Richard Rankin is Programme Director of the Integrated Environmental Science and Technology Business Line, Energy and Environment Directorate at the Idaho National Laboratory (INL) - the US National Nuclear Laboratory. The environmental business line includes activities in areas ranging from remediation oriented actions, to mitigation of environmental impacts associated with energy resource recovery and use, to the management of nuclear materials, and water resource management. Richard manages the development of the INL’s environmental R&D programme and is also the INL’s Relationship Manager for the U.S. Department of the Interior and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. He has over 30 years experience in technology development, deployment and management, and has worked with technologies and processes in areas including biotechnology, chemicals, defense, environment, manufacturing, materials, nuclear and fossil energy. He has conducted laboratory research and managed projects in areas focused on the design and development of processes, instruments and sensors for demanding chemical measurement applications.
Richard has published widely, primarily in the areas of hazardous waste processing and management, technology commercialization, chemical analysis, instrument design and electronic component design. He is a recipient of the INL Lifetime Achievement Award for Inventorship and is included in the INL Inventors Hall of Fame, has received an R&D 100 Award for one of the top 100 technical products in the world, a George Westinghouse Innovation Award recognizing the Westinghouse Corporations’ top inventors and a George Westinghouse Signature Award for engineering excellence.