Biofuels Conference Speakers

Helena Athanasiou

A graduate of the University of Reading having studied a BSc in Economics, Helena has worked as an economist for HGCA for the last two years. Her experiences involve analysis of the biofuel market in the UK, EU and the rest of the world.

Robert Bailey

Robert Bailey is a senior policy adviser at Oxfam GB, and Oxfam International policy lead on biofuels. He has traveled extensively in Latin America, Africa and East Asia researching the impacts of biofuels on people living in poverty, and is the author of Bio-fuelling Poverty: why the EU renewable transport target may be diastrous for poor people, and Another Inconvenient Truth: how biofuel policies are deepening poverty and accelerating climate change. He also leads Oxfam's engagement on biofuel sustainability initatives such as the Roundtable on Sustainable Biofuels and is also involved in Oxfam's work on the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil.

Before joining Oxfam, Robert spent several years working in mergers and acqusitions and financial services, and attended Cambridge University and the London School of Economics.

Technical Director of the Oil Firing Technical Association (OFTEC), Alan is primarily responsible for the designing and drafting of technical guidance for the oil industry, which ensure the maintenance of high standards across the sector.

Alan chairs the OFTEC Technical group which enables industry stakeholders to discuss and comment on important technical matters. As a result of this he then lobbies government, etc. on their behalf and represents the industry on numerous consultative committees.

Alan also provides technical input to new course qualifications, which keep technicians up to speed with everything they need to know to service and install oil fired equipment in line with Regional Legislation and British Standards.

Since joining OFTEC, Alan has introduced a number of initiatives to aid both technicians and consumers, including a technical helpline- where dedicated technical staff, provide a wealth of information and advice to callers.

Alan also conceived the idea for OFTEC Direct, which through the subsequent introduction of the OFTEC Direct catalogue and website have also proved very successful. Bringing together essential items for oil firing technicians the one stop shop for technicians sells everything installers need, including a wide range of products that are often hard to find.

Mairi has worked on non-food applications of plants for over 15 years for Reckitt & Benkiser, Du Pont Ltd and for the UK arable levy board HGCA. She has been working on biofuel policy, biofuel feedstocks and carbon and sustainability reporting since 2004. She currently works for the Porter Institute, Imperial College on GHG and sustainability aspects of advanced technologies for biofuels. Mairi has a B.Sc (Hons) Horticulture and Ph.D on the physico-chemical properties of polysaccharides, from the University of Strathclyde, Scotland.

Rory Clarke

Rory Clarke is Managing Director of Rix Biodiesel Ltd. Rory has worked in the Petroleum Industry for almost 20 years. Rix are an Independent Fuel Distribution and Shipping Company and in 2002 were one of the first companies in the UK to become involved in the manufacture, blending and distribution of biodiesel. Along the way Rix's achievements have been recognised with the Forecourt Trader of the Year 'Best Oil Company Initiative' 2002, a Green Apple Environment Award in 2003, the Green Fleet Awards 'Alternative Fuel Supplier of the Year' in 2007 and an EAST (Environment and Sustainable Technology) Award in 2007.

Alastair Dickie, has spent the last 30 years as a trader and analyst in the world's commodity markets. His experience includes trading in grains, soyabeans & meals, all vegetable oils (including managing softseed crushing plants, animal feed mills and poultry units), sugar, metals (ferrous & non-ferrous). He is also experienced in international foreign exchange and interest rate futures.

His experience in different commodity markets covered all aspects of the risks associated with the trading business and he specialised in Market Risk Assessment and the use of Futures and Options, lecturing to commercial audiences in Europe and the Far East.

He has been, since 1999, the Director of the Crop Marketing department of the HGCA, the statutory body responsible for the cereal and oilseed industries in the UK. His department is responsible for the provision of market information and training, market development of cereals and oilseeds at home and the promotion of exports. British Cereal Exports (BCE) is part of his Department.

