There is a dire need to further reduce the carbon footprint of sectors including transportation, industry, and buildings. In this webinar, leading researchers will discuss the role that low-carbon fuels, such as hydrogen and biofuels, can play in getting us to net-zero emissions across all of these sectors––an increasingly urgent cornerstone of any effective climate change mitigation strategy.
This is the first in our spring webinar series hosted by MIT’s Industrial Liaison Program (ILP) and the MIT Energy Initiative (MITEI), a continuation of the energy innovation webinar series. The series engages leading researchers from across MIT and industry executives on energy transition topics including low-carbon fuels, decarbonization of buildings, and more. Industrial collaboration has long been a hallmark of MIT’s approach to problem solving. Please join us to hear what we are doing together with our industrial partners to address the climate change challenges.
Dr. CJ Guo joined the Office of Corporate Relations as a Senior Industrial Liaison Officer in July, 2015. CJ comes to OCR with 25 years of extensive global experience in technology innovations, portfolio management and business development in emerging and conventional energy sectors with leading multinational corporations in the US, China and Canada.
CJ is a leading expert in emerging energy technologies and energy system transitions. With Shell, he was the Emerging Technology Theme Leader in China/Beijing (2011 to 2015), worked extensively with the Chinese energy communities on the country's future energy landscape, and the Senior Technology Advisor in alternative transportation fuels in the US / Houston (2006-2010), and served during 2010 as Chairman of the Fuel Operations Group for the US DOE FreedomCar Partnership. Prior to joining Shell, CJ has held technology development, commercialization and management positions with Air Liquide (2002-2006) and The BOC Group (1995-2001) after working as a research scientist in oil-sands upgrading with CANMET in Canada (1992-1994).
CJ earned his Ph.D., Chemical Engineering, at CSU, Ohio, his M.S. and B.S., Chemical Engineering at TYUT, China. He has earned various awards from Shell, Air Liquide, BOC, Shanxi Province (China). He holds many patents and has sat on the board of Shenzhen Sanmu Battery Technology Company as an independent board member during 2009-2010.
Professor Robert C. Armstrong directs the MIT Energy Initiative, an Institute-wide effort at MIT linking science, technology, and policy to transform the world’s energy systems. A member of the MIT faculty since 1973, Armstrong served as head of the Department of Chemical Engineering from 1996 to 2007. His research interests include polymer fluid mechanics, rheology of complex materials, and energy.
Armstrong has been elected into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (2020) and the National Academy of Engineering (2008). He received the Founders Award for Outstanding Contributions to the Field of Chemical Engineering (2020), Warren K. Lewis Award (2006), and the Professional Progress Award (1992), all from the American Institute of Chemical Engineers. He also received the 2006 Bingham Medal from the Society of Rheology, which is devoted to the study of the science of deformation and flow of matter,
Armstrong was a member of MIT’s Future of Natural Gas and Future of Solar Energy study groups. He advised the teams that developed MITEI’s most recent reports, The Future of Nuclear Energy in a Carbon-Constrained World (2018) and Insights into Future Mobility (2019), and is co-chairing the new MITEI study, The Future of Storage. He co-edited Game Changers: Energy on the Move with former U.S. Secretary of State George P. Shultz.
Kristala Jones Prather is the Arthur D. Little Professor and Head of MIT Department of Chemical Engineering. She received an S.B. degree from MIT in 1994 and a Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley (1999), and worked four years in BioProcess Research and Development at the Merck Research Labs prior to joining the faculty of MIT.
Her research interests are centered on the design and assembly of recombinant microorganisms for the production of small molecules, with additional efforts in novel bioprocess design approaches. Prather is the recipient of an Office of Naval Research Young Investigator Award (2005), a Technology Review “TR35” Young Innovator Award (2007), a National Science Foundation CAREER Award (2010), the Biochemical Engineering Journal Young Investigator Award (2011), and the Charles Thom Award of the Society for Industrial Microbiology and Biotechnology (2017).
Additional honors include selection as the Van Ness Lecturer at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (2012), and as a Fellow of the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study (2014-2015). Prather has been recognized for excellence in teaching with the C. Michael Mohr Outstanding Faculty Award for Undergraduate Teaching in the Dept. of Chemical Engineering (2006, 2016), the MIT School of Engineering Junior Bose Award for Excellence in Teaching (2010), and through appointment as a MacVicar Faculty Fellow (2014), the highest honor given for undergraduate teaching at MIT.
Adam Bratis manages NREL's research and development efforts in support of the U.S. Department of Energy's mission in the bioenergy space.
This includes technical and managerial oversight in the areas of biosciences; conversion of biomass to fuels, chemicals, and materials; algal biofuels; techno-economic and life-cycle analyses; and fuels testing. He also serves as a spokesperson for the bioenergy research program at NREL both internally and externally.
Bratis also leads the Renewable Carbon Fiber Consortium, which is a multiyear, multi-institution research consortium made up of national lab, academic, and industrial partners. The objective of the consortium is to demonstrate cost-effective production of renewable carbon fibers from lignocellulosic biomass-derived acrylonitrile.
Prior to joining NREL in 2008, Bratis had 11 years of experience with ExxonMobil in the areas of research and development, corporate planning, and refining and supply. He has extensive knowledge with respect to both alternative and conventional fuels.
Bratis has a bachelor’s degree in chemistry from Clarion University, a doctorate in organic chemistry from the University of Delaware, and a master of business administration from the University of Delaware.
Dharik Mallapragada joined the MIT Energy Initiative in May 2018. Prior to MIT, Dharik worked at ExxonMobil Corporate Strategic Research, where he contributed to research on power systems modeling, life cycle assessment and also led a research program to study energy trends in developing countries. Through his Ph.D. and nearly five years of research experience in the chemicals and energy industry, Dharik has worked on a range of sustainability-focused research topics such as designing light-weight composite materials and carbon-efficient biofuel pathways, as well as developing novel tools for energy systems analysis. His research interests include the design of novel energy conversion processes and their integration into the energy system. At MIT, Dharik is working on advancing power systems modeling tools to study questions around renewables integration and economy-wide electrification.
Dharik holds a M.S. and Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from Purdue University. He received a B.Sc. in Chemical Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras.
Karine Boissy-Rousseau currently serves as President of Air Liquide Hydrogen Energy U.S. LLC. In this role, she leads the development and expansion of Air Liquide’s position in hydrogen for transport in the U.S. and Canada. Karine is focused on the continued growth in commercial and business development along with the improvement in the hydrogen market infrastructure. Prior to her current role Karine was Managing Director for Air Liquide Benelux Industries in Belgium, managing the Large Industries and Industrial Merchant activities in Benelux. Karine joined Air Liquide as an engineer more than 20 years ago and has held positions of increasing responsibility within the Air Liquide Group including strategy, marketing, energy, and operations management in the Engineering & Construction, Large Industries and Healthcare businesses. Karine holds a Master's of Science in Chemical Engineering and a Master’s in Marketing & Management.