Dr. Do is the author and inventor of our proprietary technology. While running his own general physician practice in the early 1990s, Dr. Do researched the journey medical waste took once leaving his office. He learned that the high-temperature gasification industry had to date been focused on destroying waste while relying on tipping fees for its income. Dr. Do sold his practice and set out to develop a high-temperature gasification system designed for efficient energy extraction/recovery while also destroying the waste. 

Solena was effectively born, patents were awarded and several industry trends have converged resulting in Solena Fuels Corporation having a market leading position in the drop-in, sustainable fuels markets. Dr. Do is responsible for the overall strategy and technology offering of the Company and has graduate degrees in Physics and Medicine from Georgetown University. 

Dr. Do has extensive experience as an entrepreneur, environmental scientist and in executive management positions Dr. Do has been advocating the uses of bioenergy for the reduction of greenhouse gases to combat climate changes and has been lecturing extensively in the US, Europe, and worldwide on the importance of alternative renewable energy.  Dr. Do is a Co-Chair for the Transportation Initiative of the American Council on Renewable Energy, a member of the AMA, a Diplomate of the American College of Forensic Examiner, a member of the National Sciences Council for Science and the Environment and a member of the Nationals Who’s Who of Registered Executives and Professionals. He is also founder of the Green Cup, a non-profit charity polo event held annually in DC for the benefit of the environment. 

Solena Fuels in partnership with British Airways has committed to building the world’s first facility to convert landfill waste into jet fuel. The chosen location for this innovative project is the Thames Enterprise Park, part of the site of the former Coryton oil refinery in Thurrock, Essex. The site has excellent transport links and existing fuel storage facilities. One thousand construction workers will be hired to build the facility which is due to be completed in 2017, creating up to 150 permanent jobs.

This ground-breaking fuel project is set to revolutionise the production of sustainable aviation fuel. Approximately 575,000 tonnes of post-recycled waste normally destined for landfill or incineration will instead be converted into 120,000 tonnes of clean burning liquid fuels using Solena’s innovative integrated technology. British Airways has made a long-term commitment to purchase all 50,000 tonnes per annum of the jet fuel produced at market competitive rates.

rvelez@solenafuels.com

LINDA L. GAINES is a Systems Analyst at the Center for Transportation Research at Argonne National Laboratory. She holds a BA in Chemistry and Physics from Harvard, and a Ph.D. in Physics from Columbia. Her primary interest is problem solving, applied to efficient use of resources.

She began her 35+ years at Argonne by writing a series of handbooks of energy and material flows in petroleum refining, organic chemicals, and copper industries that provided background for studies of technical and institutional issues involved in recycling discarded tires, packaging, and other energy-intensive materials.

Dr. Gaines has examined the costs and impacts on energy use and the environment of production and recycling of advanced-design automobiles, trucks, and trains, and batteries. She has also examined the potential growth of electricity demand by industry and performed technical and economic analysis of alternative fuels, including hydrogen and biofuels.

Her most recent work has involved studying ways to reduce petroleum use and other impacts from transport by recycling of batteries and also by reducing vehicle idling.

She is married to a high-energy physicist; they have 2 grown daughters (and 2 grand-children) and a cat. She sings in 3 choirs, swims on a masters’ team (occasionally racing in meets), attends symphony and opera, and interviews prospective students for Harvard.

lgaines@anl.gov

Silvia Fiore is Associate Professor in Environmental Sanitary Engineering at Politecnico di Torino, Italy. Her scientific activity involves both fundamental research and full scale applications, and it is strongly oriented toward the feasibility of academic findings. The main research topics are:

• recovery of industrial wastes (particularly from foundries, end of life vehicles, end of life tyres);

• anaerobic digestion of biomasses;

• water treatment (potabilization processes, lagooning, dinfection by-products);

• wastewater treatment and reuse (municipal and industrial wastewater);

• study of contaminants sorption phenomena, characterization and remediation of polluted sites considering organic and inorganic pollutants (particularly on site remediation technologies concerning zero-valent iron permeable reactive barriers and innovative oxidation/reduction processes).

She holds the courses Environmental Chemistry (BSc level), Optimization of Wastewater Treatment Plants (Master level), Solid Wastes (PhD level) at Politecnico di Torino.

silvia.fiore@polito.it

University Education:

1988 Degree in Civil Engeneering and Water Management at BOKU University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences Vienna

1989 – 1990 Engineer at Neukirchen Civil Engineering Vienna

1993 Degree in Environmental Engeneering at the Vienna University of Technology and BOKU University

1992 – 2002 Assistant Professor at the Institute of Waste Management, BOKU University Vienna

1995 Ph.D. 

Since 2002 Associated Professor at BOKU University Vienna

2008 - 2009 Head of Science at KERP Research “Electronics and Environment” Vienna

Current position:

Associated Professor at the Institute of Waste Management, BOKU University Vienna

Main working topics:

His main research topics in waste management cover Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment, waste collection schemes, recycling of secondary material, producer responsibility and Life Cycle Assessment. Research project address both waste management in Europe as well as in Asian, African and Latin American countries.