Geraint is the NNFCC's Technology Transfer Manager specialising in biofuels and biorefineries. As a Technology Transfer Manager, he makes scientific and technical information on non food crop uses available so that industry can consider their uptake, marketability and commercialisation.

Prior to joining the NNFCC, he worked in close plant support roles at the ConocoPhillips Humber Refinery and the British Coal Direct Coal Liquefaction Project at Point of Ayr. He has technical expertise in complex refining processes including thermal cracking, hydrodesulphurization, coking and calcining; coal combustion and liquefaction; biomass and wastes; gasification and pyrolysis. Geraint is a Chartered Engineer being a corporate member of both the Institution of Chemical Engineers and the Energy Institute.

An important part of the NNFCC's work is developing the evidence base for products produced from renewable materials and non food crops so that it is clear where they do or do not have environmental and / or economic benefits. Recent and ongoing projects managed by Geraint are listed below:

- Techno-Economic Evaluation of Emerging Biodiesel Production Technologies (AMEC). March 2007.
- The Feasibility of Second Generation Biodiesel Production in the UK (Nexant Chem Systems). May 2007.
- Mapping the Development of UK Biorefinery Complexes (Tamutech). May 2007.
- Liquid Transport Fuels - Technology Status Report (NNFCC). Nov 2007.
- Techno-Economic Assessment of Biomass "Densification" Technologies (NNFCC). May 2008.
- Advanced Thermochemical Conversion of Biomass to Biofuels Roadmap and Challenge (NNFCC). April 2009.
- Review of Technologies for Gasification of Biomass and Wastes in the UK (tbc). May 2009.
- An Evaluation of Opportunities for Converting Indigenous UK Wastes to Fuels and Energy (tbc). May 2009.

Philip has spent the main part of his working life founding and growing new businesses. In 2000 he pioneered new technology in air quality and odour control markets.

His patented worldwide Odour Control system is now installed in many fast food restaurant chains and also in waste to energy projects. The technology has now been Licenced to Franke Holdings AG, a company based in Switzerland, who now manufacture and distribute the technology for the catering market worldwide, under Licence.

In 2005 Philip set up a new business venture, forming
Reclaim Resources Limited. Following extensive R&D and personal funding, he built a full scale operational prototype
which has been successfully demonstrated to interested parties from the UK and overseas. His revolutionary 'continuous feed'
Vantage Waste Processing system is now patented worldwide.

The 'Vantage Waste Processor' not only offers a solution that can reduce the volume of municipal household waste by up to 60%, but it also processes the waste into a sanitized state, breaking down the cellulose and organics into a fibrous biomass that is suitable for a variety of uses, including conversion into valuable bio ethanol or electricity.

Victoria Hodkinson-Gibbs graduated from Portsmouth University in 1994 and went on to complete a PhD in Aeronautical engineering, working with the Ministry of Defence and Rolls Royce.

She then spent time working in industry in the fields of materials engineering , safety risk management and automotive safety, before joining the Highways Agency in 2004. She moved to the Department of Transport in 2007 and took up her current role as deputy-head of the Cleaner Fuels and Vehicles division in the Department in June of this year. She has overall responsibility on biofuels policy, the Renewable Transport Fuel Obligation, advice on road transport taxation, co-sponsorship (with DTI) of the Low Carbon Vehicle Partnership, DfT's communications campaign on Smarter Driving and the development of future Euro emission standards.

Andy Horsley is rapidly becoming recognised as a leading figure in the UK arena of renewable technology in the built environment. Andy is an energy specialist with many years experience in the energy performance of buildings, integrated energy efficiency and renewable energy design, and in the project development process. As such he has gained extensive experience of renewable energy project development processes and technologies.

