The first phase of the Pelican Gulf Coast Carbon Removal project recently received nearly $4.9 million in grants. Photo via Getty Images

The University of Houston is spilling details about its role in a potential direct air capture, or DAC, hub in Louisiana.

The first phase of the Pelican Gulf Coast Carbon Removal project recently received nearly $4.9 million in grants, including almost $3 million from the U.S. Department of Energy. Led by Louisiana State University, the Pelican consortium includes UH and Shell, whose U.S. headquarters is in Houston.

The funding will go toward studying the feasibility of a DAC hub that would pull carbon dioxide from the air and either store it in deep geological formations or use it to manufacture various products, such as concrete.

“This support of development and deployment of direct air capture technologies is a vital part of carbon management and allows us to explore sustainable technological and commercial opportunities,” Ramanan Krishnamoorti, vice president for energy and innovation at UH, says in a news release.

Chemical engineer Joseph Powell, founding executive director of the university’s Energy Transition Institute, will be the primary leader of UH’s work on the Pelican project.

“DAC can be an important technology for addressing difficult-to-decarbonize sectors such as aviation and marine transport as well as chemicals, or to achieve negative emissions goals,” Powell says.

Powell, a fellow of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, was Shell’s first-ever chief scientist for chemical engineering from 2006 until his retirement in 2020. He joined Shell in 1988.

Shell is the Pelican project’s “technical delivery partner.”

“Advancing carbon management technologies is a critical part of the energy transition, and effectively scaling this technology will require continued collaboration, discipline, and innovation,” says Adam Prince, general manager of carbon capture storage strategy and growth at Shell.

The University of Houston has received a grant from the Baker Hughes Foundation. Photo via UH.edu

University's energy transition hub scores $100,000 grant from energy corporation

just gifted

A Houston school is cashing in a major gift from a local energy company in order to support the industry's future workforce, research, and more.

The University of Houston Energy Transition Institute received a $100,000 grant from the Baker Hughes Foundation this week, which will work towards the ETI’s goals to support workforce development programs, and environmental justice research.

The program addresses the impact of energy transition solutions in geographical areas most-affected by environmental impacts.

“We are proud to support the University of Houston in its environmental justice research and workforce development programs; at Baker Hughes, we strive to take energy forward, and are committed to a fair and just energy transition,” says Chief Sustainability Officer Allyson Book in a news release. “Novel educational approaches centered around social, climate and environmental justice are crucial to creating a sustainable future for generations to come.”

The grant aims to help ETI in analyzing environmental footprints of energy use processes, energy use processes, impact on health, and emissions, as well as support the university’s Energy Scholars Program, which focuses on research programs on carbon management, hydrogen, and circular plastics for undergraduate students.The donation also supports Baker Hughes’ work with the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) that work to ensure “inclusive and equitable quality education for all.”

“We look forward to working with the Baker Hughes Foundation to address grand challenges in energy and chemicals and create a sustainable and equitable future for all,” says Ramanan Krishnamoorti, vice president of energy and innovation at UH.

ETI launched a year ago through a $10 million grant from Shell USA Inc. and Shell Global Solutions (US) Inc., and is led by Joe Powell, who opted to take the helm of the program over retiring, telling EnergyCapital that it was an opportunity he couldn't pass up.

UH has announced a central campus innovation hub that will house UH's programs for STEM, social sciences, business and arts. Slated to open in 2025, the 70,000 square foot hub will house a makerspace, the Cyvia and Melvyn Wolff Center for Entrepreneurship, the Energy Transition Institute, innovation programs, and Presidential Frontier Faculty labs and offices.

“The University of Houston aims to transform lives and communities through education, research, innovation and service in a real-world setting," Krishnamoorti says in a news release. “I am confident that working together we will make a greater impact.”

Joseph Powell, founding director of UH Energy Transition Institute, discusses the institute's role in the clean energy landscape and their corporate partnerships. Photo via uh.edu

University of Houston's energy transition exec unpacks future of institute, partnerships, and more

Q&A

Joseph Powell is about six months into his role as the founding director of the University of Houston’s Shell-backed Energy Transition Institute but already is eyeing how the Institute can aid generations to come through clean energy.

The Energy Transition Institute, which launched a year ago through a $10 million grant from Shell USA Inc. and Shell Global Solutions (US) Inc., is focused on three core areas of clean energy: hydrogen, carbon management, and circular plastics. Powell previously served as chief scientist for Shell as a chemical engineer and has co-invented 60 granted patents.

