SPEAKERS

Alexandra Aragão is Professor at the Faculty of Law of the University of Coimbra, teaching environmental law, European law, risk governance and food security law. She is vice Director of the «Planning law, urban law and environmental law Review» (https://impactum.uc.pt/en/revista?id=90390&sec=5). She has participated as an expert in the drafting of the 2030 Agenda for research and innovation in circular economy of the Foundation for Science and Technology. Her present areas of research in environmental law are: waste law, circular economy, precautionary principle, polluter pays principle, environmental justice, environmental impact assessment, ecosystem services and law in the Anthropocene.

Bia Carneiro is a doctoral researcher in sociology at the Centre for Social Studies/Faculty of Economics of the University of Coimbra. She holds a Joint Major Communication and Latin American Studies from Simon Fraser University, Canada; a specialisation in Social Policy Management from Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Paraná, Brazil; and a MSc Social Policy and Development from the London School of Economics, UK. In between her academic pursuits, Bia has gained more than fifteen years of professional experience in international development. She has been an activist for social change and environmental sustainability since her teenage years, having participated in social movements and community organisations in the various places where she has lived. Since moving to Coimbra six years ago, she has supported Casa da Esquina in the promotion of circular economy initiatives such as clothes swaps and a food buying group. Personally, Bia attempts to reduce her (and her community’s) impact on the environment through vegetarianism and minimal consumption, as well as through advocacy for systemic change.

Carlos Silveira has been working in CCDRC since 2015 in the Regional Development Department. Since then, he has been involved in different H2020 funded projects as well as in the development of Centro’s Regional Agenda for Circular Economy. He is currently a PhD student on ‘Governance, Knowledge and Innovation’ in the Faculty of Economics of the University of Coimbra, and is developing a research project on Sustainable Consumption within the concept of Circular Economy and the ways of promoting it.

Cécile van Oppen is the co-founder of Amsterdam-based niche consulting firm Copper8. As a professional she has been active in accelerating the circular economy and circular construction for over 10 years. Convinced that a transition to circular thinking requires the rethinking of traditional business models, with Copper8 she wants to develop the ‘new norm’ for consulting businesses. Copper8 has earned both BCorp certification as well as the status of Social Enterprise NL for these efforts. Cécile holds an MSc from the LSE, and has authored two books on the circular economy.

Cillian Lohan is the CEO of Irish Environmental NGO the Green Economy Foundation and representative on the Environmental Pillar in Ireland. He has been a member of the European Economic and Social Committee since 2014. A graduate of University College Cork and University of Ulster, his expertise lies in Circular Economy specifically and the role of new economic models in the just transition to a low carbon future. He has rapporteured EESC reports a range of related subjects from Climate Justice and Climate Finance to the suite of legislative proposals arising from the European Commission’s Circular Economy Action Plan. He has played an active role in the founding and steering of the European Circular Economy Stakeholder Platform. He is regular speaker on the international stage on Circular Economy matters. He is an active participant in the UNFCCC CPP process linking the various Climate files with Circular Economy through the Global Climate Action Agenda.

David Fitzsimons holds a MBA from the London Business School and founded the consulting firm Oakdene Hollins in 1994 where he is now managing director. In January 2017, he became Director of the newly formed European Remanufacturing Council based in Brussels. He represents the Council at the Ellen MacArthur Foundation and co-authored the “BetterThanNew” co.project which is being promoted through social media by the CE100 group of member companies. He has reported on the remanufacturing demonstration bases in China and received a Highly Commended award at Davos in 2018 for his leadership on the theme of product value retention through remanufacture.

Despoina Kouria is a public procurement consultant and programme/project management professional with progressive work experience within the United Nations system as well as the NGO sector.
As team member of the Sustainable UN (SUN) facility of UN Environment, she has carried out extensive work related to the streamlining of sustainable procurement within the UN system, as well as providing expert advice and support to individual agencies for embedding sustainable procurement considerations in their procurement operations and policies.
Currently, she is supporting the management of the One Planet network’s Sustainable Public Procurement (SPP) programme, led by Rijkswaterstaat, the Environmental Development Centre of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment of China and ICLEI. The SPP programm is one of the six programmes of the One Planet Network, a recognized SDG12 implementation mechanism with the UN mandate, formed to generate collective impact and implement the commitment of the 10 Years Framework of Programmes on Sustainable Consumption and Production.

