Making energy available to society requires finding and producing fuel, improving the efficiency of energy use under the ultimate limits imposed by thermodynamics, and reducing the effects of these processes on the environment. The widespread use of fossil fuels increases the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, and means are now sought for its reduction or removal. Further environmental distress can result from manufacturing processes and society's use of the manufactured products. The traditional response of treating process wastes is still useful, but there is growing emphasis on designing new processes to produce less waste. This might be done by improving catalysts to decrease unwanted by-products, finding alternatives to volatile solvents, and developing more effective separation processes. Chemical engineers are at work in all these areas, as well as developing alternative energy sources and assessing the effects of pollutants on human health.

In the Department, you will find expertise in combustion, chemical reaction networks, geothermal energy, carbon dioxide sequestration, catalytic treatment of pollutants, global air pollution modeling, low-waste process design, and many other areas of energy and environmental engineering. View the pages of individual faculty members to learn about recent and ongoing research.

Paul I. Barton	Professor	617.253.6526 pib@mit.edu	process dynamics; process modeling, simulation, and optimization; energy systems engineering; pollution prevention
Janos M. Beér	Emeritus Professor	617.253.6661 jmbeer@mit.edu	turbulent combustion of gaseous, liquid, and solid fuels; reduction of pollutant emission from flames by combustion process modification
Daniel Blankschtein	Professor	617.253.4594 dblank@mit.edu	colloid and interface science, thermodynamics, statistical mechanics, environmental and biomedical aspects of structured fluids, bioseparations, transdermal drug delivery
William H. Green, Jr.	Professor	617.253.4580 whgreen@mit.edu	chemical kinetics, molecular simulation, free radical reactions
T. Alan Hatton	Professor	617.253.4588 tahatton@mit.edu	transport phenomena, separation processes, microemulsions, colloids
Gregory J. McRae	Professor	617.253.6564 mcrae@mit.edu	environmental science and engineering, process modeling, numerical analysis and optimization
Kenneth A. Smith	Professor	617.253.1973 kas@mit.edu	fluid mechanics, heat and mass transfer
Jefferson W. Tester	Professor	617.253.7090 testerel@mit.edu	environmental remediation and control technology, chemical processes in supercritical fluids, renewable and geothermal energy systems, gas hydrates in natural environments
Bernhardt L. Trout	Professor	617.258.5021 trout@mit.edu	kinetics of aqueous and biological systems, protein stabilization, nucleation of pharmaceutical and clathrate hydrates, theoretical heterogeneous catalysis, molecular-level design of products and processes, emissions control and sustainable development