Materials with oxygen storage capacity can be exploited to make chemical reaction processes more efficient. The original way of making hydrogen some 120 years ago used this oxygen storage concept. The steam-iron process involved the reduction of iron oxide in a fuel gas to produce particulate iron; this iron was then oxidised in steam to produce hydrogen and magnetite. Such processes have the advantage of separating the products of the fuel oxidation from the hydrogen product leading to a greater thermodynamic efficiency. As a result of their inherent advantages, chemical looping processes (as they are known) are once again in the research spotlight. Of interest is oxygen carrier material design to fit the chemical process in question (using this approach we have demonstrated novel approaches to achieve super-equilibrium conversions), oxygen carrier synthesis and oxygen carrier characterisation (particularly in-situ or even operando).
Biography:
Ian Metcalfe studied undergraduate chemical engineering at Imperial College before performing his graduate studies at Princeton University. He returned to the UK to take up a position as a Lecturer and later Senior Lecturer at Imperial College. In 1997 he was appointed to the Chair of Chemical Engineering at the University of Edinburgh and in 2001 he became Professor of Chemical Engineering at UMIST. In 2005 he moved to Newcastle University as the Professor of Chemical Engineering.
Ian was elected a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering (RAEng) in 2012. He has held a European Research Council Advanced Grant and was director of the virtual UK membrane centre (SynFabFun) for five years. He currently holds a 10-year RAEng Chair in Emerging Technologies. He has authored a text book on chemical reaction engineering which has sold more than 10 000 copies and has published more than 175 refereed research articles. He has supervised more than 60 PhD students.
His research is in the area of the thermodynamics of chemical conversion with an emphasis on energy processes. He has a particular interest in membrane processes, solid-gas reactions and the application of ionic conductivity.