Independently accredited by the Carbon Trust, Andy leads the LowC team of industry specialists and associates in their desire to make Low Carbon communities happen. His recent works not only span the PFI sector, where he successfully integrated the UK's first pure plant oil CHPs in the form of renewable energy centres in new schools for Nottingham City Council; but he has also led the design teams of private developers providing innovative and pragmatic solutions to a variety of energy, carbon and renewable energy challenges. This resulted in the optimisation of renewable energy generation for community developments and when linked to the energy efficiency initiatives, achieved the highest possible energy and carbon benefit towards the "Code for Sustainable Homes".

Andy's work has also extended into the financial sector through the development of asset value maximisation programmes and strategic guidance papers for the property investment portfolio of one of the UK's leading pension and insurance organisations.
Before joining LowC Communities as a founder Director, Andy was the Head of the Energy in the Built Environment department of Ecofys UK, (a Dutch owned consultancy). Prior to this he spent over 6 years working with Carillion plc, initially on the integration of energy performance optimisation processes into PFI projects, and latterly as Sustainability Manager for the Carillion Building business.

Andy holds an Engineering Doctorate (EngD) in Environmental Technology from the University of Surrey, and a BSc in Geography from the University of Durham.

Head of Business Development for Deloitte's Energy, Infrastructure and Utilitiespractice. I am a trustee of the Energy Institute, Chairman of the Institutes Branches committee and sit on their HR committee. I am also a freeman of the Worshipful Company of Fuellers, the city's livery company supporting the energy and mining communities.

Responsible for the Deloitte India desk with respect to Energy here in London.

- Originally worked for a High Street bank
- Subsequently spent 10 years in the Police Service, 5 of which in CID
- Set up and ran a Private Detective Agency
- 1996 entered the world of accountancy with Coopers & Lybrand in Leeds
- Specialised in the Oil and Gas sector and shortly after moved to London with PwC
- Joined Deloitte in November 2004
- Have made several visits to India, including a 3 month stay earlier this year.

Tony Lesowiec is the Practice Leader for Pera's Environmental Technologies team, part of the Technology Division who have helped over 100 UK companies accessing over £200 million of funding in the last decade for new product development. His team are involved in developing a range of cutting-edge technical and commercial solutions in the environmental sector, areas covered include: novel approaches turning waste-to-energy; sustainable fuel development, land remediation; waste-water treatment; and clean air technologies. Tony has been at Pera for 14 years, and progressed within the organisation from managing projects, team mangement, and international business development to his current position.

Tony is the author of a number of Envirowise "best-practice"publications.

Tony, graduated with an Honours Degree in Applied Chemistry, he is a Chartered Chemist and a Member of the Royal Society of Chemistry.

Neil Lewis

Neil is a Director of the Waterman Group plc, an international engineering design consultancy predominantly supporting the construction industry. The Group is involved in many pioneering projects around the world, with sustainable solutions being at the forefront of their design philosophies.

Neil is a chartered engineer with over 30 years experience of design and management within the building services sector.
Whilst still practising as a design consultant, he holds a strategic role within the group advising on sustainable, low carbon engineering design and strategies.

In past years Neil has lectured on the subject of passive low energy solutions for both the Chartered Institute of Building Services and the Royal Institute of British Architects.

He has extensive experience of renewable technologies within the construction industry including biomass, solar, wind and geothermal energy. He also represents a specialist in-house group providing energy auditing and benchmarking using assessment tools such as BREEAM (Building Research Establishment Energy Assessment Method) and LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design)

Chris Malins

Chris has been the Communications Officer at the RFA since March 2008. He is the editor of the Renewable Fuels Digest and was Communications Coordinator for the Gallagher review.

Chris joined the RFA from academia, and has almost finished writing up a doctorate in solar physics at Sheffield University.

Tim Peara

Mr. Peara is the founder and Managing Director of Alternative Energy Finance Ltd., a specialist financial advisory and strategic consultancy for early-stage renewable energy companies (www.altenergyfin.com). Last year AEF became part of Energy Invest Group (www.energyinvestgroup.com). Mr. Peara is a sought after speaker at renewable energy conferences and regularly evaluates novel technologies and projects.

