Energy, Environment and IMCC

This paper gives a brief description of the important role that the ionic and mixed conducting ceramics (IMCC) type of materials will play in the R&D of energy and environment technologies of the - presumably - near future. IMCC materials based technologies for energy harvesting, conversion and storage as well as for monitoring and protection of our environment are exemplified.

The strong impact of the international IMCC research on development of devices based on such materials is illustrated, and some recent trends in the scientific exploration of IMCC are highlighted. Important groups of genuine IMCC are the fluorite and perovskite structured metal oxides that have proven practically applicable, but also fine structured composite materials consisting of separate, but well mixed, electronic and ionic conducting phases may do the job of a mixed ionic and electronic conductor (MIEC).

Recent years’ research has pointed to ever more complicated multiphase structures that have superior performance.