Presenting Dr. Jennifer Wilcox as first speaker

Our first research talk will take place on 14 September 2022, and we are proud and honored to present Dr. Jennifer Wilcox as our first speaker. Join us online for a talk about carbon capture technologies and US climate mitigation strategies!

Dr. Wilcox is the Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary in the Office of Fossil Energy and Carbon Management at the US Department Of Energy. She is on leave as the Presidential Distinguished Professor of Chemical Engineering and Energy Policy at the University of Pennsylvania.

Dr. Wilcox holds a Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering and an M.A. in Chemistry from the University of Arizona, as well as a B.A. in Mathematics from Wellesley College. Dr. Wilcox's research takes aim at the nexus of energy and the environment, developing both mitigation and adaptation strategies to minimize negative climate impacts associated with society's dependence on fossil fuels. She has served on committees of the National Academy of Sciences and the American Physical Society to assess carbon capture methods and impacts on climate. She is the author of the first textbook on carbon capture, Carbon Capture, published in March 2012. She also co-edited the CDR Primer on carbon dioxide removal in 2021.

Wilcox’s research takes aim at the nexus of energy and the environment, developing both mitigation and adaptation strategies to minimize negative climate impacts associated with society’s dependence on fossil fuels. This work carefully examines the role of carbon management and opportunities therein that could assist in preventing 2° C warming by 2100. Carbon management includes a mix of technologies spanning from the direct removal of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere to its capture from industrial, utility-scale exhaust streams, followed by utilization or reliable storage of carbon dioxide on a timescale and magnitude that will have a positive impact on our current climate change crisis.

In her talk, she will, among others, touch upon the following themes.

• How the U.S. invests in carbon removal technologies and development to reach net-zero 2050 goals
• How the environmental impacts of fossil fuel energy production and other hard-to-abate sectors must be reduced
• The energy-, land- and water resources required to remove carbon dioxide on a climate-relevant timescale