In support of Hydrogen Week UK, Supercritical has left the lab and entered the classroom to provide some insights into work in the hydrogen industry, the clean tech sector and a startup!
In just two and a half years, Supercritical has grown from 4 founders to 15 full time employees. In that time, we’ve had hundreds applicants for various roles across the business! Finding the right people has been a momentous challenge, but we have successfully built a highly capable and diverse team. Together we’re making great progress towards taking Supercritical’s green hydrogen technology to market. Each member of the team has had their own unique career path to where they are today, but they all started with the decisions that they made at school!
As 2023 took off, Supercritical reached out to schools to support students in Year 9 and Year 11 in making more informed decisions about their GCSEs and A Levels respectively. Science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM) subjects are crucial in saving our planet from the effects of climate change! At Supercritical, we want to be the catalyst for sustainable life on earth. We want to help ensure that the next generation knows just how pivotal they can be in helping the world tackle its biggest ever challenge! We believe that sharing the stories of our career journeys till date would inspire the younger generation as they make their career choices.
A team of Supercritical’s passionate engineers went out to Ellen Wilkinson School for Girls and Berkhamsted School to talk to students about the choices in education that got them to where they are today and what they’re doing on a daily basis to help enable green hydrogen at scale.
The visits were a hit! Ms. Nihal Ferchichi, Head of Chemistry at Ellen Wilkinson School for Girls, said “'Our students found the talk eye-opening, the Supercritical staff were passionate about their roles and the students were interested in their experiences and career journeys. Many of our (female) students loved that two female engineers came to talk about their experiences and it really got them thinking about all the different possibilities with a career in engineering". Ellen Wilkinson School for Girls is in Ealing, the same borough in London as the Supercritical laboratory/office. One of the students commented; “I found the talk really useful, as I would love to help the environment using science; the session with the engineers allowed me to think of many other careers around this”.
According to Engineering UK, in 2022 only 16.5% of engineers were women. As of 1st Feb 2023, Supercritical’s team includes 4 women (27%); a number we are actively trying to increase! The more girls who choose STEM subjects, the more women that will end up in STEM jobs.
Dr. Steve Redman, Head of Physics at Berkhamsted School in Hertfordshire said, “Many talented female scientists do not take academic paths that lead to STEM careers paths because they have not been well enough informed, have not been convinced about the relevance of such paths or, most worryingly, because of a lack in self-confidence in some STEM subjects. Changing the conversation everywhere – at home, at school, in the workplace – is all of our responsibilities. The only thing that should determine whether or not a female student chooses a STEM subject should be her own choice, not ignorance or under-confidence.”
At Berkhamsted, we spoke to a slightly younger group of students, in Year 9. It was really encouraging to see so many who were enthusiastic about finding careers in helping to fight climate change and who were already aware of hydrogen. This awareness is fantastic, the message that the status quo is unacceptable is so reaching those who need to hear it.
We hope that our support will help these students make more informed decisions as they take on their next big milestone!
Are you considering a career in science, engineering, technology or maths? Take a look at the profiles of our outreach team:
Supercritical
Supercritical is developing the world’s first high pressure, ultra-efficient electrolyser, for the production of hydrogen and oxygen from water, with zero emissions. By using heat and pressure Supercritical's proprietary design allows it to exploit the benefits of supercritical water and deliver gases at over 200 bar of pressure, without the expense or challenges of hydrogen compressors. With this, Supercritical will deliver the lowest cost of pressurised green hydrogen.
Hydrogen Week UK
The UK’s first official Hydrogen Week will take place on 13 -19 February 2023. Bringing together stakeholders across the UK, it will celebrate and promote the role of hydrogen in reaching net zero.
With growing momentum around hydrogen, it will bring together partners from industry, to academia, to government to celebrate hydrogen with a week-long awareness raising campaign.
Spearheaded by the North West Hydrogen Alliance (NWHA) it aims to bring all regions of the UK together to cement the nation’s role as a world leader in hydrogen and capitalise on the huge opportunity the sector offers for both reducing carbon emissions and driving green economic growth.
Professor Joe Howe, Chair of the NWHA and Executive Director, Energy Research Institute at the University of Chester, said: “The last few years have seen hydrogen rising in prominence in the net zero agenda. It’s now recognised as critical to delivering on our decarbonisation targets. While there are a number of regions that are already delivering on hydrogen projects, if we really want to capitalise on this huge opportunity the UK needs to collaborate.
“Hydrogen Week will bring everyone together to raise awareness of the role that hydrogen can play in tackling climate change. I’d urge anyone who’s got an interest in hydrogen, whether that’s a big business, community group or school, to get involved.”
www.hydrogenweek.co.uk provides a hub for all activity taking place and provide a platform to share opinions and best practice on hydrogen.
To get involved visit the website or contact [email protected].
You can follow Hydrogen Week on social channels @H2WeekUK and using the hashtag #H2Week.
