Category: Interview

Imperial College London International Student Energy Summit (SES 2019)

Imperial College London will host the 2019 International Student Energy Summit (SES 2019, 17 – 20 July), the largest youth energy conference in the world, which will bring together over 650 students from around the world to discuss all things energy-related. The vision for this year’s Summit is ‘breaking barriers’ – it seeks to be inclusive and foster reflection and discussion across a variety of challenges unique to this point in time.

Chemical Engineering PhD students Luciana Miu and Michael Ehrenstein are responsible for bringing the Summit to Imperial, following a successful bid in 2017. Luciana acts as the Sponsorship Vice-Chair, and Michael the Finance Vice-Chair. Amidst busy preparation for the conference we spoke to Luciana and Michael about their research, motivations and hopes for this year’s conference.

(more…)

Interview with Professor Geoff Maitland CBE, Professor of Energy Engineering

Professor Geoff Maitland CBE was recognised in this year’s New Years Honors List for ‘services to chemical engineering following a distinguished career where he drove connections between industry and academia’. He first joined the Department of Chemical Engineering at Imperial College London is 1974 as a Lecturer in Applied Polymer Science. In 1985 he left to take on several senior roles at Schlumberger, rejoining us in 2005 with a wealth of expertise which he has applied not only to teaching and research but the department’s strategic vision. In addition to his teaching and research responsibilities Geoff has been an active member of several departmental committees, and was pivotal in establishing the Greening Imperial initiative. He also played a crucial role in the Carbon Capture Usage and Storage (CCUS) Cost Challenge Taskforce, which produced a report for government in December 2018 setting out how CCUS can be developed at-scale in the UK.

Geoff is a very valued member of the department, and Imperial College as a whole. We took the opportunity to interview him and find out more about his early interest in chemical engineering, his career, and his thoughts on climate change.

(more…)

“Engineers are absolutely essential to solving so many of the world’s problems”: Dr Marlene Kanga on engineering, diversity, and her role as President of the WFEO

Dr Marlene Kanga AM is President of the World Federation of Engineering Organisations (WFEO), the international body for engineering institutions representing some 100 engineering institutions and approximately 30 million engineers around the world. She is the first chemical engineer to hold this position, specialising in process safety and risk engineering for the oil and gas industry in Australia and New Zealand.

Dr Kanga completed her Masters Degree in Chemical Engineering at Imperial College London in 1977, prior to which she achieved a Bachelor of Technology in Chemical Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Mumbai. She also holds a PhD in Business Administration from Macquarie University in Sydney.

In October she will be attending the Global Engineering Congress, co-hosted by the WFEO and the Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE), where she has organised two sessions on diversity. It’s a subject she’s passionate about, so we caught up with her in advance of the conference to find out more.

(more…)