Energy Science & Engineering: 10 Years of excellence

Abstract

This year celebrates 10 years of the journal, Energy Science & Engineering (ESE). In 2013, ESE was launched as a peer-reviewed, open-access journal devoted to publishing high-quality research in energy. Published by Wiley and the Society of Chemical Industry (SCI), the journal offers authors a fast route to publication and the ability to share their important research in the highest visible global forum. As a prestigious journal, it maintains the highest standards of peer review as evidenced by an average rejection rate of over 60%. Dr Tomas Kaberger was the first editor-in-chief of the ESE, and he played an important leading role in the journal development. In 2018, it was my honor to succeed Tomas Kaberger as the Editor-in-Chief of the journal.1 In his inaugural editorial on the first page of this journal, Kaerger said “We hope this journal will serve as an excellent platform for integrated research, education, and communication, particularly for those with results of immediate relevance in the energy industry.”2 On the 10th birthday of ESE, we can see that ESE has grown in all possible ways, including the number of annual submissions (1000+), the number of papers (up to 300), and issues (12) published annually, and the impact factor (4.170). It has achieved numerous milestones (see Table 1) and has published many high-impact papers (see Table 2). This is because of your participation and contributions as authors, reviewers, readers, staff, editorial advisory board members, and editors. To celebrate the 10th anniversary of ESE, we organized this special issue, which consists of 12 invited articles in various energy areas, including CO2 reduction, solar energy conversion, photovoltaics, batteries, electrolysis of water, and clean fuels. The first three articles are reviews on the application of non-thermal plasma in methanol synthesis from CO2 hydrogenation, recent progress in the electrochemical reduction of carbon dioxide on metal single-atom catalysts, and CO2 reduction into formic acid under hydrothermal conditions, respectively. The fourth and fifth review articles summarized solar energy conversion, including the application of ultrathin TiO2 layers in solar energy conversion devices and the phase change of salt hydrates for photovoltaics thermal management. The review article on solid-state lithium-ion batteries constitutes the sixth article, while the seventh article is a review on sodium-ion batteries. The eighth review article assessed the degradation issues and highlighted the stabilization strategies of protonic ceramic electrolysis cells for steam electrolysis. Among four research papers, the first one is the investigation of energy management for robots. Renewable hydrogen production and natural gas blending systems were developed and assessed in the second research article, while the third research paper explored subphthalocyanine–triangulene dyads for light-harvesting device applications. The final article has made contributions to Fischer–Tropsch synthesis by converting waste to sustainable aviation fuel. I wish to express my gratitude by thanking all the authors and reviewers for their contributions to this special issue and my two colleagues (ESE Deputy Editors-in-Chief at Wiley), Dr Sonia Ojo and Dr Costas Kouroupis-Agalou, for their great efforts in the peer-review process and the organization of this special issue. At this unique moment, I would like to say “Happy Birthday” to ESE, and extend my sincere gratitude to all of you for your enthusiasm in submitting high-quality manuscripts as authors, your important evaluating manuscripts as reviewers, your energetic discussions, and helpful suggestions as editorial advisory board members, and your great contributions as handling editors. I also appreciate the strong support and help from the publisher Wiley and the SCI. Prof. Yun Hang Hu is the Editor-in-Chief of Energy Science & Engineering.