For view more informations, please click here.

stefan.salhofer@boku.ac.at

Karin Molenveld studied polymer chemistry at the technical university of Twente. Since 1994 Karin is working at WUR-FBR in the field of bioplastic.

Research topics have included cellulose plastics, natural fibre reinforced composites, biobased plasticisers and biobased resins.

At present Karin is project manager, senior scientist and responsible for biopolymer science at Wageningen UR – Food and Biobased Research. Novel processes and applications of PLA, like the development of Biofoam ™ are an important part of her work. At present Karin is Work package leader in two European projects focussing on the production and end of life of biobased materials and their applications.

Karin has presented her work on additives for PLA at the 1st  PLA World congress in Munchen in 2008 and her work on practical applications of strain enhanced crystallisation of PLA at the 2nd  PLA World congress in Munchen in 2012.

She is co-author of the Bioplastics 2012 booklet and recently published a booklet on biobased packaging materials within the “Groene Grondstoffen” series.

karin.molenveld@wur.nl

Maria Manuela Moreira Alves was born in February 1971 in Porto, Portugal. Maria Manuela Moreira Alves has a graduation in Chemical Engineering, by the Faculty of Engineering, University of Porto (FEUP). In 2001, concludes her PhD in Chemical Engineering, at the same University, in the area of rheology.

From September 2000 until September 2012, she was Professora Auxiliar at Instituto Piaget, where it was lecturer responsible for course units in the field of chemistry, physic and food engineering; under this period, she was also member of pedagogical board, member of scientific board and coordinator of the chemical, biochemical, biology and microbiology laboratories.

From November 2012 to October 2013, she worked as a postdoctoral research fellow at Associated Laboratory ICETA-REQUIMTE, within a European project in the field of sustainable food packaging.

Since November 2013 joined ERCR - European Research Centre for Recycling.

Maria Manuela Moreira Alves participated as a researcher in some R&D projects and is the author of publications in conference proceedings and refereed international journals. 

Her current research interest is in recycling technologies. Another areas of the interest are the physicochemical and rheological characterization of biopolymers blends, as well as their uses in applications that can replace petroleum-based materials; and recovery of compounds from different types of waste streams.

mmalves@ercr.eu

For view the Biographie, please click here.

cmm@isep.ipp.pt

Soraia is a Research Fellow at the Department of Mechanical Engineering, Imperial College London. She holds a Research Fellowship from the Royal Academy of Engineering, awarded in 2014.

Soraia graduated as a Mechanical Engineer from the Faculty of Engineering from the University of Porto in 2008. Her PhD (awarded by the Department of Aeronautics, Imperial College London, in 2013) was focused on analysing and modelling the mechanics of recycled composites. She is currently running new research projects in collaboration with recyclers and end-users, aiming to provide guidance to the development of new recycled composites, and design tools for semi-structural applications.

In addition to recycled composites, Soraia’s research interests include the mechanics and modelling of virgin composites, both for high-performance and high-volume applications. She also uses modelling to design novel materials - with complex architectures and bio-inspired systems - to create improved solutions for challenging applications.

Personal web page here.

soraia.pimenta@imperial.ac.uk

Søren Løkke is Associate Professor and research coordinator at the Danish Centre for Environmental Assessment at Aalborg University.

He has a background in Chemistry and Environmental Engineering, is PhD in chemicals regulation, and has experience from consultancy and the plastic packaging industry.

Søren Løkke will present the latest results and experiences from the EU Life Project Plastic Zero and the Nordic Ministers Council projects “Nordic plastic value chains, Case WEEE” & “Improvements in existing collection and recycling systems of plastic waste from households and other MSW sources”.

The presentation focus on the challenges of and opportunities for recycling and reusing plastics with the aim of zeroing out plastics as a waste.

For view more informations, please click here. 

loekke@plan.aau.dk

Kerstin Kuchta received her Diploma 1991 in Environmental Engineering, Berlin University of Technology. Between 1992-1997 she was researcher at Darmstadt University of Technology and finalised her PhD in 1997 in the field of recovery and utilisation of waste incineration ashes.

Between 2002-2010 she was Full Professor for Energy and Environmental Management at Hamburg University of Applied Science and founding dean of the faculty of engineering at German-Kazak University (DKU) in Almaty, Kazakhstan.

Since 2010 Prof. Dr.-Ing. Kerstin Kuchta is head of the research group “Waste Resources Management” at the Institute for Environmental Technology and Energy Economics, Hamburg University of Technology.

Her major research interests are recovery of rare earth elements and critical metals form secondary sources such as e-waste or industrial residues, bio energy production and environmental sound waste management.

She supervised more than 180 Diploma and Master thesis and published more than 200 articles in books, journals and conference proceedings.

Since 2014 she is vice president of the board of trustees of the German Waste Management Industry (EdDE) and leading several work groups in the field of resource recovery and sustainability on the regional, national and international level.

Kuchta@tuhh.de