Overview

The webinar will review the opportunities and challenges for the storage of CO2, hydrogen and methane gases in the subsurface for industrial decarbonisation. It will begin with a basic geology of the UK, including the basics of rocks that can store gases and why, and consider where gas storage already takes place.

The presentation will then move on to future sites and technologies for geological gas storage, particularly for CO2 and hydrogen, and review the development of future UK and international clusters and industrial decarbonisation ‘ecologies’, as well as developments in the North Sea energy transition.

It will review the key geological research questions and the importance of pilot and demonstration sites and finally briefly review investment obstacles, regulation and policy, and social licence.

Speaker

Michael Stephenson, Professor, Stephenson Geoscience Consulting Limited

Mike has 25 years' experience in energy and geological science and research, including 8 years' national level science leadership as the UK’s chief geologist (Executive Chief Scientist and Director of Science and Technology of the British Geological Survey). Mike has been providing geoscience advice to Government for almost 15 years and has an excellent overview of Government policy, industrial activity and funding landscape in applied and energy geoscience, including CCUS, shale gas, geological radioactive waste disposal and geoscience data. Mike also has expertise in positioning organisations in controversial energy topics eg CCUS, shale gas and nuclear.

Mike was adviser to Sir Mark Walport (when UK Government Chief Scientist) on shale gas and CCUS in 2016; Chair of BIS e-infrastructure Energy Data Expert Group, 2013-2014; a member UKRI’s Energy Strategic Advisory Committee 2020 to 2021; a member of the Royal Society-Royal Academy of Engineering Shale Gas Steering Group (2018-2021); and a Member of the UK Government’s Hydrogen Advisory Council 2021. Widely recognised as an excellent scientist, he has over 100 peer-reviewed scientific papers including many on CCUS, and ~200 conference abstracts; in addition he was the Chief Editor of an Elsevier science journal for 12 years. His science excellence is recognised in his status as professor at four universities. He is Visiting Professor at the University of Nanjing, China, and the University of Milan, Italy, and Honorary Professor at Nottingham University, UK.

Mike is a well-known communicator of science and has published three single-author popular science books. His book on CCUS ‘Returning Carbon to Nature’ is widely seen as the go-to introductory text on CCUS, and reviews of the book include: ‘a tour de force’; ‘excellent review of an important topic’; and ‘conversational prose that opens the book to nontechnical readers’. Mike has also delivered high profile lectures, for example in UK Parliament, and has been a science advisor for the BBC’s ‘Horizon’ and ‘Bang Goes the Theory’ programmes.

The material presented in this webinar has not been peer-reviewed. Any opinions are the presenter's own and do not necessarily represent those of IChemE or the Nuclear Technology Special Interest Group. The information is given in good faith but without any liability on the part of IChemE.

Webinar archive

This webinar is free of charge and open to all to attend, but if you wish to access the slides and a recording to replay on demand then you will need to be a member of the Nuclear Technology Special Interest Group.