Powell discussed with EnergyCapital the projects ETI is excited for, opportunities for students to get involved, and their partnership with corporations.

EnergyCapitalHTX: To get started with a little bit of background, the University of Houston Energy Transition Institute was established in March 2020 with a $10 million commitment from Shell. So why did the university decide now is the time for an institute like this to be formed?

Joseph Powell: Houston is the energy capital, and the energy transition has been on everyone's mind, and so certainly now is the right time for an offering to industry to look at how to coordinate activities in that space. We reached out to Shell, which has really made strong commitments in terms of making the pivot from being an oil and gas company to being an energy company and really embracing the energy transition and everything that goes along with that. There was a strong relationship between University of Houston and Shell on the recruitment side, so a number of the Shell staff and employees. UH has been one of the principal suppliers of talent to Shell as an organization, also on the research side in terms of research around hydrogen chemical reaction engineering, and other aspects on the social and community benefits side of what happens with energy. So, there's been quite a bit of overlap. I think Shell saw it as really important to be partnering in the energy capital of the world, to be providing that pipeline of talent for what's going to be needed for the energy transition.

EC: You decided to come to UH to lead the Energy Transition Institute over retiring. What inspired you to take on this role? What’s your vision for the organization?

JP: It was an opportunity I couldn't pass up. I had worked 36 years in the industry, for Exxon and 32 years with Shell. The elements of the Energy Transition Institute were something that I was very passionate about working on with Shell, since I've been promoted to chief scientist of chemical engineering for the growth global group in 2006. I was involved in helping Shell set its strategy to become a full energy company and chemicals, not just oil and gas. I was involved in the elements of that transition, and then I also had a very strong interest in sustainability in terms of how to manage not only the greenhouse gas footprints of the company, but also elements on the chemical side that go with sustainability.

Shell wanted to combine those two into an energy transition Institute, circular plastics and chemicals were a major focus of that, along with hydrogen as a clean vector for future energy. I was involved with Shell and helped to put together some of their moonshots for how hydrogen can be used in the future economy. The Biden administration has now termed moonshots as Earthshots for the US to be able to use hydrogen as that clean vector to deliver renewable and other forms of energy going forward, as well as carbon management, so I was heavily involved Shell’s planning for how to deal with CO2, whether to capture it and put it underground, or capture it and use it. I'm on the National Academy study team right now, looking at what is the potential to be using some of that CO2 into products as opposed to storing it underground. All of those elements were important and in line with things that I care about and have been heavily involved with, throughout my career. So, why retire when one can be engaged with all of those types of things and now help the next generation come up to speed and take that over and drive it into 2050 and beyond what needs to be done?

EC: How is UH engaging with corporate partners? Why is a collaboration of this nature important?

JP: This collaboration is important for several reasons. One is that we are that bridge to the students and workforce of the future. It's very important for this generation to be as excited about careers and energy as I was, coming up during the energy crisis of the last century and we thought we were absolutely out of energy. We had rationing of gasoline and other things going on, back when I was in high school. Now we have many sources of energy, in a certain sense an energy abundance, but we really need to be looking at the environmental footprint, impact on the climate and then what forms of energy we want to be using. Then you add to that the issue with the impact of plastics on the environment, and how to drive to a more circular economy where we're recycling those and having less of that escape into the environment; those are all strong drivers of what needs to be done going forward.

It takes a lot of energy to process chemicals, plastics, and materials in a circular manner. Developing that workforce of the future means we need the students who want to engage in these efforts and making sure that those opportunities are available across the board to people of all different economic backgrounds in terms of participating in what is going to be just a tremendous growth engine for the future in terms of jobs and opportunities. You're looking at trillions of dollars of annual investment that's needed to manage the energy transition, so it's a really exciting opportunity for those who want to be going into those careers. It's not just science and engineering, but also jobs in law, policy, and communications, because there's a tremendous need for knowledge and background in the energy transition in order to be effective in that going forward. We want to have all the good talent that can be attracted to that arena as a way to address the problem. It's a grand challenge.

We want to make sure that in addition to the research opportunities, since UH is a Tier 1 research institute, we focus on working very closely with industry; there's a number of multinational and local chemical and energy companies that have their research centers and home offices in the Houston area. We can develop those close relationships between the researchers and business interests involved with the students at the university, because we're right here and co-located and can really develop some very strong working teams in that space. It's been exciting to be responding to the federal grant opportunities, which have been abundant in the last year and a half and putting together proposals, to be engaging the industry investigators along with the university students to work on some of those problems. It's a good win-win for both.

