Klaus Lackner

Who is Klaus Lackner?

Klaus Lackner is a professor in and department chair of Earth and Environmental Engineering at Columbia University, the director of the Lenfest Center for Sustainable Energy, and the co-founder of Global Research Technologies in Tucson, AZ. Lackner pioneered the concept of carbon dioxide air capture as a means for climate change mitigation, i.e. abating emissions of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. Trained as a theoretical physicist, he has made a number of contributions to the field of Carbon Capture and Storage since 1995, including early work on the sequestration of carbon dioxide in silicate minerals and zero emission power plant design. His current work includes the use of tracers in geological carbon storage, power plant modeling, carbon capture membranes for use at high temperatures, gravitational carbon storage, advanced fossil fuel technologies, scaling and automation, among others. Lackner is currently the director of the Lenfest Center for Sustainable Energy at the Earth Institute.