Tim has 25 years experience in investment research, deal structuring and business development. He has worked extensively raising capital for and advising on the renewable, petroleum and power industries globally. Tim started his career with securities firms (Prudential Securities, Lehman Brothers) in financial futures, asset backed securities and emerging markets fixed income.  He then worked as a business developer for US private oil company Koch Industries, an oil & gas pipeline joint-venture of GE-Capital and Bechtel and a pipeline & power venture of United Technologies. Since 2002 Mr. Peara has consulted on strategy and arranged finance for early-stage energy companies.

Tim has lived in London since 1989, holds an MBA from the University of Chicago and a BA from Wesleyan University, Connecticut.

Andrew J Robertson

Clean Energy Consultancy Limited is a specialist carbon management, renewable energy and sustainability consultancy business managed by Andrew Robertson.

As the UK's most experienced heating appliance liquid biofuel combustion engineer, Andrew has tested liquid biofuels with range cookers, cooker pot burners, domestic boilers, commercial boilers and micro CHP appliances and is the original architect for the Carbon Connections/OFTEC/ICOM liquid biofuels heating project.

Andrew has written a thesis entitled "Biodiesel: A Sustainable Heating Oil for the Future" and has published a technical paper entitled "Biodiesel Heating Oil, Sustainable Heating for the Future."

The thesis and paper demonstrate that biodiesel blends used to replace heating oil with existing oil fired central heating boilers is technically viable and results in higher carbon dioxide emission savings and a reduced arable land requirement than road transport biodiesel.

Andrew has published numerous articles about the use of liquid biofuels as heating fuels and works in the UK heating industry as a liquid biofuels heating consultant with burner and boiler manufacturers.

James Scruby has spent 20 years working in the energy and power sector. Until 2002 he worked on the financial side, advising governments and international energy companies on privatisation, regulation, financing and investment in the sector. Since 2003, he has been focused on renewable energy as an advisor, investor and manager of renewable energy related businesses in a number of renewable energy technologies.

More recently he has focused on pure plant oil as an environmentally efficient biofuel and is involved with several pure plant oil activities associated with Elsbett Technology. Current involvement includes fuel production and supply of pure plant oil from rapeseed in Europe and production and supply of Jatropha oil fuel in the developing world.

He is a Director of Elsbett AG, the diesel engine technology company and is also a Director of Verdant Fuel Limited, the pure plant oil fuel supplier.

Tom Swithenbank has been CEO of Energem Biofuels since October 2007. He was previously CEO of Aricom plc, the London listed Anglo-Russian mining company, which developed iron ore mining operations in the Far East of Russia. Prior to this, he spent six years as an investor in the EMEA equity markets, initially as a proprietary trader with West Merchant Bank and subsequently as a fund manager with WestLB Asset Management.

Tom holds a Masters in Finance from London Business School and a BA (Modern Languages) from Durham University. He speaks fluent French, German and Russian.

On EBL:

Energem Biofuels Limited is the alternative energy division of Energem Resources Inc, which is listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange and London's AIM. EBL is focused on the development of biofuels and alternative energy projects, with a focus on Africa. The company owns a majority interest in the 60,000 litre per day ethanol plant in Kisumu, Kenya and has been developing two further projects in Mozambique and Malawi for the cultivation of jatropha curcas. In Mozambique, where EBL has been granted the right to 60,000 hectares of suitable land, the company is focusing on a large-scale plantation model. In Malawi, the
model focuses on small scale farming nuclei with associated outgrower schemes.

William Thurmond is the President and founder of Emerging Markets Online, a global energy and biofuels intelligence firm started eleven years ago in 1997. Mr. Thurmond is also the author of Biodiesel 2020: A Global Market Survey.

