The Department of Chemical and Process Engineering has continually fostered links with industry, not only to develop our research and knowledge exchange activities, but also to support our excellent teaching experience by providing first-hand insight into the challenges of an engineering role and giving clear context to the concepts covered within the course. We engage with a number of industry leaders from a range of sectors to demonstrate the variety of roles available to our graduates, and this myriad of input helps us create a stimulating and highly relevant curriculum that addresses the needs of future employers.
Chemical & Process EngineeringVisiting Professors
Tom Baxter, FIChemE, Chemical Engineering Consultant, PDB
Tom Baxter graduated from Strathclyde University in 1975 with a BSc in chemical engineering (first class honours). He is a Fellow of the IChemE. He started his career with ICI Petrochemicals, moved to fine chemicals with the Swiss company Ciba-Geigy before taking a position as a process engineer in 1980 with BNOC (British National Oil Corporation). Through privatisation and acquisitions BNOC became Britoil then BP. Here he worked as an operations engineer, development engineer and research manager. In 1991, he left BP and joined Altra Consultants as technical manager. He accepted a position as technical director with Genesis in 1998, and became the Aberdeen Business Unit director in 2005. He returned to his role as technical director on 2010 together with a position as senior fellow in the Chemical Engineering Department at Aberdeen University, which he helped establish. Since 2003, he has been visiting professor of chemical engineering at Strathclyde University. He is currently a chemical engineering consultant providing greenhouse gas reduction expertise.
Gareth Hinds, FICorr FIMMM FNACE FREng
Professor Gareth Hinds is NPL Fellow and Science Area Leader in the Electrochemistry Group at the National Physical Laboratory (NPL) in Teddington, United Kingdom. His primary expertise is in the development of novel in situ diagnostic techniques and standard test methods for assessment of corrosion and material degradation in energy applications.
Gareth obtained his primary degree in Experimental Physics and a PhD in Electrochemistry from the University of Dublin, Trinity College. He joined NPL in 2002 and has added world-leading metrology capabilities in electrochemical energy conversion and storage technologies to NPL’s well-established research activities in corrosion. He has been a Visiting Professor at the Department of Chemical & Process Engineering since 2016, collaborating with academics in the department and co-supervising PhD students.
Gareth is a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering and holds other visiting academic positions at the University College London and Harbin Institute of Technology, China. He is the author of over 200 publications and a Past President of the Institute of Corrosion. Gareth is also active on many international standards committees covering hydrogen technologies, batteries and corrosion.
Derek James McNab, CEng, CEnv, FIChemE
Visiting Professor, Derek James McNab, is a Chartered Engineer and Chartered Environmentalist who has dedicated his career to protecting people and the planet through delivering safety and environmental engineering solutions. He has led Mabbett & Associates Ltd since 2000 and grown it with his colleagues to become one of the UK’s leading safety and environmental focused consultancies.
Derek is a Fellow of the IChemE, former Chairperson of the IChemE Scottish Members Group, IChemE’s representative on the Engineering Policy Group Scotland (acting as a two-way link between engineering and Government) and Vice President of the Renfrewshire Chamber of Commerce.
Having studied at Strathclyde as both an under-graduate and post-graduate, he is proud to return to the Department to share his experience and knowledge. Derek lectures on a range of environmental engineering related topics to include: emerging technologies; ethics, sustainability and environmental engineering; industrial effluent management; and environmental engineering for solving industrial challenges.
Scott Allen, CEng FIChemE, Managing Director, Allen Associates (HPE) Ltd
Professor Scott Allen joined Stirling based Allen Associates (HPE) Ltd in 2001, taking on the role of Managing Director in 2006.
Over the past 20 years Scott and his team have worked with many of the world’s biggest spirits brands with the business now established as the largest Scottish based chemical and process engineering design consultancy serving the Scotch whisky and related industries. The company has completed over 1000 projects in the UK and overseas, with clients ranging from small craft distillers to multi-national corporations.
Although Scotland’s distillery sector remains at the core of the business, Allen Associates’ international footprint has expanded rapidly in recent years with the team delivering design solutions to a portfolio of clients in 17 countries, including projects in the United States, Scandinavia, Australia and China.
Throughout his career Scott has championed the cause for sustainable distilling and has been at the forefront of the drive to achieve net zero targets within the industry. With an intimate knowledge of the distilled spirit production process, Scott and the team help distillers deliver projects which have a significant impact on Lean, Clean & Green energy measures.
Scott is a Chemical and Process Engineering graduate of the University of Strathclyde. In 2015 he was awarded a Fellowship of the Institute of Chemical Engineers (IChemE) and in 2017 he was appointed Visiting Professor at the University of Strathclyde’s Department of Chemical & Process Engineering.
Jon Clipsham
Jon is an Industrial Chemist with over 25 years experience of working with catalysis and hydrogen processes. He is a proponent of low carbon hydrogen production from renewables, and was instrumental in the development of the global ‘first of a kind’ demonstration of an industrial scale prototype hydrogen economy in Orkney.
Jon currently splits his time between academic/skills/training and industrial advisory/due diligence work through his own successful business - Hydrojon Limited - supporting start-ups, project developers, investors, and government agencies internationally.
Jon sits on the board of Hydrogen Scotland (formerly the Scottish Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Association) and is a Member of the Royal Society of Chemistry.