Preface Electrochemical energy systems are prospective systems for a sustainable, safe and renewable source of future energy. This textbook provides an introduction to the wide field of electrochemistry and energy storage and conversion. This book is an outcome of my lecture notes that I prepared for a course conducted by me in 2017 for graduate and undergraduate students at the Department of Mechanical Engineering, Yonsei University, Seoul, Korea. Electrochemistry is experiencing a renaissance

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... since more than ten years. A selfstanding discipline in science, research and technology, electrochemistry is scattering into various other areas. It is not a domain of only electrochemists anymore. With Professor Ryu who hosted me several times at Yonsei University, I now have three personal collaborators from departments of Mechanical Engineering worldwide, including one computational mechanical engineer who are actively working in electrochemistry. Why is electrochemistry taking a center stage? Well, batteries are electrochemical energy storage devices and we need batteries for our mobile gadgets. There has been a lot of research and development going on in the past 30 years for supply to the growing market of mobile applications such as video cameras and mobile phones. About 20 years ago, batteries were seriously considered for powering automobiles. In the late 1990s, hybrid cars became available where a traction battery could power an electric motor in addition to the conventional fossil fuel combustion engine. Batteries have become larger and their use has become more diverse. Electricity from hydropower, solar PV panels and wind farms can be stored in large factory-type batteries. Fuel cells were also a hot topic for automotive traction. However, in a review on fuel cells published in 1996, fuel cell experts Srinivasan and Mosdale [Srinivasan 1996] wrote: To date, the only application of fuel cells has been and continues to be as an auxiliary power source in space vehicles.