New Openings – PhD in Chemical Engineering
We are looking for a creative individual who is highly motivated to do a PhD in the area of flow measurements for CO2 transport applications, funded by academia and industry. A background in chemical/process engineering or close discipline and laboratory experimentation are required. The 3.5 years funding includes tuition fees and stipend.
Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) will play a crucial role for achieving decarbonisation targets. Transporting CO2 from the capture plant to the storage site is key for the deployment of CCS operations. However, flow metering is challenging due to the unusual physical properties of CO2 and the presence of impurities. The aim of this PhD studentship is to improve our understanding of flow measurements for CCS applications, so that uncertainties can be reduced to stay within the EU ETS agreement. This study will test different technologies which could be used for industry scale CCS metering. Flow measurements will be conducted at relevant temperatures and pressures, particularly for challenging metering conditions. This project builds upon our previous published work, for more information https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apenergy.2017.12.024 or 10.1016/j.ijggc.2016.09.013.
The student will join Heriot-Watt’s Research Centre for Carbon Solutions (RCCS; http://rccs.hw.ac.uk), an internationally leading centre for researching solutions to prevent climate change. The centre includes state of the art laboratories, servicing a dynamic community of students and researchers.
This PhD studentship is sponsored by the Energy Technologies Partnership (ETP), with the main academic supervisor at Heriot-Watt University (Prof Maroto-Valer) and co-supervisors in TÜV SÜD National Engineering Laboratory (https://www.tuvsud.com/en-gb/) and Aberdeen University (https://www.abdn.ac.uk/).
The successful applicant will benefit from: (i) developing skills in a new research area addressing industry/societal need/emerging industry; (ii) working in an interdisciplinary research group with access to state of the art facilities; and (iii) exposure to academia-industry interactions.
There are a wide range of skills that will be developed during this project, including: experience working with CO2, phase transitions near critical point, heat capacity enhancement, fluid property determination and multiphase flow.
If interested in applying, please send your CV and cover letter to Prof Maroto-Valer via email m.maroto-valer@hw.ac.uk. Applications will be reviewed from 6th December and we will continue to advertise until a suitable candidate is found. The successful applicant will start on 28th February 2020 at the latest.