Seminar and main stage presenters

Charles Bradshaw-Smith - CEO, SmartKlub Ltd
Charles Bradshaw-Smith left the corporate world to establish SmartKlub because he believes community energy needs disrupting. Starting out in customer facing IT, Charles proved his innovation credentials by floating a dot com in personalised print and after successful exit joined E.ON in 2001, establishing its front office systems. In 2006 Charles led E.ON into the Distributed Energy market writing its first strategy and setting up its Innovation department in UK and then EU-wide from Germany, where he wrote E.ON’s Smart City strategy. A physicist by training, Charles’s creativity is in system thinking applied to diverse topics from Electric Vehicles to social benefits of Smart Cities. Charles has advised on public policy in Brussels and London: President of Micro Power Europe (elected); UK Micropower Council; and Green Building Council. In 2014 Charles investigated the SmartKlub concept to build resilient communities via innovative business models. SmartKlub was spun out of E.ON in July 2015 after winning Innovate UK funding. Having won a number of further R&D Innovation grants, SmartKlub is now preparing for the launch of its two offers: CAPE Platform and its Community ESCO model.

Professor Karl Ryder
Professor Ryder's  research activities cover three main project areas detailed below. Underpinning all these areas is an interest in electrochemistry, electrochemical interfaces and materials. The research carried out at the Materials Centre within the University of Leicester is aimed at novel and interesting electrochemical processes and materials, and draws upon many state of the art techniques for surface and interfacial characterisation. These include probe microscopy, x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (NCESS) neutron reflectivity (ILL, ISIS) electrochemical acoustic impedance spectroscopy and others.

Professor Martin Freer
Professor Freer is Director of the Birmingham Energy Institute (BEI) and Head of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Birmingham. He is former Director of the Birmingham Centre for Nuclear Education and Research, which he established in 2010. His background is in Nuclear Physics for which he was awarded the Rutherford Medal for his contributions to the subject. He has overseen the development of the BEI, helped establish Energy Capital and has co-led the establishment of the joint University of Birmingham–Fraunhofer Germany research platform. He has led two previous policy commissions for the University of Birmingham, the first on the ‘Future of Nuclear Energy in the UK’ and the second on ‘Doing Cold Smarter’, an examination of the global demand for clean cooling technologies and the potential for UK leadership.

Professor Emma Kendrick
Prof Emma Kendrick is Chair of Energy Materials in the school of Metallurgy and Materials at the university of Birmingham. Previously Reader in Electrochemical Energy Materials within the Energy Innovation Centre (EIC) at WMG. She has 10 years of industrial research experience in new battery technology development, latterly as Chief Technologist in Energy Storage at SHARP Laboratories of Europe Ltd (SLE) and prior to that for two highly innovative SME’s, Fife Batteries Ltd and Surion Energy Ltd. Her research over the last 20 years has focused on translation of novel functional materials to industry relevant device demonstrators. New battery materials and chemistries to cell demonstrators.

Nick Ebbs - CEO Blueprint
Nick Ebbs is a Chartered Surveyor and Vice Chairman of igloo Regeneration Ltd. Igloo are specialists in the development of sustainable places and buildings. Within igloo Nick is responsible for igloo’s activity in the Midlands and is Chief Executive of Blueprint, a partnership between Places for People and Nottingham City Council. Prior to joining igloo Nick was a founder member of Innes England Consultant Surveyors, where he was responsible for development and regeneration agency. Nick is an Honorary Professor of Sustainable Development at the University of Nottingham and a Governor of Nottingham Trent University. He is currently High Sheriff of Nottinghamshire (for year 2018/19).

Prof. Dr. Robert Steinberger-Wilckens
Robert, who is Chair Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Research at the University of Birmingham, is a Physicist by training with a specialisation in renewable energies. He co-founded engineering consultancy PLANET in 1985 and has been active in the areas of hydrogen, fuel cells and electric vehicles over the past 20 years. He was the Programme Manager for SOFC at Research Centre Jülich, the largest German research campus, from 2002 to 2012, and now is Professor for Fuel Cell and Hydrogen Research at the University of Birmingham, leading a group of 50 lecturers, PostDocs and PhD students.

