Rodney John Allam, MBE (born 1940 in St Helens, Lancashire) is an English

chemical engineer A chemical engineer is a professional equipped with the knowledge of chemistry and other basic sciences who works principally in the chemical industry to convert basic raw materials into a variety of Product (chemistry), products and deals with ...

and fellow of the

Institution of Chemical Engineers The Institution of Chemical Engineers (IChemE) is a global professional engineering institution with 30,000 members in 114 countries. It was founded in 1922 and awarded a Royal Charter in 1957. The Institution has offices in Rugby, Warwickshire, ...

who is credited with inventions related to

power generation Electricity generation is the process of generating electric power from sources of primary energy. For utilities in the electric power industry, it is the stage prior to its delivery ( transmission, distribution, etc.) to end users or its stora ...

, notably the Allam power cycle, which is a generation process for

fossil fuel A fossil fuel is a flammable carbon compound- or hydrocarbon-containing material formed naturally in the Earth's crust from the buried remains of prehistoric organisms (animals, plants or microplanktons), a process that occurs within geolog ...

s, with integrated

carbon dioxide Carbon dioxide is a chemical compound with the chemical formula . It is made up of molecules that each have one carbon atom covalent bond, covalently double bonded to two oxygen atoms. It is found in a gas state at room temperature and at norma ...

capture.

Career

Allam was employed by Air Products & Chemicals for 44 years, most recently as Director of Technology Development. In 2004, he was appointed member of the

Order of the British Empire The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding valuable service in a wide range of useful activities. It comprises five classes of awards across both civil and military divisions, the most senior two o ...

for services to the environment. He has also been a visiting professor at the

Imperial College Imperial College London, also known as Imperial, is a public research university in London, England. Its history began with Prince Albert, husband of Queen Victoria, who envisioned a cultural district in South Kensington that included museums ...

of Science and Technology and a lead author of the

IPCC The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is an intergovernmental body of the United Nations. Its job is to "provide governments at all levels with scientific information that they can use to develop climate policies". The World M ...

special report on carbon dioxide capture and storage, released in 2005. In 2007, the IPCC, along with

Al Gore Albert Arnold Gore Jr. (born March 31, 1948) is an American former politician, businessman, and environmentalist who served as the 45th vice president of the United States from 1993 to 2001 under President Bill Clinton. He previously served as ...

, was awarded with the

Nobel Peace Prize The Nobel Peace Prize (Swedish language, Swedish and ) is one of the five Nobel Prizes established by the Will and testament, will of Sweden, Swedish industrialist, inventor, and armaments manufacturer Alfred Nobel, along with the prizes in Nobe ...

. His work has included new processes and equipment for production of gases and cryogenic liquids, such as

oxygen Oxygen is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol, symbol O and atomic number 8. It is a member of the chalcogen group (periodic table), group in the periodic table, a highly reactivity (chemistry), reactive nonmetal (chemistry), non ...

nitrogen Nitrogen is a chemical element; it has Symbol (chemistry), symbol N and atomic number 7. Nitrogen is a Nonmetal (chemistry), nonmetal and the lightest member of pnictogen, group 15 of the periodic table, often called the Pnictogen, pnictogens. ...

argon Argon is a chemical element; it has symbol Ar and atomic number 18. It is in group 18 of the periodic table and is a noble gas. Argon is the third most abundant gas in Earth's atmosphere, at 0.934% (9340 ppmv). It is more than twice as abu ...

carbon monoxide Carbon monoxide (chemical formula CO) is a poisonous, flammable gas that is colorless, odorless, tasteless, and slightly less dense than air. Carbon monoxide consists of one carbon atom and one oxygen atom connected by a triple bond. It is the si ...

hydrogen Hydrogen is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol, symbol H and atomic number 1. It is the lightest and abundance of the chemical elements, most abundant chemical element in the universe, constituting about 75% of all baryon, normal matter ...

and

helium Helium (from ) is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol, symbol He and atomic number 2. It is a colorless, odorless, non-toxic, inert gas, inert, monatomic gas and the first in the noble gas group in the periodic table. Its boiling point is ...

. Several of these gases are generally produced through

air separation An air separation plant separates Atmosphere of Earth, atmospheric air into its primary components, typically nitrogen and oxygen, and sometimes also argon and other rare inert gases. The most common method for air separation is fractional distill ...

, which is also a necessary step in the practical application of the Allam cycle, in which

gaseous Gas is a state of matter that has neither a fixed volume nor a fixed shape and is a compressible fluid. A ''pure gas'' is made up of individual atoms (e.g. a noble gas like neon) or molecules of either a single type of atom ( elements such as ...

fossil fuels, for example natural gas or gasified coal, are combusted with pure oxygen. A 50 MW demonstration plant being built in

Texas Texas ( , ; or ) is the most populous U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. It borders Louisiana to the east, Arkansas to the northeast, Oklahoma to the north, New Mexico to the we ...

is expected to start operating in 2017. In 2012, Allam was awarded the Global Energy Prize, for his work on processes and power generation, along with Russian scientists Valery Kostuk and Boris Katorgin. , he is chairman of the international award committee for the prize. , Allam works for ''8 Rivers Capital'', with among other things the commercialisation of the Allam cycle.

References

External links

Description of the Allam power cycle
{{DEFAULTSORT:Allam, Rodney 1940 births Living people British chemical engineers 21st-century English engineers 20th-century English inventors Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change lead authors Members of the Order of the British Empire Environmental engineers People from St Helens, Merseyside

Career

See also

References

External links