Biographies
Here you can find invited speakers and contributors’ biographies in alphabetical order.
Peter Andersson
CEO, General Plastics Scandinavia
Bethanie Carney Almroth
Professor, Ecotoxicology and Zoophysiology, Gothenburg University
Bethanie Carney Almroth is a professor of ecotoxicology at the University of Gothenburg in Sweden. She studies the environmental impacts of plastics, microplastics and chemicals in plastics products. This work spans from molecular toxicity to planetary scale impacts. Her research is interdisciplinary and seeks to understand solutions to plastics pollution and sustainable development. She is also a member of the Scientists Coalition for an Effective Plastics Treaty.
Fredric Bauer
Associate Senior Lecturer, Environmental and Energy Systems Studies, Lund University
Britt Marie Bertilsson
Chairperson of STEPS Board
Britt Marie Bertilsson has a long experience from research and development in chemical as well as automotive industry, international relations, funding and evaluation of research. She has also been board member of several research institutes.
Mark Carl-Henrik Conrad
Material Economics
Mark is an Expert Project Manager at Material Economics by McKinsey & Company. He advises clients across a wide range of industries on sustainability strategy. His areas of expertise and experience include: net-zero transformations, sustainable packaging, materials circularity, and building robust recycling systems.
Anders Egede Daugaard
Associate Professor in Polymer Chemistry, Technical University of Denmark DTU, Denmark
Rasmus Eisted
The Danish Environmental Protection Agency
Rasmus Eisted is a Ph.D. in waste management and has more than 20 years' experience in the waste sector both as an adviser and as an official for the Danish Environmental Protection Agency. RasmusEisted has extensive experience in the area of plastics, recycling and waste management in general. The work in the Department for Circular Transformation in the Agency's recycling and waste prevention are central focus areas for plastics as well as product design for repair, reuse and recycling. Rasmus Eisted has been part of Denmark's National Plastics Knowledge Center and has worked with many facets of the challenging material and a number of the composites.
Lars Fogh Mortensen
STEPS Board Member
Circular Economy, Consumption and Production Expert at the European Environment Agency (EEA)
Lars Fogh Mortensen is an economist by training and works at the European Environment Agency as an expert on circular economy with a focus on plastics, textiles and circular business models. He has led a number of EEA reports on plastics circularity in the past years, and works closely with the European Commission on EU plastics policies and contributes to the EU positions in negotiations of the global treaty on plastics. He has over 25 years of experience on sustainability - focusing on sustainable consumption and production and circular economy - in international organizations, including the EEA, OECD and the UN.
Georg Gübitz
Professor, Institute of Environmental Biotechnology, Boku University
Teis Hansen
Professor, Department of Food and Resource Economics (IFRO), University of Copenhagen
Teis Hansen’s research interests are located at the intersections of geography, innovation, sustainability and policy. He is Professor at the Department of Food and Resource Economics, University of Copenhagen, and Senior Research Scientist at the Department of Technology Management, SINTEF, Trondheim. He is also a member of the Danish Government’s expert group on the role of research in the green transition, and a Semper Ardens Accomplish grant holder of the Carlsberg Foundation.
Karl Holmberg
PhD student, Department of Political Science, Lund University
Karl Holmberg is a PhD candidate at the Department of Political Science of Lund University. Karl is writing his dissertation on the cultural political economy of plastic disposability focusing on Sweden between 1945-1975. Karl has published articles on the governance, politics and history of plastics in the journals like Waste Management (2019), Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Energy and Environment (2020), Environmental Politics (2021), and Environmental Science & Policy (2023). He holds a master’s degree in global environment, politics and society from University of Edinburgh.
Christian Hulteberg
Professor, Department of Process & Life Science Engineering, Lund University
Christian Hulteberg is a professor in chemical engineeing, with a particular interest in the transition of technology from the lab to the industry. He primarily focus on developing heterogeneous catlaysts for transforming non-traditional feedstocks from biomass and recycled materials, into chemical and petrochemical feedstocks for the existing industry.
Søren Hvilsted
STEPS Board Member
Søren Hvilsted is Professor Emeritus, PhD., from the Technical University of Denmark where he taught and researched polymer chemistry for decades. He has been an active STEPS Board member from the beginning of the program. He has furthermore insisted that the legacy of STEPS among other valuable merits should result in up-scaling of production of valuable biobased monomers and building blocks to industrial scales.
Mohamed Ismail
Postdoc in Biotechnology, Lund University
Anna Jöborn
Chief Executive Officer, Mistra, The Swedish Foundation for Strategic Environmental Research
Anna Jöborn is the CEO of the Swedish Foundation for Strategic Environmental Research, Mistra. Before taking on this role, she served as the director of the Science Affairs Department at the Swedish Agency for Marine and Water Management for 10 years. Prior to that she was head of the Department for Natural Resource Management and Environmental Effects at Swedish Environmental Research Institute, IVL.
She has a PhD in microbiology with focus on the Aquatic Environment. In addition, she is a technical college graduate, has studied history of art and architecture, and also pursued development studies at the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency Sida Sandö.