We also get to be a trusted voice in the overall equation because there's a lot to know and understand about energy and circular chemicals. They’re more nuanced and complex than what may appear in the news headlines in terms of understanding the trade-offs that have to be worked out, in order to optimize for everyone who's involved. The university can bring in that broad set of stakeholders and have a conversation and make sure that all those co-benefits are understood and the issues that come with energy infrastructure are also worked through for people impacted by the infrastructure but also the benefits of clean air, cleaner environment, and reduced risk of climate change.

EC: Are there any particular technologies the institute is focusing on or excited about at the moment?

JP: I'm really big on hydrogen as an energy vector for the future. Currently, we use hydrogen primarily in refining petroleum into gasoline and diesel and also making fertilizer which is very important for mankind. There was a Nobel Prize on that, you know, more than 100 years ago, and the importance of being able to grow food at rates the planet’s population requires.

Hydrogen now is being looked at, beyond those applications as essentially the diesel or gasoline of the future and also the liquefied natural gas of the future. It can be a clean vector, because you can put it into a fuel cell and generate energy cleanly where water is the only product of that reaction. That can be used to drive quite a number of energy related processes that are currently using combustion of fossil fuels that contain carbon. One of the interesting things is that hydrogen can be supplied to trucks and buses, agricultural tractors, and such. Most of the goods that you're buying today are produced in warehouses where the forklifts are running on hydrogen fuel cells rather than batteries because they refuel so quickly. It's cleaner than emissions. So then there's good air quality in the warehouses. There are more than 60,000 hydrogen-fueled forklifts now in the US, because of that value proposition. We see that for this heavy duty transportation, hydrogen is that very clean vector, you can make it by taking renewable energy and splitting water into hydrogen so it can be very clean. It can also be made from the abundant natural gas we have in Texas and storing the CO2 underground and then using the clean hydrogen for that fuel. That's one of the very exciting new value propositions that go with the Institute.

The second one is carbon management. The Energy Transition Institute will sit within UH Energy, which was founded a number of years ago and so it's looking at the transition part of energy, but UH Energy has its Center for Carbon Management in Energy, which has been focusing capturing and storing CO2 underground off of the existing facilities that we have up and running. They're run by Chuck McConnell but what we will do with ETI is extend that more onto the research side for some of the new things coming along in terms of capturing and utilizing CO2. I'm on a national academy study looking at where and how we want to be turning that CO2 into usable products, using energy and hydrogen, to make a number of those projects. That synergizes with hydrogen as part of the Institute.

Capturing and converting CO2 into usable products is certainly one of the exciting opportunities and then also to reuse those products we've already been making. There are also so many nice things you can do with hydrogen in terms of energy storage, and also helping to upgrade some of the carbon dioxide into usable products, but then also bio feedstock, you can take crop residues or trees and other energy type materials and use hydrogen to upgrade those into those types of plastic materials as well. That's another place where hydrogen is combined with managing a carbon resource to make a more sustainable plastic or polymer.

EC: With UH’s strong emphasis on research and entrepreneurship, is the Institute playing to these strengths within its programming and opportunities to further this trend and if so how?

JP: The money that's been funded by Shell into the launch of the Institute, and then that's been leveraged up to the $52 million point through various donors matching funds. With that, we will be hiring additional faculty to work in this space so that we can further expand the research that's being done. Each new faculty member becomes the opportunity for three things: more coursework in the area around energy, which impacts the student education; the hiring of graduate students who will be doing research; and then that also translates into undergraduate opportunities to be working in the labs and learning. We're also going to be building a new innovation hub in the center of campus here. It will be right across from the MD Anderson library where the old College of Technology building had been located.

On the first floor, there will be a makerspace where the students with ideas and people from the community will be able to come in and have access to 3D printers and other types of materials to put their widgets and prototypes together. On the second floor, then will be the Wolff Center for Entrepreneurship, which has the top undergraduate program in terms of entrepreneurship so they will hold mentorships, present there, in classroom-like settings, getting people involved with launching an idea and taking it forth into the commercial marketplace. The Energy Transition Institute will be on the third floor because so much of that innovation will be involved in the space of energy transition, which is really the main growth engine for expanding research at the university. Then we'll have on the top floor some laboratories, not only on chemistry and materials, but also on data science. And so we have a Data Science Institute, set up by HPE here at UH, looking at for example how artificial intelligence, machine learning and all those kinds of things help you innovate in the energy materials and processes.

