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Geologist, Advanced Resources International (2017-2020)

            As a geologist for ARI, Phil worked on on the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)’s Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program (GHGRP), serving as a subject matter expert in greenhouse gas emissions from extractive processes such as oil and gas production and underground coal mining. Among many tools, Phil used ArcMap, Python, and PostgreSQL to organize and navigate through large emissions datasets annually collected by the EPA.

          Phil has also worked on international outreach on methane emission mitigation for the US EPA through the Global Methane Initiative (GMI) and the Coalbed Methane Outreach Program (CMOP). Through this work, he has conducted research and drafted pre-feasibility studies on projects that propose to reduce methane emissions from coal mines around the world, delivered presentations to industry leaders and policymakers around the world at Group of Experts meetings sponsored by the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe, and developed a training module for methane capture project feasibility assessments.

Selected works:
  • Live webinar presentation on Financial and regulatory incentives for U.S. CMM projects - US EPA, September 12, 2018
  • Pre-feasibility study for methane drainage and utilization at the TengHui Coal Mine - March 2019: (contributing author)
  • Training course for conducting a pre-feasibility assessment for methane capture at coal mines (drafted, edited, submitted modules 1 - 3, drafted modules 4 - 5.
Graduate Student, Penn State University (2015-2017)
          
            Phil worked with Dr. Peter Heaney at Penn State to study the oxidation-reduction chemistry between aqueous chromium and manganese oxides. Taking simultaneous measurements using time-resolved (TR) X-ray diffraction, TR  X-ray spectroscopy, and aqueous chemical spectrometry, he monitored the redox process between aqueous chromium (III) and birnessite at different concentrations of solution pH.  Phil’s master’s thesis can be found here.

Phil at 13-ID-E , Advanced Photon Source
Publications
Peer-Reviewed
1 Kong K, Heaney, P.J., Fischer, T.B., Post, J.E., Stubbs, J.E., Eng, P.J. (2019) Mineralogical and geochemical constraints on chromium oxidation induced by birnessite. Applied Geochemistry, 108, 104365. PDF
Conference Proceedings
1 Talkington, C. and Kong, K. and Ruiz, F., Achieving Near-Zero Methane Emissions Coal Mining. 14th Greenhouse Gas Control Technologies Conference Melbourne 21-26 October 2018 (GHGT- 14). PDF