Currently, she serves as a member of the Council for Evidence-Based Environmental Analysis and is also a member of the Academy of Engineering Sciences Business Executive Council.
Håkan Jönsson
Senior lecturer, Associate professor, Researcher, Division of Ethnology, Lund University
Håkan Jönsson is associate professor in European Ethnology and senior lecturer in Food technology and nutrition at Lund University (Sweden). His research profile is food, culture and consumption, often conducted in interdisciplinary and applied projects, involving both public and private actors outside academia. Currently working on the research project FossNet, a Horizon project aiming at advancing open and inclusive science and education for food systems transformation.
Rajni Hatti Kaul
Professor in Biotechnology, Lund University, Sweden
Kumi Kitamori
Head of Division, Green Growth and Global Relations, Environment Directorate, OECD'
Robert Lazare
Packaging specialist at Coop AB.
He has a candidate in geography and vocational education as a packaging developer. He has been working with packaging and food for about ten years. At Coop, he focuses mainly on private brands, packaging strategy and circularity, together with the other Nordic countries.
Ellen Lindblad
SYSAV AB
With a decade devoted to R&D at the municipal waste company Sysav, Ellen has played a pivotal role in the Siptex project and putting Sysav on the global textile map. Currently, Ellenis involved in various initiatives aimed at shaping the future of the textile value chain, collaborating both nationally and internationally to explore new solutions for a more sustainable textile future.
Vicki Liu
Fermentation scientist, LanzaTech
Vicki is a fermentation scientist at LanzaTech, where she has worked on numerous projects transforming waste gases into valuable chemicals for everyday products in lab scale fermentation experiments. Her fermentation process experience spans small and large scale and most recently she has successfully served as the project manager for a Department of Energy funded project focused on generating an acetate producing biocatalyst to be upgraded into oleochemicals. She is deeply committed to promoting sustainability, as well as advancing diversity, equity and inclusion in the workplace and scientific community, by leading an employee-led resource group at LanzaTech focusing on these values.
Katja Loos
Professor, Zernike Institute for Advanced Materials, University of Groningen
Katja Loos is Professor at the Zernike Institute for Advanced Materials of the University of Groningen, holding the chair of Macromolecular Chemistry and New Polymeric Materials. She currently serves as the President of the European Polymer Federation for the period of 2023 to 2025. She has pioneered the field of enzymatic polymerization, especially the biocatalytic synthesis of polysaccharides and polyamides, and the synthesis and self-assembly of PVDF containing block copolymers.
Stine Hach Juul Madsen
PhD, Department of Food and Resource Economics (IFRO), University of Copenhagen
Stine Hach Juul Madsen is a postdoc at the University of Copenhagen. She is a human geographer by training, and her research focuses on the politics of systemic change. In her PhD project she looked at the transition towards greater circularity in waste management - zooming in on plastics in various respects.
Alain Marty
CEO, Carbios, Clermont Ferrand, France
Daniel Montalvo
Head of Group Clean and Circular Economy, European Environment Agency, Copenhagen, Denmark
Daniel spent the last 20 years working on environment and climate policy, having worked across several topics and governance levels in Europe. After a few years in an environmental consultancy, Daniel worked as an industry regulator in Spain, having led the environment inspectorate in the Madrid Region. He worked at the European Commission, again in the field of industrial policy, at Directorate General Environment. The last 10 years he is based at the European Environment Agency, where he currently leads the team looking into the transition to a more circular economy and the transformation of European industry with a zero-pollution ambition. Daniel’s team works in both compiling and producing European datasets on these issues and interpreting their meaning to inform European policy design and implementation.
Lars J. Nilsson
Professor, Environmental and Energy Systems Studies, Lund University
Lars J. Nilsson has a PhD in Energy Systems Studies (1993) from Lund University and was a Visiting Research Fellow at Princeton University in 1994-95. He has 30 years of experience in the fields of energy and environmental systems studies, technology assessments and policy analysis. A recent research focus is decarbonisation transitions in industry and their co-evolution with energy system transitions, as well as industrial development policy strategies. He was Coordinating Lead Author for the Industry chapter in the IPCC WGIII 6th Assessment Report (2022). Since 2022 he is a member of the European Scientific Advisory Board on Climate Change under the European Climate Law.
Leif Nilsson
STEPS Board Member
Karin Odelius
Professor in Polymer Technology, Royal Institute of Technology KTH, Stockholm
Karin Odelius was appointed Professor in Fibre and Polymer Technology – Biobased functional materials at KTH Royal Institute of Technology in 2022, where her research focus is on the synthesis of sustainable polymers applying the principles of green chemistry, their structure-property relationships and chemical recycling.
Tara Olsen
Research assistant, Department of Political Science, Lund University
Tara Olsen has a masters in Environmental Law and her work currently focuses on the plastic treaty negotiations. She is starting her PhD at the University of Copenhagen in October 2024.
