Howard Herzog receives the 2010 Greenman Award

Senior Research Engineer for the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Howard Herzog, has been awarded the 2010 Greenman Award by the International Energy Agency Greenhouse Gas R&D Programme for his longstanding national and international commitment to carbon capture and storage (CCS) research and development.

The IEA GHG made the presentation during the final session of the International Conference on Greenhouse Gas Control Technologies (GHGT-10) in Amsterdam.  The conference, one of the most significant in the field of greenhouse gas emission reduction, attracted over 1500 delegates throughout the past week.

The Greenman award is given to an individual in recognition of a significant contribution to the development of the GHGT conference series, or for services to the development of knowledge and understanding of the issues involved with CCS and Greenhouse Gas Control Technologies.

The International Energy Agency estimates that CCS, which captures carbon dioxide from large industrial sources and stores it safely and permanently deep underground, could be responsible for as much as 19 per cent of the carbon dioxide emission reductions required to tackle the challenge posed by climate change.

CCS is one of the key technologies being developed globally to deal with our growing greenhouse gas emissions and will be part of a portfolio of global options, along with renewable energy, energy efficiency and fuel switching.

Former recepients:

• Meyer Steinberg – 1996
• Wim Turkenburg – 1996
• Yoichi Kaya – 1996
• Olav Kaarstad – 2006
• William Gunter – 2008

During the closing session the Greenman awards were presented by Kelly Thambimuthu to Howard Herzog and Peter Cook. The chairman of the IEA GHG programme explained that the awards are given to honour important contributions toward harnessing technology for mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions. Herzog was ‘speechless’ - which he admitted was very rare - and Cook was ‘staggered and humble’.