Having a hub that combines all of that together really is an attraction to get all those players together on campus and will be really a key to making all this happen. It's a really exciting place to get involved and if you're a student, having all that in front of you, in terms of opportunity, we think it'd be a great attraction.

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This conversation has been edited for brevity and clarity.

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Houston companies scoop up $31 million in funds from DOE, EPA methane emissions program

fresh funds

The U.S. Department of Energy and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced the selection of seven projects from Houston companies to receive funding through the Methane Emissions Reduction Program.

The projects are among 43 others nationwide, including 12 from Texas, that reduce, monitor, measure, and quantify methane emissions from the oil and gas sector. The DOE and EPA awarded $850 million in total through the program.

The Houston companies picked up $31.7 million in federal funding through the program in addition to more than $9.5 million in non-federal dollars.

“I’m excited about the opportunities these will create internally but even more so the creation of jobs and training opportunities for the communities in which we work,” Scott McCurdy, Encino Environmental Services CEO, said in a news release. His company received awards for two projects.

“These projects will allow us to further support and strengthen the U.S. Energy industry’s ability to deliver clean, reliable, and affordable energy globally,” he added.

The Houston-area awards included:

DaphneTech USA LLC

Total funding: $5.8 million (approximately $4.5 million in federal, $1.3 million in non-federal)

The award was granted for the company’s Daphne and Williams Methane Slip Abatement Plasma-Catalyst Scale-Up project. Daphne will study how its SlipPure technology, a novel exhaust gas cleaning system that abates methane and exhaust gas pollution from natural gas-fueled engines, can be economically viable across multiple engine types and operating conditions.

Baker Hughes Energy Transition LLC 

Total funding: $7.47 million (approximately $6 million in federal, $1.5 million in non-federal)

The award was granted for the company’s Advancing Low Cost CH4 Emissions Reduction from Flares through Large Scale Deployment of Retrofittable and Adaptive Technology project. The project aims to develop a scalable, integrated methane emissions reduction system for flares based on optical gas imaging and estimation algorithms.

Encino Environmental Services

Total funding: $15.17 million (approximately $11 million in federal, $4.17 million in non-federal)

The award was granted for two projects. The Advanced Methane Reduction System: Integrating Infrared and Visual Imaging to Assess Net Heating Value at the Combustion Zone and Determine Combustion Efficiency to Enhance Flaring Performance project aims to develop and deploy an advanced continuous emissions monitoring system. It’s Advancing Methane Emissions Reduction through Innovative Technology project will develop and deploy a technology using sensors and composite materials to address emissions originating in storage tanks.

Envana Software Solutions

Total funding: $5.26 million (approximately $4.2 million in federal, $1 million in non-federal)

The award was granted for the company’s Leak Detection and Reduction Software to Identify Methane Emissions and Trigger Mitigation at Oil and Gas Production Facilities Based on SCADA Data project. It aims to improve its Recon software for monitoring methane emissions and develop partnerships with local universities and organizations.

Capwell Services Inc.

Total funding: $4.19 million (approximately $3.3 million in federal, $837,000 in non-federal)

The award was granted for its Methane Emissions Abatement Technology for Low-Flow and Intermittent Emission Sources project. It aims to to deploy and field-test a methane abatement unit and improve air quality and health outcomes for communities near production facilities and establish field technician internships for local residents.

Blue Sky Measurements 

Total funding: $3.41 million (approximately $2.7 million in federal, $683,000 in non-federal)

The award was granted for its Field Validation of Novel Fixed Position Optical Sensor for Fugitive Methane Emission Detection Quantification and Location with Real-Time Notification for Rapid Mitigation project. It aims to field test an optical sensing technology at six well sites in the Permian Basin.

Southern Methodist University, The University of Texas at Austin, Texas A&M Engineering Experiment Station and Hyliion Inc. were other Texas-based organizations to earn awards. See the full list of projects here.

Texas university's 'WaterHub' will dramatically reduce water usage by 40%

Sustainable Move

A major advancement in sustainability is coming to one Texas university. A new UT WaterHub at the University of Texas at Austin will be the largest facility of its kind in the U.S. and will transform how the university manages its water resources.

