Engineer Appointed to Environmental Protection Agency Advisory Board

September 17, 2008

AUSTIN, Texas — Chemical Engineering Professor David Allen has been appointed a three-year term on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) Science Advisory Board, the federal agency recently announced.

According to the EPA, Allen will be asked to provide independent expert advice on technical issues underlying EPA policies and decision-making. In a letter, the agency wrote that his 25 years of experience in air quality management, alternative energy development and other environmental aspects of chemical engineering would be "a great asset" to the board, which has about 30 members.

Congress established the advisory board in 1978 and gave it a broad mandate to advise the agency on technical matters. Allen's term begins Oct. 1 and ends Sept. 30, 2011.

"Developing environmentally and economically sustainable supplies of energy is one of the greatest challenges we face as a nation, and the EPA will play a critical role in defining the energy pathways we follow," he says. "I look forward to bringing my expertise in atmospheric chemistry and the science and technology of energy production to the Science Advisory Board."

Allen, who joined the Cockrell School of Engineering faculty in 1995 after 12 years on the faculty at UCLA, holds the Gertz Regents Chair in Chemical Engineering and is the director of the university's Center for Energy and Environmental Resources.

He has an extensive record of participation on national advisory boards and councils. From 1998-2004, Allen was on the National Research Council's Board on Environmental Studies and Toxicology, and from 2002-2008 he was on the EPA's Advisory Council on Clean Air Act Compliance Analysis, a council of the Science Advisory Board.

A high-resolution photo of Allen is available. Learn more about the Center for Energy and Environmental Resources.

For more information, contact: Daniel Vargas;  David Allen, Department of Chemical Engineering, Cockrell School of Engineering, 512-471-0049.