Diana Nicolau has a degree in Biology and Geology, from Aveiro University (Portugal) and Certificate to Trainer (CAP) with pedagogical competence. She has been working since 2004 to actual date, in LIPOR – Intermunicipal Waste Management of Greater Porto (Portugal).
Currently, she occupies a technical position in the Education, Communication and Marketing Department, participating mainly in technical areas and cross-on strategies on Sustainability. She is the project manager on Circular Economy and on Biodiversity, from LIPOR. Is also responsible for the Sustainability Report, the Stakeholders Engagement and the Materiality. 
As a trainer at the LIPOR Academy, she organizes and dynamizes Training Programs. Represents and promotes the Organization in several initiatives such as conferences, seminars, meetings and working groups, internal and external (National and European level).

Fausto Freire is an Associate Professor at the University of Coimbra, with research and teaching on Industrial Ecology, focusing on developing and implementing Life-Cycle based approaches and Circular Economy systems. He coordinates the Center for Industrial Ecology (http://www2.dem.uc.pt/CenterIndustrialEcology), and is a member of the coordination committee of the Energy for Sustainability initiative (http://www.uc.pt/efs). Faculty at the MIT-Portugal program. MIT visiting Scholar in 2011-2012. Fulbright Scholar at the University of Michigan in 2008. Member of the International Society for Industrial Ecology. Member of the Ecoinvent Editorial Board. Senior Member and Expert in Energy of the Portuguese Engineers Association. He has studied and coordinated projects on several industrial and energy systems, including agro-industry, buildings, electricity, transportation, renewable energy, waste management. Currently, He is focused on ecodesign and on extending life cycle assessment to include uncertainty, MCDA and economic-social aspects towards more sustainable approaches.

Filipa Alves has a degree in Portuguese Studies and a postgraduate degree in “Social Economy – Cooperativism, Mutualism and Solidarity” from the Faculty of Economics of the University of Coimbra (FEUC / UC), having also attended the Master in Feminist Studies. She coordinates Casa da Esquina, together with Sandra Alves, a cultural association that promotes reflection and debate dynamics on different themes and seeks transdisciplinarity in the arts field.

Helena Freitas received her PhD in Ecology from the University of Coimbra, in collaboration with the University of Bielefeld, Germany, in 1993, and did postdoctoral studies at Stanford University, USA, between 1994 and 1996. She is Full Professor of Biodiversity and Ecology at the Department of Life Sciences of the Faculty of Sciences and Technology of the University of Coimbra since 2003, and holds the UNESCO Chair in Biodiversity and Conservation for Sustainable Development since 2014 (http://unescobiodiversitychair.uc.pt).
She is currently Coordinator of the Center for Functional Ecology – science for people and the planet (cfe.uc.pt), Scientific Coordinator of FitoLab – Phytosanitary Laboratory of the Pedro Nunes Institute (https://www.ipn.pt/ laboratory / FITOLAB), and is part of the Scientific Council of the Department of Life Sciences of the University of Coimbra. The scientific areas of specialty are related to: Ecology; Mediterranean Ecosystems; Forest and Agriculture; Ecology and Management of exotic and invasive species; Conservation of Nature, Biodiversity; Physiology of the tree; Diversity of Plants and Fungi; Tolerance to Stress and Bioremediation; Environmental policy; Bioenergy; Conservation of Nature; Microbial ecology; Ecology and Society.

Inês Costa is currently aid to the Minister of Environment for the area of Circular Economy. Previous: senior consultant at 3DRIVERS, in strategic analysis and public policy in resource efficiency and management. Senior researcher at IN+ Centre for Innovation, Technology and Policy Research, with a PhD in Environmental Engineering on the policy and technological challenge of industrial symbiosis in Portugal.Author and co-author of scientific papers, technical reports and books on industrial ecology, industrial symbiosis and waste management, as well as eco innovation. Member of the International Sustainable Development Research Society (ISDRS) and International Society for Industrial Ecology (ISIE).

Joan Prummel is a Strategic Advisor on Circular Economy for the Dutch Rijkswaterstaat. Together with international colleagues Joan supports and guides organisations all over Europe to set their ambitions, policies and operations, aiming at a more circular organisation by implementing circular procurement. Rijkswaterstaat advises, stimulates and supports public bodies (and private companies) in Europe about circular economy and the role of procurement, using their procurement as a lever to stimulate circular economy: stimulate markets by their demand, stimulate and enable circular propositions, ‘produce’ useful resource flows instead of waste and embrace the benefits of circular business models.

