg of the U.S. power grid stool.

Sustainability is now non-negotiable. Corporate renewable and low carbon energy procurement is strong. State renewable portfolio standards (RPS) and clean energy standards (CES) have established aggressive goals. Domestic manufacturing of the equipment deployed in the U.S. is growing meaningfully and in politically diverse regions of the country. Solar, wind and batteries are increasing less expensive. But, perhaps more importantly, the grid needs as much renewable and low carbon power generation as possible - not in lieu of gas generation, but as an increasingly growing pairing with gas and other technologies. This is not an “R” or “D” issue (as we say in Washington), and it's not an “either, or” issue, it's good business and a physical necessity.

As a result, solar, wind and battery storage deployment, in particular, will continue to accelerate in the U.S. These clean technologies will inevitably become more efficient as the buildout in the U.S. increases, investments continue and technology advances.

At some point in the future (it won’t be in the 2020s, it could be in the 2030s, but, more realistically, in the 2040s), the U.S. will have achieved the remarkable – a truly modern (if not entirely overhauled) grid dependent largely on a mix of zero and low carbon power generation and storage technology. And when this happens, it will have been due in large part to the clean technology deployment and advances over the next 10 to 15 years resulting from the current digital infrastructure boom.

---

Hans Dyke and Gabbie Hindera are lawyers at Bracewell. Dyke's experience includes transactions in the electric power and oil and gas midstream space, as well as transactions involving energy intensive industries such as data storage. Hindera focuses on mergers and acquisitions, joint ventures, and public and private capital market offerings.

Rice researchers' quantum breakthrough could pave the way for next-gen superconductors

new findings

A new study from researchers at Rice University, published in Nature Communications, could lead to future advances in superconductors with the potential to transform energy use.

The study revealed that electrons in strange metals, which exhibit unusual resistance to electricity and behave strangely at low temperatures, become more entangled at a specific tipping point, shedding new light on these materials.

A team led by Rice’s Qimiao Si, the Harry C. and Olga K. Wiess Professor of Physics and Astronomy, used quantum Fisher information (QFI), a concept from quantum metrology, to measure how electron interactions evolve under extreme conditions. The research team also included Rice’s Yuan Fang, Yiming Wang, Mounica Mahankali and Lei Chen along with Haoyu Hu of the Donostia International Physics Center and Silke Paschen of the Vienna University of Technology. Their work showed that the quantum phenomenon of electron entanglement peaks at a quantum critical point, which is the transition between two states of matter.

“Our findings reveal that strange metals exhibit a unique entanglement pattern, which offers a new lens to understand their exotic behavior,” Si said in a news release. “By leveraging quantum information theory, we are uncovering deep quantum correlations that were previously inaccessible.”

The researchers examined a theoretical framework known as the Kondo lattice, which explains how magnetic moments interact with surrounding electrons. At a critical transition point, these interactions intensify to the extent that the quasiparticles—key to understanding electrical behavior—disappear. Using QFI, the team traced this loss of quasiparticles to the growing entanglement of electron spins, which peaks precisely at the quantum critical point.

In terms of future use, the materials share a close connection with high-temperature superconductors, which have the potential to transmit electricity without energy loss, according to the researchers. By unblocking their properties, researchers believe this could revolutionize power grids and make energy transmission more efficient.

The team also found that quantum information tools can be applied to other “exotic materials” and quantum technologies.

“By integrating quantum information science with condensed matter physics, we are pivoting in a new direction in materials research,” Si said in the release.

View All Listings

ENERGYCAPITALHTX EMAILS ARE AWESOME