Mr. Thurmond's work been cited in the Wall Street Journal, the Financial Times, Biodiesel Magazine, Swiss Derivatives Review, the Futurist, BBC Radio, Fox News, Reuters TV, and his business has received Forbes Magazine's "Best of The Web" award seven years in a row. Mr. Thurmond is also a columnist for Biofuels International journal, Renewable Energy Access, Biofuels Digest, and speaks regularly at biofuels and renewable energy conferences.

Mr. Thurmond is a member of The International Association for Energy Economics, and the Association of Professional Futurists, and serves the American Biofuels Council as Chairman of Development, the National Algae Association as Chairman of Research and Development, and serves the University of Houston as a lecturer and adjunct faculty and where he teaches Technology Forecasting for Entrepreneurs. Mr. Thurmond has participated in graduate courses towards a PhD, Alternative Futures, at The University of Hawaii at Manoa; earned an M.S., Studies of The Future, from The University of Houston; and a B.A, International Relations and Economics from Rollins College.

Robert Trezona

Robert is responsible for all the Carbon Trust's investments in low-carbon research and development and has led the Advanced Bioenergy Accelerator initiative that was launched earlier this year with the Pyrolysis Challenge.  Other areas of focus for the Carbon Trust are algal biofuels and novel routes from sugars.  

Robert is a materials scientist by training, and has a First Class degree and a PhD from the University of Cambridge. He has five years experience as an engineer working on fuel cell technology with Johnson Matthey and then Ceres Power, where he led the fuel cell development programme.  Before joining the Carbon Trust in 2007, Robert worked for management consultants McKinsey and Company, where he focussed on strategic and operational issues in the energy, utilities and basic materials sectors. 

Biogas Conference Speakers

John Barker

John Barker is a one of four Specialist Corporate Agribusiness Managers within HSBC Bank who are based across the UK.

He has a portfolio of customers focused on land based industries and the food chain, some of whom are at various stages of investigating or investing in anegrobic digestion projects.

John will highlight the key risk areas banks seek to understand when considering funding proposals involving renewable energy, as well as suggest some potential solutions customers can put forward that will improve their chances of funding success.

John has a Degree in Agriculture Business Management from Wye College, University of London.

Having been with M&S for almost 25 years, Mervyn has fulfilled a wide range of roles across Stores, Distribution Centres and the London Head Office.

The roles have increasingly had an energy involvement, initially in procurement, until 2002 Mervyn was appointed Energy Manager for the Group which comprises around 500 buildings and an energy usage of c. 1 tWh of power & natural gas p.a. The scope of the role is very broad and growing and includes both supply and demand management with an increasing focus on sustainability. He currently has a team of 10 supporting the increased profile and demands on the energy function.

More recently Mervyn has been a key architect and driver of Marks & Spencer's unique Plan A which is setting industry-leading standards, including in the field of energy management. Renewables form a key part of the initiative.

Michael Chesshire graduated with a degree in engineering at Cambridge University and after a spell in the nuclear industry, his professional career since the 1975 has been dedicated to the commercial development of anaerobic digesters (AD). He founded Farmgas which built more than 50 sewage sludge digesters in 1980s and he now manages Greenfinch, a specialist AD company based in Ludlow. Greenfinch has designed and built ten on-farm biogas plants as well as the South Shropshire Food Waste Digester, all using home-grown technology.

Michael is Chairman of the Renewable Energy Association Biogas Group, and is a visiting Professor at the University of Southampton.

Bruno Derungs

Bruno Derungs is a Partner in the CCC Private Equity Fund. Prior to CCC Bruno was a Principal at SAM Private Equity, where he made a number of successful investments in the Clean Energy space. Prior to that he was Managing Director of Advanced Technology Ventures, a Zurich based VC. As a consultant at Bain & Company he primarily worked for their Private Equity and M&A practice group. As a young engineer he managed one of Philips-Datacommunication's National Sales Organisations. Bruno has an MSc in Electrical Engineering and an MBA from Columbia Business School in New York.