João Nunes is President and CEO of the Association BLC3 – Campus of Technology and Innovation. He is also the founder and President of All – Portuguese Association for Bioeconomics and Circular Economy; Member of the Societal Challenge Working Group 2: Societal Challenge 2 – Food Security, Sustainable Agriculture and Forestry, Marine and Maritime Research and Inland Waters and Bioeconomics; Member of RIS3 – Smart Specialization Working Group; Innovation co-coordinator of the FCT Circular Economy R&I Agenda and Member of the evaluation team of the Participatory Budget Portugal in the area of Science. He obtained his PhD in Biosciences from the University of Coimbra and holds a Master’s degree in Mechanical Engineering: Energy and Environment. From 2010 to 2018, he was the Coordinator of 26 R&D projects, with a value of 11.6 million euros.
He has published over 20 technical-scientific articles and over 50 papers and posters in the areas of Biorefineries, Energy, Industrial Biotechnology, Agrifood, Bioeconomics, Circular Economy, Life Cycle Assessment, Biofuels, Biomass, Environment, Rational Energy Use, Fires Forestry.
He has received 3 scientific-work recognition awards and 1 regional merit work award and has registered 1 National Patent; 1 National Patent, 1 European and 1 International under evaluation.

Kate Burningham is a co-investigator and Deputy Director of the multi-disciplinary ESRC Research Centre, Centre for Understanding Sustainable Prosperity (CUSP) led by Professor Tim Jackson. She is a Reader in Sociology of the Environment; a joint appointment between the Department of Sociology and the Centre for Environment and Sustainability (CES) at the University of Surrey.
Kate leads one of the work themes focusing on the social and psychological dimensions of prosperity exploring how people negotiate their aspirations for the good life https://www.cusp.ac.uk/themes/s1/. One of the projects within this theme is an international study CYCLES: Children and Youth in Cities—Lifestyle Evaluations and Sustainability www.cusp.ac.uk/CYCLES. CYCLES involve research in collaboration with partners in India, Bangladesh, New Zealand, South Africa, Japan and Brazil.
Her research interests focus on the social construction of environmental problems, public environmental knowledge, environmental inequalities and sustainable lifestyles.

Leonardo Rosado is an Associate Professor at the Architecture and Civil Engineering department at Chalmers University of Technology (Sweden) focusing on the Urban Metabolism field, in particular using a holistic approach to develop methods to study all resource flows of cities. Leonardo Rosado has developed a groundbreaking method to account for materials in urban areas – the Urban Metabolism Analyst. The main goal is to study cities and regions to provide valuable information to stakeholders on different levels: circular economy, waste management, urban planning, industry and households.

Lívia Tirone is an Arquitect and Real Estate Promotor devoted to sustainable construction and urban resilience for the past 25 years. For 7 years she colaborated probono with the European Commission in these areas. Author of the book Construção Sustentável (Sustainable Construction) and editor of a magazine with the same name, she has been promoting more than two hundred communication actions about sustainable construction.
She set up and managed the Lisbon Local E-Nova Agency and was elected councillor in Lisbon Municipality. Curator for Social and Environmental Innovation and Leadership Programmes, she seeks passionately to contribute for the renewable prosperity of the planet.

Luisa Magalhães is an Environmental Engineer with a Master of Science in Environmental Diagnostics since 2002. From 2002 to 2016, she worked as a consultant at SPI – Sociedade Portuguesa de Inovação (Portuguese Society for Innovation). From 2004 to 2016, she performed activities of advising public bodies in the environmental area at Lisbon Municipality and Lisboa E-Nova – Lisbon’s Agency for Energy and Environment. Since september of 2016, she is the Executive Director of Smart Waste Portugal Association, being responsible for the direct contact with almost 100 Associate Members, which include several companies in the waste sector. The activities include the promotion of key areas of the waste sector by coordination of several working groups as well as promotion of research projects in close contact with the academia.

Mervyn Jones is a circular economy and circular procurement (CP) specialist with a background in sustainability and climate change. He provides circular procurement technical support, mentoring and training on EU Interreg BSR and Horizon 2020 projects and works with the Dutch Rijkswaterstaat as a circular procurement specialist adviser, including Green Deal 2.0 roll-out and assistance on the UN One Planet Network Sustainable Public Procurement and Sustainable Buildings & Construction programmes. He is also providing implementation support to the City of Toronto on circular procurement.Mervyn previously worked at UK WRAP (Waste & Resources Action Programme) for over 12 years to 2015, heading up the Construction Waste Minimisation programme, Products & Materials and International Development programmes.

