One of the focus points of VU Amsterdam is ‘Science for Sustainability’: how can we create an ecologically healthy, socially just and economically viable world? Climate change is not just about the environment, it is also about dealing with individuals and society and finding alternative ways to cover the needs of society. Our energy system is one of such systems that needs to be revised. The transition to a sustainable, net-zero, energy consumption builds largely on new techniques to extract and store alternative energy resources like hydrogen, heat or carbon.
At VU Amsterdam, we collaborate closely with partners in the energy transition to identify and quantify the subsurface resources potential of the deep subsurface in the Netherlands. With the use of geophysical data, we produce images of the sub-surface of the Netherlands, both onshore and offshore, to identify risks and opportunities for subsurface resources. Our students actively contribute to this endeavour through our DOCS (Deep Offshore Carbon Storage) program that has been running successfully for many years and was selected as one of the major innovations for ‘A better world at VU’.
Main topics of research:
- Investigating the Dutch sub-surface for potential carbon storage sites
- Understanding hydrothermal systems in active volcanoes
- Identifying risks and opportunities for energy potential in the deep subsurface