Tag: CCUS Taskforce

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…)

Why does the UK need to invest in carbon capture and storage?

The CCUS (Carbon Capture, Usage and Storage) Cost Challenge Taskforce recently delivered their report to the Government which puts forward a strategy to develop large-scale carbon capture and storage (CCS) in the UK. The key message outlined in the report, Delivering clean growth, is that the Government needs to act urgently to invest in CCS if it is to meet its goal of having projects delivered and operational from the mid-2030s. Without this, the UK will not meet its emissions reduction target, as set out in the Climate Change Act 2008.

Geoff Maitland, Professor of Energy Engineering at the Department of Chemical Engineering, Imperial College London, and Director of the Qatar Carbonates and Carbon Storage Research Centre (QCCSRC), is a member of the CCUS Cost Challenge Taskforce. He explains what carbon capture and storage means, and why it’s so vital in tackling climate change.