Dr Hannah Edmonds
Dr Hannah Edmonds has worked at the Manufacturing Technology Centre (MTC), part of the High Value Manufacturing Catapult, since 2012. She is a Technical Specialist in Design Engineering and leads the Thermal Energy Research Accelerator (T-ERA) project exploitation for Factory In A Box (FIAB) Manufacture at MTC. At the start of the project, Dr Edmonds engaged with a number of thermal energy start-ups / SMEs to identify the technical and commercial feasibility of FIAB manufacture for their products; understanding their manufacturing challenges and the potential benefits of industrial digital technologies for their business. Dr Edmonds now leads the MTC’s Smart Manufacturing Accelerator (SMA), a service for delivering integrated manufacturing and supply chain solutions enabled by industrial digital technologies. The SMA uses the capabilities and digital tools developed within the T-ERA project at MTC to deliver impact for industrial customers.

Professor Philip Eames, Loughborough University
Philip is the Lead for Loughborough’s Global Energy Challenge, Director of Centre for Renewable Energy Systems Technology (CREST) and holds the Chair in Renewable Energy at Loughborough University. He has over 28 years developed an internationally recognised track record for undertaking high quality research in the field of advanced low heat loss glazing, concentrating solar energy systems, energy saving and solar energy harnessing building fabric components, thermal energy storage systems and life cycle analysis.

Professor Colin Snape, University of Nottingham
Prof. Colin Snape (FRSE) has been involved in fuel science and related disciplines for over 30 years having started working at the Coal Research Establishment (CRE) of British Coal (formally the National Coal Board) in 1974 and, as part of the liquefaction programme. After taking a position at Strathclyde University, Professor Snape moved to the University of Nottingham in 2000,  where he was instrumental in establishing Nottingham as an internationally recognized centre for fossil energy, the multi-disciplinary research portfolio encompasses carbon technology, applied geochemistry and pollutant source apportionment as major themes. His current research programme encompasses novel adsorbents for CO2 capture both in combustion and gasification.

PhD presentations

Ayesha Rana, Aston University
I am a PhD student working as part of the European Bioenergy Research Institute (EBRI) and Aston Institute of Materials Research (AIMR) at Aston University, Birmingham. My project is investigating novel bioprocessing strategies for the production of functional magnetic nanoparticles. My project aims to improve the yield and lower the cost of generating ‘magnetosomes’ from Magnetospirillum gryphiswaldense MSR-1 bacteria which has a multitude of uses when it comes to tackling issues we face as a planet today from pollution to alternative energy sources.
My background is in biological sciences. I completed my masters in September 2018 and went straight into the PhD, as it is a brilliant interdisciplinary project that embraces biosynthesis and essentially uses microbial cell factories for tomorrow’s bioenergy solutions.

Frank Scotti, University of Nottingham
Fluid Flow Through Compacted Bentonites for Nuclear Waste Geological Disposal
A geologist by trade, I graduated in Petroleum Reservoir Geoscience from University of Liverpool in 2016, and I’ve recently undertaken a PhD in Chemical and Environmental Engineering in Nottingham. My project is focussed on designing a new method to derive nanometre-scale pore size distribution maps of clays to be used as plugs and seals in radioactive waste burial sites. Such method is based on echo-spin nuclear magnetic resonance imaging of deuterium. This research is in cooperation with BGS (British Geological Survey) and other international entities such as ANDRA (Agence Nationale pour la Gestion des Déchets Radioactifs) and SKB (Svensk Kärnbränslehantering AB), and it finds application within the broader picture of nuclear waste management, specifically underground storage, where safety and environmental concerns dictate radioactive materials be disposed of and sealed with a high degree of stability. The anticipated results are expected to further address uncertainty in modelling interaction between nuclear waste, burial rocks, and formation water, as well as to contribute to the design of man-made compacted bentonites able to provide sealing for periods of time exceding 1,000 years. Additionally, my project is foreseen to have other potential applications, such as enhanced oil recovery, and carbon sequestration and storage.