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The SPE IOR Pioneer Award is presented to selected individuals who have made significant advancements over the years in improved oil recovery technology. This award has been presented to 90 individuals since its inauguration in 1984. 

Graduate programs in Penn State's College of Earth and Mineral Sciences were recently recognized among the nation’s best in U.S. News & World Report's 2023 Best Graduate Schools rankings.

Last spring, at the request of President Eric Barron, a team of more than 20 faculty members, staff members and students began to formulate a plan to address climate change, one of the most complex and urgent issues of our time, by significantly lowering the University’s greenhouse gas emissions on all its campuses. Today, the Carbon Emissions Reduction Task Force unveils its recommendations for the University to achieve 100% emissions reduction by 2035.  

In a commonwealth with a long history of mining, Penn State’s Department of Energy and Mineral Engineering is focusing on refining mining to be more environmentally sustainable — as mining engineering faculty say mining will play a large role in a sustainable future.

Two Penn State students won awards during the MINEXCHANGE 2022 SME Annual Conference & Expo held February 27 through March 2, 2022, in Salt Lake City, Utah. 

Luis Ayala, William A. Fustos Family Professor of Petroleum and Natural Gas Engineering in the College of Earth and Mineral Sciences at Penn State, is the recipient of the 2022 Howard B. Palmer Faculty Mentoring Award. 

Mohammad Rezaee, assistant professor of mining engineering in the John and Willie Leone Family Department of Energy and Mineral Engineering at Penn State, has been named a 2021-22 Henry Krumb Lecturer by the Society for Mining, Metallurgy & Exploration (SME).

The topic-specific workshops were designed to introduce early-career faculty, graduate students, and postdoctoral researchers to the broader science communication community and teach them to use social media, storytelling, and a web presence to network with other scientists and engage with diverse audiences. 

The vast majority of critical minerals and rare earth elements that help power electric vehicles and wind turbines come from mining operations overseas. But a new initiative spearheaded by the US Department of Energy is looking for ways to extract them from fossil fuel waste.

Increases in lung diseases have been related to respirable coal mine dust. Penn State has been awarded $327,849 from the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) to fund research targeting ways to reduce or eliminate the toxicity of respirable coal mine dust.