Event
Special ChBE/UMERC Seminar: Mohammad Soltanieh
Thursday, July 24, 2014
11:00 a.m.
UMERC Conference Room, Engineering Lab Building
Professor Sheryl Ehrman
sehrman@umd.edu
Carbon Capture and Storage in Energy Conversion and Industrial Processes
Mohammad Soltanieh
Professor of Chemical & Petroleum Engineering
Sharif University of Technology
Tehran, Iran
Fossil fuels will continue to be the dominant source of the world’s energy in the next decades (82% of global energy mix, as has been for the past 25 years) and the demand for these fuels is on a growth path, particularly in the large developing countries, with global greenhouse gases (GHGs) emission exceeding 20 GT per annum. Renewable energies will only reduce this energy mix by about 7% in the next two decades. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), to avoid dangerous climate change impacts, GHG emissions have to be controlled to keep the atmospheric concentration of GHGs below 450 ppm and the average temperature rise of the atmosphere below 2 degrees Celsius. Thus, deep reduction of 50-80% of GHGs is required which cannot be achieved through the existing methodologies such as energy conservation/efficiency, renewable energies, etc.
At present carbon capture and storage (CCS) is applicable to large stationary sources of GHGs emissions, such as thermal power plants and major industrial processes (cement, steel, petrochemical plants and oil and gas refineries). Whereas transformation to a sustainable energy system with low GHGs emissions is very challenging, worldwide assessments suggest that under a range of stabilization scenarios, the contribution of CCS, as a low-cost GHG mitigation portfolio, is anticipated to be about 20% of needed emission reductions over the next century. Without CCS, the overall costs to reduce emissions to 2005 levels by 2050 increase by 70%.
Is this presentation, after a brief overview of CCS technology for climate mitigation, recent global CCS projects, either operational, under implementation or planned will be briefly reviewed. Finally recent research activities of the presenter in the following three areas will be highlighted:
- CO2 capture by membranes
- Energy systems and GHG emission reduction
- Enhanced oil recovery and enhanced gas recovery and CO2 storage.
About The Speaker
Dr. Soltanieh received his Ph.D. (1979) and M.S. (1975) degrees from the State University of New York (SUNY) at Buffalo and his B.S. (1970) from Sharif University of Technology, Tehran, Iran. He is currently a visiting professor in the Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences at the University of Maryland and he has been a visiting professor at MIT, RPI and SUNY.
Dr. Soltanieh has over 35 years of academic and executive experiences in multidisciplinary areas of chemical engineering, energy and environment, climate change and public policy development. Since 2001 he has served as the National Climate Change Project Manager in the Department of Environment (DOE) of Iran, where he has been responsible for preparation of the National Communications to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the related climate change activities such as IPCC. He has published over 75 papers in international scientific peer reviewed journals and has presented over 100 papers at national and international conferences. In particular, in recent years he has published several papers in the area of gas separation by membranes, greenhouse gas technologies including carbon capture and storage (CCS).
He is a founding member of several scientific societies including the Iranian Association of Chemical Engineers and Iran Energy Association, an affiliate member of the Academy of Sciences of Iran, a member of the National Sustainable Development Committee, and serves on the editorial board of seven scientific journals. He is a distinguished professor and the winner of several environmental awards and recognitions. Dr. Soltanieh is a Nobel Laureate for Peace in 2007 for his contribution to the IPCC on climate change (Coordinating lead author of the Special Report on Carbon Capture and Storage - 2005).
