EBNet/Carbon Recycling Network webinar: CO2 Biomethanisation

Title: Gas fermentation from lab to process: biological methanation as a model platform

Dr. Sébastien Bernacchi holds a MSc in chemical engineering and biotechnology earned at the Federal Polytechnique School of Lausanne (EPFL), Switzerland and he is currently employed at Krajete GmbH as project manager and process development engineer. In addition, he obtained a PhD in bioprocess technology at the Vienna University of Technology where he worked on the development, scale-up engineering and optimization of control strategies for the high performing biological methanation (CO2- BMP) process. Since then, he focuses on modelling, simulation and engineering of gas converting bioprocesses and gas purification processes with a particular focus on biological methanation and its integration in different industrial ecosystems.

Title: Metagenomics and metabolic flux balance approaches for the improvement of biological biogas upgrading

Dr Stefano Campanaro, is Associate Professor at the Department of Biology and Director of the Centre for Innovative Biotechnologies (CRIBI), University of Padova. From Anaerobic Digestion, to fermented food and human gut, I use my expertise in molecular biology, computation and microbiology to study the genomes, evolution and ecology of microbial populations through ‘omics strategies

Title: Hybrid biomethanation of hydrogen and carbon dioxide

Michael Chesshire is a Cambridge engineering graduate. After a brief spell in the nuclear industry (including cold commissioning of Hinkley B), he set up his first AD business in 1975 in the wake of the Middle-East oil crises. Over the years his companies have built more than 100 biogas plants and have employed more than 200 people in South Shropshire. Furthermore, employees from these companies have gone on to start their own new biogas businesses within the industry – notably Marches Biogas. Since 2008, he has been a visiting professor at the University of Southampton, teaching both at the university and at summer schools in Finland. More recently his association with the university has been on research projects. He has been an active participant in trade associations, as a Director of the Renewable Energy Association (2009 to 2017), Director of Renewable Energy Assurance (2011 to date), and a Board Member of the European Biogas Association (2017 to date).

Title: In-Situ Biomethanation – Opportunities and Challenges in Process Simulation

Dr Mark Walker, University of Hull graduated with a MEng in Engineering (Mechanical) from the University of Durham in 2004. He went on to study for his PhD at the University of Southampton with the project title “Development of a Mesh Bioreactor for the Anaerobic Digestion of Biodegradable Municipal Waste”. In the subsequent decade he has continued to specialise in anaerobic digestion and biogas systems applied as a bioenergy technology and to treat both organic waste and wastewater. Increasingly his research has broadened to incorporate more general issues surrounding energy system integration and decarbonisation, industrial and environmental biotechnology and the bio- and circular economies.