It's designed to work with natural processes instead of against them for water savings of an estimated 40 percent. It's slated for completion in late 2027.

The university has had an active water recovery program since the 1980s. Still, water is becoming an increasing concern in Austin. According to Texas Living Waters, a coalition of conservation groups, Texas loses enough water annually to fill Lady Bird Lake roughly 89 times over.

As Austin continues to expand and face water shortages, the region's water supply faces increased pressure. The UT WaterHub plans to address this challenge by recycling water for campus energy operations, helping preserve water resources for both the university and local communities.

The 9,600-square-foot water treatment facility will use an innovative filtration approach. To reduce reliance on expensive machinery and chemicals, the system uses plants to naturally filter water and gravity to pull it in the direction it needs to go. Used water will be gathered from a new collection point near the Darrell K Royal Texas Memorial Stadium and transported to the WaterHub, located in the heart of the engineering district. The facility's design includes a greenhouse viewable to the public, serving as an interactive learning space.

Beyond water conservation, the facility is designed to protect the university against extreme weather events like winter storms. This new initiative will create a reliable backup water supply while decreasing university water usage, and will even reduce wastewater sent to the city by up to 70 percent.

H2O Innovation, UT’s collaborator in this project, specializes in water solutions, helping organizations manage their water efficiently.

"By combining cutting-edge technology with our innovative financing approach, we’re making it easier for organizations to adopt sustainable water practices that benefit both their bottom line and the environment, paving a step forward in water positivity,” said H2O Innovation president and CEO Frédéric Dugré in a press release.

The university expects significant cost savings with this project, since it won't have to spend as much on buying water from the city or paying fees to dispose of used water. Over the next several years, this could add up to millions of dollars.

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A version of this story originally appeared on our sister site, CultureMap Austin.

Report: Texas solar power, battery storage helped stabilize grid in summer 2024, but challenges remain

by the numbers

Research from the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas shows that solar power and battery storage capacity helped stabilize Texas’ electric grid last summer.

Between June 1 and Aug. 31, solar power met nearly 25 percent of midday electricity demand within the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) power grid. Rising solar and battery output in ERCOT assisted Texans during a summer of triple-digit heat and record load demands, but the report fears that the state’s power load will be “pushed to its limits” soon.

The report examined how the grid performed during more demanding hours. At peak times, between 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. in the summer of 2024, solar output averaged nearly 17,000 megawatts compared with 12,000 megawatts during those hours in the previous year. Between 6 p.m. and 9 p.m., discharge from battery facilities averaged 714 megawatts in 2024 after averaging 238 megawatts for those hours in 2023. Solar and battery output have continued to grow since then, according to the report.

“Batteries made a meaningful contribution to what those shoulder periods look like and how much scarcity we get into during these peak events,” ERCOT CEO Pablo Vegas said at a board of directors conference call.

Increases in capacity from solar and battery-storage power in 2024 also eclipsed those of 2023. In 2023 ECOT added 4,570 megawatts of solar, compared to adding nearly 9,700 megawatts in 2024. Growth in battery storage capacity also increased from about 1,500 megawatts added in 2023 to more than 4,000 megawatts added in 2024. Natural gas capacity also saw increases while wind capacity dropped by about 50 percent.

Texas’ installation of utility-scale solar surpassed California’s in the spring of last year, and jumped from 1,900 megawatts in 2019 to over 20,000 megawatts in 2024 with solar meeting about 50 percent of Texas' peak power demand during some days.

While the numbers are encouraging, the report states that there could be future challenges, as more generating capacity will be required due to data center construction and broader electrification trends. The development of generating more capacity will rely on multiple factors like price signals and market conditions that invite more baseload and dispatchable generating capacity, which includes longer-duration batteries, and investment in power purchase agreements and other power arrangements by large-scale consumers, according to the report.

Additionally, peak demand during winter freezes presents challenges not seen in the summer. For example, in colder months, peak electricity demand often occurs in the early morning before solar energy is available, and it predicts that current battery storage may be insufficient to meet the demand. The analysis indicated a 50% chance of rolling outages during a cold snap similar to December 2022 and an 80% chance if conditions mirror the February 2021 deep freeze at the grid’s current state.

The report also claimed that ERCOT’s energy-only market design and new incentive structures, such as the Texas Energy Fund, do not appear to be enough to meet the predicted future magnitude and speed of load growth.

Read the full report here.