Design of H2 PSA units to tie in with chemical looping processes.Development of a complete pilot scale test unit for a chemical looping process.Design and scale-up of CO2 capture adsorption processes.

Working with Engineurs to help industrial clients to design, build and operate commercial scale adsorption processes. Examples being H2 PSAs and air pre-puification units removing H2O and CO2.

I am currently working to improve the understanding of issues that arise when scaling-up adsorption units and what can be done to address them. I also interested in new applications for adsorption processes and providing support on what is needed to turn a concept into commerical reality.My particular research interests include:1. PSA/VSA/TSA cycle modelling and design.2. The impact of flow maldistribution on adsorption processes.3. Bench-scale testing needed to address long-term problems that arise in commercial plants.4. Performance improvement through interconnectivity of adsorption units with other unit operations.5. The impact of non-steady operating conditions on performance and control.6. How to combine modelling with laboratory- and pilot-scale experiments to minimise cost and risk in scaling-up adsorption processes.

For 7 years I worked on taking adsorption process ideas from concept through to commerical application. This involved taking pilot-scale experimental work and creating new fundamental models to enable process engineers to design full-scale equipment. I would then undertake plant performance testing to validate the model result. I was heavily involved in the technical risk management, intellectual property protection, economic evaluation and safety/operational assessments needed to move these technologies through to commercialisation. The specific adsorption fields that I was involved with include air-prepurification, hydrogen PSAs and novel technologies for CO2 capture such as sorption-enhanced water gas shift.I spent 3 years working on Air Products' pilot-plant used to validate their oxyfuel CO2 purification technology. This was comprised of flue gas quenching, compression, absorption/reaction columns, adsorption, membrane separation and CO2 condensation and distillation. I was embedded with the commissioning team on site to help troubleshoot this first-of-a-kind process, gaining extensive knowledge along the way about plant start-up and operation. My responsibility was then to develop test plans, oversee their execution and analyse the results obtained.My final 3 years at Air Products was spent on plant data collection and first principles modelling of the Tees Valley Energy from Waste project. I spent a lot of time with the Operations and Engineering teams testing assumptions about the the design, trouble-shooting unexpected issues and providing qualified predictions about unit operation performance under various scenarios. Often this needed to done in a concise fashion to minimise lost operating time. The modelling work included both steady-state and dynamic models, and tools were also created that could be used to ongoingly assess the "health" of the plant.