Dr Renato Zagorscak

Joining Date: 28/06/2013

Renato is a Research Associate and Work Package Leader in the “Unconventional Gas” of the FLEXIS project aiming to make significant advances beyond state-of-the-art and evaluate the potential of deep lying coal seams for the development of Underground Coal Gasification (UCG) and Coal Bed Methane (CBM). He holds a PhD in Geoenvironmental Engineering, MSc in Mining Engineering and BSc in Geoengineering with over 6 years of experience in various working environment.

Renato joined GRC in 2013 as a member of the ERDF funded £10.1 million SEREN project to study the THM behaviour of porous media in response to geo-energy applications. Shortly after joining the GRC, he has started to read for a PhD in relation to reactive high pressure gas transport in coal. Following on from the SEREN Project in 2015, he has been employed to continue both experimental and computational research as a member of the newly appointed £24.5 million FLEXIS project (https://www.flexis.wales/) as a part of the carbon sequestration work package. From December 2016, Renato has been appointed a role of “Unconventional Gas” Work Package Leader to coordinate work on UCG and CBM related research activities.

Education

2013-2017: PhD Geoenvironmental Engineering; GRC; Cardiff University; Wales; UK

2009-2011: MSc Mining Engineering (Geotechnical Engineering Module); Faculty of Mining, Geology and Petroleum Engineering; University of Zagreb; Croatia

2006-2009: BSc Geoengineering (Geotechnical Engineering Module); Faculty of Geotechnical Engineering; University of Zagreb; Croatia

Research Publications

---

Journal

• • Sadasivam, S., Thomas, H.R., Zagorščak, R., Davies, T. and Price, N. 2019. “Baseline geochemical study of the Aberpergwm mining site in the South Wales Coalfield”. Journal of Geochemical Exploration (In Press).
  • Zagorščak, R. and Thomas, H. R. 2018. “Effects of subcritical and supercritical CO2 sorption on deformation and failure of high-rank coals”. International Journal of Coal Geology, 199, pp. 113-123. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.coal.2018.10.002
  • Zagorščak, R., Sedighi, M. and Thomas, H. R. 2016. “Effects of thermo-osmosis on hydraulic behaviour of saturated clays”. International Journal of Geomechanics, 17(3), DOI: https://doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)GM.1943-5622.0000742.
  • Zagorščak, R. and Thomas, H. R. 2016. “A review on performance of energy piles and effects on surrounding ground”. Inženjerstvo Okoliša (Croatian Environmental Engineering Journal) 3 (1), pp. 33-45.

Conference

• • Thomas, H.R., Hosking, L.J., Sandford, R.J., Zagorščak, R., Chen, M. and An, N. 2018. “Deep Ground and Energy: Carbon Sequestration and Coal Gasification”. In: Zhan L., Chen Y., Bouazza A. (eds) Proceedings of the 8th International Congress on Environmental Geotechnics Volume 1. ICEG 2018. Environmental Science and Engineering. Springer, Singapore
  • Zagorščak, R. , Sadasivam, S., An, N., Whittaker, J. and Thomas, H. R. 2018. “Unconventional Energy Resources”. Poster presented at the FLEXIS Young Researchers Conference, 13 July 2018, Port Talbot, Wales, UK.
  • Zagorščak, R., An, N., Palange, R., Green, M., Krishnan, M. and Thomas, H. R. 2018. “Underground Coal Gasification – Recent Achievements and further developments through coupled modelling”. Presented at: The European Conference on Fuel and Energy Research and its Applications (12th ECCRIA), 5th – 7th September 2018, Cardiff University, Cardiff, Wales, UK .
  • Zagorščak, R. and Thomas, H. R. 2018. “Effect of Sorption Induced Swelling on Gas Transport in Coal”. In: Farid A., Chen H. (eds) Proceedings of GeoShanghai 2018 International Conference: Geoenvironment and Geohazard. GSIC 2018. Springer, Singapore.
  • Zagorščak, R. and Thomas, H. R. 2016. “Experimental study of the Klinkenberg effect on gas permeability of coal”. Presented at: 12th International Conference on Diffusion in Solids and Liquids – DSL2016, Split, Croatia, 26 – 30 June 2016. Diffusion Foundations, 10, pp. 83-92.
  • Zagorščak, R. and Thomas, H. R. 2016. “Thermo-osmosis in saturated shale”. Presented at: 24th UK Conference of the Association for Computational Mechanics in Engineering, Cardiff University, Cardiff, UK, 31 March – 1 April 2016. ACME-UK: 2016 24th Conference on Computational Mechanics. Cardiff: Cardiff University/ACME, pp. 322-325.

Thesis

• Zagorščak, R. “An Investigation of Coupled Processes in Coal in Response to High Pressure Gas Injection”, PhD thesis, Cardiff University, 2017.

Peer-review activities

---

• Computers and Geotechnics (Elsevier)
• Journal of Rock Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering (Elsevier)
• Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews (Elsevier)
• Adsorption (Springer)
• Energy Exploration & Exploitation (SAGE)

Membership of professional bodies

---

• International Society for Soil Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering (ISSMGE)
• International Society for Rock Mechanics (ISRM)
• Croatian Geotechnical Society (CGS)