General information

I am a Research Director (DR1) with the CNRS and have been seconded part-time to TOTAL to coordinate an ambitious “Disruptive CO2 capture technologies” project at TOTAL.

My secondment at TOTAL is for 80% of my time to advise their “Disruptive CO2 capture technologies” program. Here we aim to challenge current CO2 capture methods with those based on adsorption. The goal of our approach is to directly integrate the ‘process level’ (and even site level) into fundamental research on CO2 adsorbent materials. This should boost mainly low TRL ideas to higher maturities. For this, I am based at the Jean Féger Technical and Scientific Centre (CSTJF) in Pau.

For the remaining 20% of my time, I will continue to support the ongoing research at the EnAP team.
Key topics and approaches 
  • Characterization of porous solids 
  • Evaluation of adsorbent materials for potential applications in gas or vapour separation or storage
  • Adsorbent performance indicators 
  • Adsorption calorimetry
  • High pressure gas adsorption
  • Mixture gas adsorption (coadsorption)

Research activities   Highlighting the adsorption & energetic properties of nanoporous solids

My research interests lie in the thermodynamic analysis of adsorption at the gas/ solid interface.

Several aspects are considered :

  • Understanding adsorption phenomena in well-ordered solids
  • Understanding adsorbent flexibility
  • Using gas/vapour adsorption for the characterization of heterogenous solids
  • The evaluation of porous materials for their eventual use in applications including the storage and separation of gases and / or vapours.
  • The role of contaminants (e.g. water) on adsorption  performance

Various approaches are taken including the development of specific apparatus to follow phenomena under pressure : Microcalorimetry, Adsorption of Gas Mixtures and other apparatus development such as a coupled adsorption-Synchtrotron XRD system. These experimental aspects are accompanied by the macroscopic thermodynamic modeling of adsorption for the prediction of mixture behaviour.

 

Project activity

Adsorption for anthropogenic CO2 capture

This is the general topic of my secondment with TOTAL where I mange and advise activities related to adsorption-based CO2 capture.

 

With my secondment, I have cut back on project coordination at MADIREL. However, I am actively interested in both (i) the use of porous materials for harmful gas recovery, and (ii) understanding flexibility in porous MOFs.

Porous materials for harmful gas recovery

We work directly with the French Army (DGA) on the characterization of potential filter materials which is corrdinated by Emily BLOCH.

I am involved in a recently funded national project which deals with novel materials for hazardous gas capture (ANR SESAM) and this project is coordinated by Sandrine BOURRELLY and equally involves Emily.

Understanding flexibility in porous MOFs

This activity is carried out in a national project, ANR 'MEACOPA' and an Franco-German project ANR 'FUN'. The lead PI for MEACOPA is Isabelle BEURROIES and the lead PI for FUN is Sandrine BOURRELLY.

 

Background
April 2019 - March 2022

Secondment to TOTAL, Exploration & Production Research Centre (CSTJF), Pau (secondment for 80% of time)
2017 : Promotion to Research Director (1st class)
2010 : Promotion to Research Director (2nd class)
2000 : 3 month sabbatical at North Carolina State University with Keith Gubbins, learning the basics of molecular simulation.
1999 : Habilitation to Direct Research
1993 : Joined the CNRS as a research assistant
 1992-3 : Post-doctoral fellowship at Mainz University, Germany working with Klaus Unger and Ferdi Schüth on the occlusion of polymers within ordered mesoporous silica’s.
1992 : PhD on the adsorption of simple gases on MFI type zeolites. Obtained within the scope of an EU project between The Centre for Thermodynamics and Microcalorimetry (J. Rouquerol, CNRS, Marseille) and the Department of Chemistry (K. Sing & C. Theocharis, Brunel University, UK).

 
Awards
2005 : Award for Scientific Outreach activities
2000 : AFCAT-Setaram young researcher award for his work in thermal analysis and calorimetry

Scientific production

Researcher ID : J-3458-2012
ORCID : 0000-0001-5124-7052

Google Scholar : h-index = 75,  i10 index = 191

 

 

 

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