Paula Trindade is a Senior Researcher at the National Laboratory of Energy and Geology. Since 2003 she is responsible for the development and management of European projects in the area of Sustainable Public Procurement. She holds a PhD in Environment and Sustainability from the NOVA University of Lisbon, with a thesis on public procurement in the context of sustainability transitions. Her research interests focus on Circular Economy and Sustainable Procurement: Circular Procurement, Green Procurement, Social Procurement and Low Carbon Procurement.

Reijo Väliharju is the development director in City of Tampere. He is leading the development for the new city district Hiedanranta. The objective is to create homes for 25,000 residents and 10,000 jobs. In vision the city district of Hiedanranta will produce more than it consumes. Hiedanranta will come to comprise a smart and sustainable city district that provides its residents with a smooth daily life and improves their quality of life by utilising new digital solutions. Hiedanranta will be the attractive western centre of Tampere, where it is pleasant to live, work and spend leisure time. New ideas, experiments and urban culture flourish at Hiedanranta. The future lakeside district will be located a convenient tramway ride away from the city centre. Hiedanranta serves as a development platform for experiments and projects that promote smart technology, sustainability and circular economy solutions. The city district will be created together with residents, businesses and communities. Reijo Väliharju has a MSc in tech. He has been working in City development for nearly 30 years.

Ricardo Rosa Pais has had experiences at Phillip Morris International (Switzerland), as Human Resources Department trainee and IAPMEI, as investment projects analyst, since 2000 works exclusively with SME’s as corporate banking relationship manager. Involved in the creation of the “Centro de Empresas de Coimbra” of the former Banco Espírito Santo, has worked with most of the largest companies of the region. In September of 2016 he was invited to create a portfolio of SME clients (turnover over 5M€) at Bankinter, as a part of the ambitious implantation programme of this Spanish bank in Portugal.
Since 2007 he also developed a strong relationship with the agents of the “innovation ecosystem” of the region, not only to help startup companies to get funds to their projects, but also as mentor in several initiatives promoted by those agents in the field.

Sérgio Costa is a MSc. in Environmental Engineer with over 20 years of professional experience in project management (nationally and internationally) and in the environmental consulting sector, in the fields of circular economy, water management, waste management, strategic environmental assessment, among others.
He was coordinator of the Working Group on Circular Economy of the Portuguese Institute of Engineers, invited expert for the National Agenda for Circular Economy’s Research and Innovation and has been working on circular economy’s actions plans and regional agendas in the last years.
He is also CEO of Simbiente (a spin-off company of the University of Minho, Portugal) and invited professor in public and private universities.

Teresa Franqueira, Associate Professor at the University of Aveiro, is a designer and has a PhD degree in Industrial Design and Multimedia Communication (2009) at Politecnico di Milano. She is also the Director and Scientific Coordinator of the Design Factory Aveiro.
Her research interests focus on themes related to service design and social innovation, and alternative scenarios towards more sustainable economic and social models. In the last years, she was the local coordinator of four international Erasmus + projects and was involved in other European research and Erasmus projects in the thematics such as education for social innovation, for circular economy and sustainability.
She also was visiting professor in Design for Social Innovation at the Dottorato di Ricerca in Design – Dipartimento di Design at the Politecnico di Milano, Italy; Design for Social Innovation and Sustainability at the Master in Product-Service System Design – College of Design & Innovation Tongji University, Shanghai, China; Short Term Course Design for Social Innovation – KISD Köln International School of Design, Technische Hochschule Köln University of Applied Sciences, Germany and at the Master in Industrial and Product Design at the Faculty of Fine-Arts University of Porto.

Dr h.c.mult. Walter R. Stahel has been founder-director of the Product-Life Institute (Switzerland), the oldest established consultancy in Europe devoted to developing sustainable strategies and policies, since 1983. From 1986 to 2014, he was also director of risk management research of the Geneva Association. In 1971, he graduated from ETH Zurich with an MA in architecture; Stahel has been Visiting Professor, Faculty of Engineering and Physical Sciences, University of Surrey, since 2005; a full member of the Club of Rome since 2013; and was awarded degrees of Doctor honoris causa by the University of Surrey (2013) and l’Université de Montréal (2016). In 1982, with ‘The Product-Life Factor’, he won a Mitchell Prize in Houston, TX; In 1978, together with Peter Perutz, he won a first prize in the competition of the German Future’s Society, Berlin, with a paper on unemployment, occupation and profession. His corner books are: ‘Jobs for Tomorrow, the Potential for substituting manpower for energy’ (1981), Vantage Press N.Y.,: ‘The Performance Economy’ (2010), Palgrave MacMillan; and ‘Circular Economy – a user’s guide’ (2019), Routledge, with translations into a number of other languages.