Petroleum Research School of Norway (NFiP) organized a Whole Value Chain CCUS Conference Week in USA

Petroleum Research School of Norway (NFiP) organized last week another successful CCUS Conference Week at Golden Hotel in Denver, Colorado. It is the largest CCUS Conference held by NFiP as of yet, with a total of 95 participants from Europe, Asia, South America and North America. The guest list consisted of PhD- and MSc students from 8 different countries in addition to scientists, engineers and CCUS experts.

"It was a highlight of my PhD!" - Catrin Harris, PhD student at the Imperial College London, UK.

The Whole Value Chain CCUS Conference Week is a biennial event organized by NFiP that covers all aspects of capture, transport, utilization and storage of CO2, also known as CCUS. NFiP received more than a hundred of applications, and out of these 45 PhD- and MSc students were invited to attend the conference in Colorado to learn from international CCUS experts. The students came from all corners of the world: Norway, USA, Ecuador, Colombia, Denmark, UK, India and Brazil.

26 experts from both academia and industry were invited to hold lectures at the conference. Through exposure to the whole value chain of CCUS, the conference aims to inspire knowledge sharing and interest in the field of CCUS, as well as provide a meeting point for participants from the industry and academia to network, learn and share.

"The one-week CCUS conference is a special and amazing journey for any participant. For a PhD student working on CCUS and with the hope to find a solution to the climate change challenge, no better chance we have than this week in Colorado Golden to meet and learn from professionals working on different aspects of CCUS and draw a big picture of how CCUS could work in the future," says Ge Zhang, PhD student at Stanford University, USA.

His fellow classmate, PhD student Yunan Li, adds:

“This conference is a success to integrate engineers and scientists from all difference parts of the CCUS value chain for discussion. I got a chance to learn how people address CCUS challenges throughout the whole value chain and understand the great case studies all over the world. I deeply appreciate the conference committee to organize this great meeting and provide opportunities for students to be involved.”

The speaker's biographies and the conference program can be found on NFiP's website.

Successful global CO2 storage and reduction of CO2 emissions are crucial in mitigating global warming. CCUS aims to develop and improve technologies that contribute to this goal, as well as revenue generating opportunities to the industry. This will provide synergy between the need for increased energy production and the need for reduction in emission of CO2, by storage in sedimentary rocks. 

The Leader for the Petroleum Research School of Norway (NFiP) is Professor Arne Graue from the Department of Physics and Technology at University of Bergen. Professor Graue also heads the research group "Reservoir Physics – Energy Technology and CO2 Storage (CCUS)", emphasizing on CCUS. 

“Providing a Whole Value Chain CCUS Conference Week with perspectives from governments, industry and academia enables the next generation energy engineers to obtain a global overview of energy needs in the future while still mitigating climate change by developing disruptive new CCUS technologies for more environmentally and economically sustainable energy production,” says Professor Graue.

Professor Graue received great feedback from students and lecturers alike for yet another successful CCUS conference. 

"This was by far the best conference I have attended – it was very well organised and the talks were informative/interesting. Also I appreciated that the attendees were from such diverse backgrounds, it really made for an international conference! Thank you for all your work in organising – it was a highlight of my PhD!" writes Catrin Harris, PhD student at the Imperial College London, UK, in an e-mail to NFiP.

The CCUS Conference Week is a collaborative effort between Petroleum Research School of Norway (NFiP), The Colorado-Norway Clean Energy Research and Educational Collaboration (ColNor), NorTex Petroleum Cluster, Rice University and is Co-Hosted by Colorado School of Mines and Royal Norwegian Consulate General in San Francisco.

About Petroleum Research School of Norway (NFiP)
Petroleum Research School of Norway (NFiP) is a national research school that  coordinates lectures given by different Norwegian universities graduating PhD’s in petroleum related scientific disciplines. NFiP provides intensive courses, seminars and conferences for all PhD students in Norway with research projects related to petroleum. The research school also aims to establish discussion groups, collaborating opportunities and interdisciplinary meeting places for PhD students and their supervisors.

PhD students admitted to a doctoral study at their respective departments at Norwegian universities or at MoU universities, may apply for participation in activities provided by the NFiP. Links to applications for the various activities are found on the announcement for each activity. Admittance is decided by the Executive Board. Other questions may be directed through Contact Us.

Collaboration opportunities
Is your organisation interested in collaborating with NFiP on a course or activity related to the field of energy or petroleum technology? Then please do not hesitate to contact us at nfip@uib.no and we will be happy to further explore these opportunities with you.