Tim Evans

Tim Evans is Managing Director of Cambridge based "Renewable Zukunft Ltd"and its Austrian sister company "BioG Biogastechnik GmbH"

A leading protagonist of Renewable Energy and fuel sustainability, Tim gained his initial interest in the sector whilst farming in former East German during the 1990's. An involvement in East Germany's first biodiesel

company in 1994 was followed by work on a biogas project in 1997 which later proved to be the catalyst for founding Renewable Zukunft in the UK.

Renewable Zukunft offers Joint Venture Biogas projects with UK partners in the agricultural, food processing and waste management industries and utilises the award winning "second generation", BioG biogas system developed in Austria.

Josef Höckner graduated from Agricultural College in 1992 and took over the family farm in 1995. Income from the 68 hectares of arable land and 100 head of fat cattle declined significantly as Austria joined the EU in the same year and Josef was faced with seeking alternative employment to support his young family.

In 1997 Joseph joined 3 neighbours to build a 340 Kilowatt district heating plant, run on wood chips, for his home village of Utzenaich in Upper Austria. In 2001 the four farmers extended their interest in Renewable Energy and began to research building a biogas plant on Josef's farm. In 2004, following three years of research and planning, the group "switched on" their own unique 500KW biogas plant fuelled by energy crops, organic waste and livestock manure.

The Utzenaich plant was christened the "Energy Ring" and consistently operated with over 98% annual engine operating time. This level of output caught the attention of a group of UK farmers in 2006 who joined forces with Josef and his colleagues to market the Energy Ring under the brand name BioG Biogastechnik GmbH of which Josef is now joint managing director.

David Neale - Business Development Manager for Masstock Arable (UK) Ltd Masstock are a major company within Origin PLC a division of IAWS Group.

David is a senior spokesman for the Masstock Group operating Smart Farm practical demonstration sites throughout the Uk to benefit its major customer base.

Masstock is market leader in all agronomy, seed and nutrition advice and supply with a unique R&D programme for Agriculture. David has spent his life in Agriculture with particular responsibilities in seeds, crops, plant breeding and end markets. In the last 4 years he has been helping drive an Energy Team within the group looking at all aspects of farm energy production and diversification. Masstock is already involved in many AD projects as well as other forms of Renewable Heat and Power. The challenge he sees is bringing a practical and business perspective to the subject at farm level and create an awareness and relevance to the whole subject.

Graham is the economist in the research department of The Andersons Centre, part of Andersons the Farm Business Consultants.

He provides specialist business research services, training, briefings and project-work for all organisations, specialising particularly in arable and renewable energy sectors of agriculture.

He is also the editor of the John Nix Farm Management Pocketbook.

Before joining Andersons, Graham was the economist for a major agricultural merchant, focussing chiefly on grain marketing providing guidance to the grain trading and grain procurement teams. Prior to then, he worked for a farm management consultancy in Central and Southern England.

Matthias Schmuderer

Consulting focus
- complex energy tasks
- project management
- sales and marketing
- train the trainer

Sectors
- energy business
- facility management
- industry
- public sector

Duncan Worth

Businessman and farmer Duncan Worth is managing director of AH Worth & Co, which is based near Holbeach in Lincolnshire and owns Worth Farms and QV Foods. Worth Farms operates on 4,500 acres of grade 1 land, with 850 acres given over to potatoes. QV Foods packs and processes potatoes and other vegetables for the major multiples and food processors. QV Foods continues to invest in infrastructure to serve its customers from its c. 36 acre site. The group employs c. 340 full time people which is supplemented by casual labour at peak times.
The family-owned businesses also supply Marks & Spencer via Manor Fresh, a joint venture formed in 2006 with Geest and Fresca. Manor Fresh are sole suppliers of potatoes to Marks & Spencer and also supplies organics and other speciality vegetables.

Duncan is also a director of the Potato Council, Pseedco, Lingrain Storage and Management Development Services.

