Partner Profile: Kat Sale | |
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My advice for young women and girls interested in engineering is to let others hear you. Entering a male-dominated field, often less is expected of you and, as such, you're given fewer opportunities. If you aren't given a chance to speak, then make it!
In celebration of Women in Engineering Day on June 23, this issue of the GCI newsletter features Kat Sale, U-M chemical engineering undergraduate, transfer student, Kansas native, LafargeHolcim intern, math and science savant.
How did you come to study engineering at University of Michigan (U-M)?
I took a roundabout way here. After finishing high school in Olathe, Kansas, I started at the University of Arizona studying environmental policy. However, I ran into some funding issues. Plus, that major did not require any math or science, and I realized that it was not for me. I moved to Ann Arbor with my sister, who was doing a PhD program here, because I had heard about U-M’s engineering program. However, before I could apply to the U-M College of Engineering, I had to first take some required courses at Eastern Michigan and Washtenaw Community College. So I really just started at U-M in the middle of the pandemic.
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Why chemical engineering?
I've always really been interested in environmental sustainability and reducing global warming. I decided that the best way that I could benefit the field was through carbon capture, figuring out how to take carbon directly out of the air. That's why I joined chemical engineering to gain the background I’d need to work on developing unique sorbents and improving carbon capture processes to make it efficient, affordable, scalable, and easily adoptable across the world.
Why are you interested in carbon capture?
I've always had this naive hope of being able to make an impact on the world. I want to be able to make the world a better place. The truth is that I was interested in it as a child. The fact that there was something that was literally affecting the entire globe, and that nobody was doing anything about was pretty ridiculous.
What have you been working on?
Last semester, I worked with Prof. Volker Sick on a project to create a model for adopting Svante’s carbon capture technology on the U-M North Campus power plant. At the end of the semester, I presented my findings, which included a report that concluded a carbon capture addition to the plant would be technically feasible, and detailed the parameters that would have to be met for this to happen. The project taught me a lot about the specific requirements for certain carbon capture technology, and I believe my work can serve as a model for evaluating the technical feasibility of implementing such a process at other universities.
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What are you doing this summer?
This summer I'm interning in Oklahoma at a LafargeHolcim cement plant. My goal here is to decrease their environmental impact through finding alternate uses for the waste cement dust that the plant generates, decreasing the quantity of water disposed of, finding alternative disposal methods for their cement dust and waste water, monitoring an increase in their use of alternative fuels, and determining the greatest contributors to the quality of their emissions.
Additionally, I'm competing in U-M's DACC-A-THON over the summer, where I'm leading a team of students in optimizing an open-source direct air carbon capture device. Ironically, the filtrate used in the DACC we are optimizing is the hydrated version of dust produced by the cement industry. I’m currently working with my plant to test using the waste cement dust in such a carbon capture process.
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What is it like to be female in a male dominated field?
I have had experiences in which it was very hard for my voice to be heard. For example, at one of the other schools where I took classes, not U-M, I was in a mechanical engineering class that was almost all male. Any time the teacher would ask a question, all the guys in the class would just start shouting out answers. And I thought to myself, “I'm not going to shout over anybody else.” So I simply stood up and walked over to the teacher one day, gave him the correct answer in a normal volume, at which point he told the rest of the class to shut up.
At this same school I took a series of physics classes, all of which were very large and also predominantly male. My final grade for the first physics class was above 100%. When I was taking the second class in the series, the teacher came over to talk to the two guys in my lab group. He told the guys about this one student in the previous semester who had a final grade over 100%. I piped up and told him that I was that student. He didn’t realize that I was the one with the high grade until I pointed it out to him.
It’s really helped me that I am assertive enough to be able to stand up for myself in situations like that. At some places, again not so much U-M, you only know about opportunities if a teacher approaches you about them. If you are not on your teacher’s radar, then you just don’t have the same opportunities and chances.
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What advice would you give to young women and girls who are interested in engineering?
My advice for young women and girls interested in engineering is to let others hear you. Your ideas are as valid as anyone else's, and you have the same potential for success. Speaking up and letting others hear those ideas is the only way to get recognition and support for your growth as an engineer. Entering a male-dominated field, often less is expected of you and as such you're given fewer opportunities. If you aren't given a chance to speak, then make it! Put yourself out there and let yourself be heard.
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XPRIZE Removal Team Q&A - The Series
June 23 at 4 PM PT July 9 at 12 PM PT
Join the XPRIZE Carbon Removal Prize Operations team for an overview of the competition and a chance to ask us any questions you may have about the registration process and competition requirements. This series will be held once every two weeks at different times each week to accommodate the global community. For more information, please click here.
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AirMiners Boot Up: Free 4-week Course to Pull Carbon from Air
Next round of Boot Up begins July 19, 2021
The AirMiners Boot Up is designed to help you more deeply understand carbon dioxide removal (CDR) approaches, learn about companies and organizations in the space, make new carbon removal friends, and figure out where you want to go next! For more information, please click here.
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VERGE Net Zero Event: Accelerating The Transition To A Climate-positive Future
July 27-28
Join more than 5,000 professionals working on sustainability, supply chains, facilities, fleets, manufacturing and other key areas to learn from leaders behind the private sector’s most ambitious carbon targets. For more information, please click here.
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Keep in touch
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