Promoting Gender Dimension, Equality, and Ethics in the CCUS Community Activities, Opinions, and Perspectives from the C4U Project

A majority of disciplines based on engineering, science, or technology, show a profound underrepresentation of women and minority groups. Unsurprisingly, this is true also for the field of Carbon Capture, Utilisation, and Storage (CCUS). Like many entities, the European Union acts against discrimination in various ways, apparent also in their scientific funding policies. The C4U project, part of their H2020 programme, advances integration of CCUS in the iron and steel industry, again a traditionally male dominated environment. In order to mitigate inequality, C4U is committed to improve gender balance and diversity on all levels of its research groups, decision-making teams, and advisory panels. A first internal analysis showed that the C4U consortium is already quite diverse under several aspects, such as social background, age, and nationality of individuals or affiliations. It consists of 21 organisations from Europe, North America, and Asia, including experts from academic, government, and industry. Diversity is also given by the involved professionals with backgrounds in business, chemistry, engineering, physics, policy, or social sciences. However, data also indicated an imbalance regarding gender distribution. As a means to further promote equity, immediate steps were taken, including adjusting participation of women in committees and boosting promotion of female applications for new positions. Besides these direct actions, and with attention to achieve a broad and long-term impact, two dedicated workshops will be organized. One focusing on gender dimension, the other with the perspective on equity, equality, ethics, and diversity within the CCUS community in more general terms. The first event will raise awareness, aiming to encourage and support especially females in their early carrier phase. This virtual workshop serves to facilitate open discussions on gender relevant topics, provides a safe platform to share individual experiences, formulate a joint response, uniting efforts of female and male colleagues to close the gender gap and exploit chances. Stimulating a direct, mutual exchange, starting or strengthening existing networks is key, not the least during these challenging times blighted by social distancing. Our overall aim is to advance diversity, to inspire and to be inspired.