Wood Energy Conference Speakers

Peter Clery ( BSc Agric). Sometime Chairman of the British Association for Biofuels and Oils, Farmer, Group Agricultural Manager Natwest Bank , Managing Director of Lands Improvement plc, a landowning and banking company.

Mr Robert Egli has been Managing Director of Buhler Ltd, the UK Sales and Service part of the Buhler Organisation for over 5 years. His original area of expertise is technical; within Milling and Process Engineering and his experience spans 36 years within Buhler.

Robert has made a personal pledge to drive the development of the Woodpelleting industry within the UK and Ireland and has been doing so for the last year with much enthusiasm and knowledge.

Gaynor Hartnell

Gaynor Hartnell is Deputy Director of the Renewable Energy Association. She has been with the Association since its formation in 2001. Gaynor has worked for renewable energy trade associations since 1995, when she joined the British Wind Energy Association as Technical and Policy Analyst. Prior to that she was a Research Fellow in the Environment Group at the Science Policy Research Unit, Sussex University. She has a degree in Environmental Science and a Masters in Science and Technology Policy.

Sandra graduated from University College London with a degree in Law and spent the early years of her career working as a solicitor. A growing interest in environmental issues led to her undertaking an MA in Environmental Law and Policy at Keele University in 1998. In 2000 she started working at the National Energy Foundation (NEF), an educational charity promoting energy efficiency and renewable energy. At NEF Sandra has promoted the uptake of wood fuelled heating through a number of projects, most recently LogPile (www.logpile.co.uk) and Pellets@las (www.pelletcentre.info), a European Project to promote and create more transparency of the European pellet market. The core work of Pellets@las is to collect and disseminate available information on prices, volumes and trade of wood and mixed biomass pellets (MBP) in all EU25 + countries.

Sandra is also responsible for developing NEF's training programme and delivers training on subjects as diverse as wood fuel heating, solar water heating, planning, domestic energy efficiency and energy related transport issues.

Graham Hilton

Graham has operated at board level in a range of oil, agricultural and renewables operations. After a career in planning, marketing and trading with BP, Finnish state oil company, Neste, and the US Coastal Corporation, Graham established, grew and sold UK agricultural supply business Prime Molasses, before becoming involved in the emerging renewables market and forming The Energy Crops Company in 2004.

Graham chairs a committee of the Environmental Industries Commission, is a regular advisor to Government on energy and the environment, and is a consultant to Green Spirit Fuels, a leading UK developer of biofuels.

Alistair Mcglynn

Alistair graduated from Aberdeen University with a B.Eng(Hons) Mechanical Engineering in 1992.

After working for Aggreko and Rolls-Royce, Alistair has now been involved in the biomass industry in Scotland for the last 7 years.

Since joining Balcas Alistair has been involved in all sales & marketing activities in the UK to help stimulate the pellet market prior to production starting at Balcas's Pellet Mill in Invergordon next year.

Alistair has increased the profile of Balcas by implementing a new sales and marketing strategy which focuses on the domestic, commercial and industrial sectors.

Brian Morris

Brian started his career in the construction industry where he worked for a major contractor on many multi million pound projects throughout the UK over 20 years. These projects were many and varied and featured, amongst others, the Rosyth Synchrolift Ship Refit Facility, a 500 cell category B Prison, multi-storey office blocks, computer facilities, building society deed stores, a pharmaceutical factory and a sports complex. During the "dash for gas" in the mid 1990's his career turned towards power generation projects where he worked on developing a number of power projects before his appointment as Project Director to lead the Turnkey Consortium Contractor on a 660MW gas fired CCGT power plant in Kent. His career then took him into rail contracting where he worked for as Major Projects Director in the rail industry responsible for many multi-million pound projects which included the Channel Tunnel Rail Link and the West Coast Main Line. An opportunity then arose which draws on his skills and background knowledge in generation plants to develop renewable CHP projects within the UK. During this time he has amassed a wealth of knowledge on many of the key factors which combine to ensure that renewable CHP projects are successful.