Ellen Palm
PhD, Department of Science and Environment, Roskilde University
Ellen Palm was one of the initiators of the first STEPS application and has been part of the team since. As of April, she defended her PhD thesis on plastics decarbonisation at Lund University and has recently started a postdoc at Roskilde University where she is to continue her work on the global socio-environmental issues presented by our current plastic system.
Merja Penttilä
Senior Scientist, VTT Finland
Merja Penttilä has been Research Professor for Biotechnology at VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland since 1999. Since 2016 she has also served as a part-time Professor of Synthetic Biology at Aalto University. Her major research interest is the development of new production processes that replace fossil raw materials. Her specific focus is on so-called cell factories, microorganisms that are engineered to produce biobased products for energy, health, materials and other applications. In 2023, Merja was awarded the honorary title of Academician of Science by the President of Finland Sauli Ninistö.
Silje Rem
Senior Adviser, Norwegian Environment Agency
Silje Rem is a Senior Adviser in the Norwegian Environment Agency, working in the Section on littering and plastic pollution. She has previously held positions at the University of Oslo, in the Norwegian Ministry of Trade, Industry and Fisheries and in the Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation (Norad). She has worked with national and international cooperation on responsible ocean management and plastic pollution, several multilateral environmental agreements as well as Norwegian reporting on the Sustainable Development Goals.
Bernhard Michael Stadler
UPM Biochemicals GmbH, Leuna, Germany
Bernhard Michael Stadler currently leads the catalysis research laboratory in the biochemicals division at UPM-Kymmene. His focus is on developing and increase understanding of catalytic conversion processes of UPM’s wood-based feedstocks into chemical products. Previously, he worked as an Innovation Engineer at Nordic Sugar, investigating bio- and chemical conversions of sugars and by-products of sugar production. Bernhard holds a Ph.D. from the Leibniz Institute for Catalysis in the Rostock, where he developed catalytic processes to convert the platform molecule levulinic acid into novel monomers and polymers.
Natalia Skripnova
Natalia holds a master’s degree in European Studies from the University of Gothenburg. At GRID-Arendal, she works as an Expert in Environmental Governance. co-leading the portfolio on plastics and climate change, supporting efforts to end plastic pollution. She is also one of the authors of the report Climate Impacts of Plastics’ (2024). Prior to joining GRID-Arendal, Nataliagained professional experience in international organizations such as the Council of the Baltic Sea States, United Nations University – CRIS, and the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe.
Åsa Stenmarck
The Swedish Environmental Protection Agency
Åsa works at the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency as a senior expert and has been active within circular economy, waste, material flows (with a focus on plastic) for the last 20 years. She is responsible for the national plastic coordination but also involved in developing legislation and other policy instruments linked to circular economy and consumption. Before Swedish EPA she worked at IVL Swedish Environmental Research Institute within the same field.
Johannes Stripple
Associate professor, Department of Political Science, Lund University
Johannes Stripple is an Associate Professor in Political Science. His research has traced the governance of environment through a range of sites, from the UN to the everyday, from the economy, the urban, and the low carbon self. He has edited Governing the Climate: New Approaches to Rationality, Power and Politics (2014), Towards a Cultural Politics of Climate Change (2016), and Decarbonising Economies (2022), all at Cambridge University Press.
Christer Svanberg
Nexam Chemicals, Lund
Christer has a long background in academic and industrial R&D of plastics materials. After a PhD in Materials Science at Chalmers University he moved to Borealis where he held several different positions in R&D, including Innovation Centre Manager Stenungsund and Head of Competence Centre. CTO in Nexam Chemicals since end of 2022.
Alan Werker
Wetsus, European Centre of Excellence for Sustainable Water Technology
Alan is an environmental engineer with more than 30 years of experience in both academic and industrial research and development. Most research focus has been an interdisciplinary mix of bioprocess engineering and materials science. His efforts are in fundamental as well as practical upscaling process developments for water quality engineering in combination with resource recovery – namely polyhydroxyalkanoate (bioplastic) production, recovery, and application. Currently, he is the owner and consultant with Promiko AB (Sweden), a research theme leader with Wetsus (The Netherlands), and an Adjunct Professor, School of Chemical Engineering, the University of Queensland (Australia).
Nick Wierckx
Professor, Forschungscentrum Jülich, Germany
Nick Wierckx got his PhD at the Dutch research institute TNO, promotion at Delft University of Technology. He is currently Department leader "Microbial Catalysis" at IBG-1, Forschungszentrum Jülich with Associated professorship at HHU Düsseldorf, and holds an ERC Consolidator grant.
Baozhong Zhang
Senior Lecturer, Center for Analysis & Synthesis, Lund University
Baozhong Zhang is Associate Professor of polymer technology at Lund Univer in Sweden. He studies the molecular design and synthesis of biobased plastics, particularly biobased polyesters and polyurethanes with the focus on the understanding of the structure-property relationships of new biobased plastics and their possible ways of recycling. He has been working with STEPS during the past several years, and his research covers not only fundamental research questions but also development toward various applications together with industrial partners.
