Designing the future of low-carbon chemicals: a systems perspective
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Designing the future of low-carbon chemicals: a systems perspective
Wed, 04/03/2026 - 14:00 to 15:00
Location:
Speaker:
Dr Fanran Meng
Affiliation:
University of Sheffield
Synopsis:
We are delighted to welcome Dr Fanran Meng to Heriot-Watt University, where he will deliver a lecture as part of his Environment, Sustainability & Energy Early Career RSC Prize Lecture Series. Please contact Dr Marc Little by email if you would like to meet Fanran during his visit on the 4th of March.
Chemical products such as olefins, aromatics, fertilisers, solvents, and polymers are essential to modern life, yet their production remains a major and growing source of greenhouse gas emissions and resource pressure. Delivering low-carbon chemicals at scale, therefore, requires more than incremental efficiency gains; it demands whole-system redesign across process technologies, feedstocks, energy supply, circularity strategies, and policy constraints.
In this lecture, I present a systems engineering framework that integrates process simulation, life-cycle assessment, techno-economic analysis, and optimisation to quantify credible transition pathways for the chemical industry. Using facility-resolved models spanning tens of thousands of production sites worldwide, I show how emissions, costs, and constraints evolve across regions, technologies, and time, and how limits on clean electricity, hydrogen, biomass, and recyclable carbon shape what is realistically achievable. The results demonstrate that resource efficiency and demand reduction are as critical as electrification and carbon capture. Targeted portfolios of interventions, such as electrified processes where feasible, low-carbon hydrogen for key routes, feedstock substitution using recycled and biogenic carbon, and strategically deployed CCUS, can reduce transition risks associated with infrastructure lock-in, scale-up, and scarce sustainable resources. Under coordinated system design, parts of the sector can progress beyond low-carbon trajectories towards net-zero and, in specific cases, net-negative outcomes. I conclude by discussing how transparent, decision-relevant models and open datasets can support industry, policymakers, and researchers in navigating trade-offs, prioritising investments, and accelerating the transition to a low-carbon, circular chemical economy.
Biography:
Dr Fanran Meng is a Senior Lecturer (Associate Professor) in Sustainable Chemical Engineering at the University of Sheffield. He is the recipient of the Royal Society of Chemistry 2025 Environment, Sustainability & Energy Early Career Prize and the 2026 ACS Sustainable Chemistry & Engineering Lectureship Award, and a finalist for the Decarbonising Transport Awards 2026. He received his PhD in Materials Engineering and Design from the University of Nottingham and held research positions at the Universities of Nottingham and Cambridge before joining Sheffield in 2023. His research addresses the decarbonisation of complex materials, chemicals, energy, and transport systems using whole-system approaches that integrate process simulation, material flow analysis, life cycle assessment, and techno-economic analysis. Dr Meng leads research projects (valued at over £32 million) supported by EPSRC, the Royal Society, and major industrial partners, including Saudi Aramco, Unilever, Mitsubishi Chemicals, and ExxonMobil. He has published over 40 papers in leading journals such as Nature Chemical Engineering, Nature Climate Change, Nature Reviews Clean Technology, Nature Water, and PNAS, and his work has been featured by The Guardian, Financial Times, and Sky News. He serves as an editor for the Journal of Cleaner Production and Resources, Conservation & Recycling Advances, and sits on the editorial boards of Environmental Nexus and Chem Circularity (Cell Press). Dr Meng is a member of the EPSRC Manufacturing and Circular Economy Early Career Forum and a professional member of IOM3, RSC, ISIE and IChemE.