Gideon is the founder and CEO of Consulting With Purpose Ltd, a consultancy company, established in 1996 and has been dedicated for the last 5 years to the sustainability, energy, energy from waste (efw) and environmental sectors.

Gideon has consulted across a wide range of industry and public sectors, for both large and small organisations as a change, business development manager and environmental management consultant. 

Gideon is the Heating and Cooling Sector Advisors to the UK's leading renewable energy trade association, the Renewable Energy Association (REA).
 
Gideon Richards, is currently the chair of BSI's PTI/17 Technical Committee for Solid Biofuels and Solid Recovered Fuel Standards and sits as a member of the European Standards Development Technical Committees TC335 Solid Biofuels, WG2 and TC343 Solid Recovered Fuels WG1. He will soon be involved with the start up of the CEN /ISO TC238 Solid Biofuels Standards and the Biofuels Sustainability Standards.

Consulting With Purpose advises government departments, public sector organisations and commercial entities on various strategic, regulatory, legislation and biomass issues.

Gideon sits on the steering group for the Microgeneration Certification Scheme and REAL Assurance Scheme, the consumer assurance scheme for microgeneration in the UK.
 
Gideon also writes as an insider for the Green Building Magazine and Green Building Bible.

Rainer Romirer-Maierhofer started his electrical training early aged 15, finishing this full time part of his education at 19. After this he studied at evening classes for his Masters Diplomas - in electrical engineering as well as mechanical & automation engineering.

He worked as a technician in different companies, and has been working with Windhager Zentralheizung for the past 6 years. He started there as a service technician. For the past 4 years he has worked with the export department. First he was responsible for technical matters in export (training, support, service, etc.), and for the past eighteen months he has also been responsible for sales in UK and Ireland.

All his experience with Windhager Zentralheizung has contributed to making him an international specialist on the domestic biomass market. He is also the head labour union speaker for the company.

Dan Rudge started in the timber harvesting and planting industry over 20 years ago, on family forests and then went into the manufacture of woodshavings for horse bedding using renewable forest waste.

We have been in the recycling industry for the last 10 years and have been looking at fuel production for 4 years. We decided to form The Briquette and Pellet co Ltd to manufacture wood pellets from renewable timber sources and formed joint venture with Jeld-Wen UK, Lowestoft to convert all their waste into wood pellets for both commercial and domestic uses.

Steve Vaux

A Reading University horticulture graduate, Steve has over 30 years experience in the agribusiness sector in the UK and developing countries across a wide variety of crops and products.

Since joining Mike Mason's Biojoule earlier this year he has concentrated on investigating the opportunities for global commercialization of the company's novel modular drying and pelletization plant. Initial indications endorse the company's goal to concentrate on utilization of smaller feed stock sources especially in less developed countries. 

Mike Webb

Mike originally trained as an electricity distribution engineer. He has spent a long career in many industries including electricity supply, the motor industry, manufacturing and consultancy both in this country and abroad.

In 1995 he joined Telford & Wrekin Council as Energy Manager, which started his interest in sustainability and reducing fossil fuel carbon emissions. He was responsible for installing two of the first biomass heating schemes in the area at Oakengates Leisure Centre and Oakengates Theatre. This gave him early experience of the issues that can befall biomass systems from a client perspective.

Having overcome the initial difficulties with these pilot installations, Mike was convinced of the future for biomass heating since he had concluded that after energy conservation measures; there was probably no more cost effective way of reducing carbon emissions and at the same time bringing into use local resources and labour.

He left about the council to help set up a local biomass business which expanded very rapidly as an Econergy distributor and local fuel supplier. Econergy is one of the leading national biomass installers and was founded in 1999. It now installs biomass systems (including district heating) from 10kW to 10mW across mainland Britain. Mike now heads up the Sales and Marketing function at Econergy.