Distinguished Professor of Environmental Technology and founding Director (in 1992) of the Centre for Environmental Strategy at the University of Surrey; Visiting Professor in Environmental System Analysis at Chalmers University, Gõteborg (Sweden); previously Head of the Department of Chemical and Process Engineering at the University of Surrey.
Professor Clift recently completed a 9-year term as a member of the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution. In 2004-5, he acted as Expert Adviser to a House of Lords enquiry into Energy Efficiency. He is a non-executive Director of the Merrill Lynch New Energy Technologies investment trust, a member of the Rolls-Royce Environmental Advisory Board and of the International Expert Group on application of Life Cycle Assessment to waste management. He is a past member of the UK Ecolabelling Board and of the Royal Society/Royal Academy Working Group set up at the instigation of a UK Government Department (DTI) to review the risk and regulatory issues raised by nanotechnology.
In 1992, he was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire "for services to science and technology". In 2003, he was awarded the Sir Frank Whittle Medal of the Royal Academy of Engineering "in recognition of an outstanding and sustained engineering achievement contributing to the well-being of the nation". In the 2006 New Year Honours, he was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire "for services to the environment", in recognition primarily of his work for the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution.