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MAXNET Energy is an initiative of the Max Planck society in which eight Max Planck institutes and two external partner institutions form a research consortium aiming at a deeper understanding of the electrocatalytic conversion of small molecules. We give an overview of the activities within the MAXNET Energy research consortium. The main focus of research is the electrocatalytic water splitting reaction with an emphasis on the anodic oxygen evolution reaction (OER). Activities span a broad range from creation of novel catalysts by means of chemical or material synthesis, characterization and analysis applying innovative electrochemical techniques, atomistic simulations of state-of-the-art x-ray spectroscopy up to model-based systems analysis of coupled reaction and transport mechanisms. Synergy between the partners in the consortium is generated by two modes of cooperation – one in which instrumentation, techniques and expertise are shared, and one in which common standard materials and test protocols are used jointly for optimal comparability of results and to direct further development. We outline the special structure of the research consortium, give an overview of its members and their expertise and review recent scientific achievements in materials science as well as chemical and physical analysis and techniques. Due to the extreme conditions a catalyst has to endure in the OER, a central requirement for a good oxygen evolution catalyst is not only its activity, but even more so its high stability. Hence, besides detailed degradation studies, a central feature of MAXNET Energy is a standardized test setup/protocol for catalyst stability, which we propose in this contribution.

The conversion of simple glucose in a salt flux results in functional carbon materials which contain larger quantities of N and S as dopants. This “salt and sugar” approach gives access to a new type of mesostructure, where single carbon ribbons terminated with oxygen and sulfur or nitrogen functionalities are “knitted” towards very homogeneous, about 10 nm thick layers with very large specific surface areas of up to 3200 m2g−1. Aberration corrected high resolution TEM together with EELS reveals the details of this structure.