2025
Fertilizer Sustainability Symposium

Steve has managed the Secretariat of the UN Global Compact Network UK since 2007, connecting UK companies and other organisations in a global movement dedicated to driving corporate sustainability and the Sustainable Development Goals. He has been Chair of the UN Global Compact’s Global Network Council and was a member of the UN Global Compact Board. He was previously a Programme Director at the International Business Leaders Forum (IBLF), leading projects across a wide range of responsible business issue areas. Prior to joining IBLF, Steve was the founder and Managing Director of a successful retail sports equipment business in Canada. He has a B.Comm from the University of British Columbia and an MSc in Business & Environment from Imperial College London.

Mark Brouwer graduated from the faculty of Chemical Engineering at the Technical University of Eindhoven. After working as a process engineer in an ethylene plan, he joined Stamicarbon as Licensing Manager, Urea Revamps. Later, he became Manager, Stamicarbon Services, responsible for all Stamicarbon's activities in existing urea plants. During these 14 years, he visited about 100 urea plants worldwide and was involved in numerous revamp, relocation, debottlenecking and grassroots projects. In 2009, Mark started up UreaKnowHow.com with the mission to improve the safety and performance of nitrogen fertilizer plants worldwide.

Willem Frens is Principal Project Developer at BA2C Europe / Latin America (BA2C) where he is engaged in developing renewable energy, municipal and biomass waste-related projects. He also advises investors from France with a focus on Scandinavian green H2 derivatives, as well as climate fund managers focused on H2 (derivative) projects in developing countries. Willem is a veteran in the green H2 derivative domain. In 2013 at Stamicarbon, he started up the project development activities for Maire Group in Italy. He continued his work with Brightlands and TNO, where he focused on integrating processes and introducing new technologies to reduce CO2 emissions. He later joined McDermott as a global energy transition specialist, and then HyCC as project development lead for international projects.

Professor Hussam Jouhara FREng

Prof. Jouhara is a Full Professor at Brunel University of London and a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering. He is also the Technical Director of Econotherm (UK) Ltd. Prof. Jouhara obtained his PhD in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Manchester, UK in 2004 and has a career in both the Industry and Academia since then. He is a Chair of Thermofluids at Brunel, and the founder and head of the Heat Pipe and Thermal Management Research Group. He has also been the Principal Investigator of many national and international projects in the areas of multiphase heat transfer and fluid dynamics, energy efficiency, renewable energy systems and innovative thermal management systems for electronics, nuclear and biomedical applications.

Gerald Marinitsch is the CEO of Solex Thermal Science, an international company with locations in Canada, The Netherlands, and the UK. He has a strong mechanical and process engineering background, as well as professional expertise in the energy sector. Previously, Gerald held a leading role in the development and commercialization of small-scale biomass combined heat and power plants, based on Stirling engines (which can be used as heat pumps and for cryogenic cycles). He has also served as a plant manager of a soybean crushing pant using solvent extraction, where he optimized the internal energy recovery, and substituted thermal power generation from oil with CO2 neutral biomass. Energy recovery and optimization are topics that Gerald is deeply passionate about. 

Christian started his career in the chemical industry in 2003. He joined the German EPA in 2008, where he promoted the development of a national strategy for sustainable P management. In 2011, he moved to the Berlin Centre of Competence for Water as program manager for resource recovery from waste(water) and coordinated the EU FP7 project P-REX. Later at ISLE Utilities, he continued the know-how transfer into practice. Since early 2019, Christian has been Managing Director of the German branch of EasyMining, a daughter company of the Swedish Ragn-Sells Group. Since 2021, he also serves as Managing Director of Phosphorgewinnung Schkopau GmbH, a joint venture between EasyMining and Gelsenwasser. Christian is co-founder and board member of the European Sustainable Phosphorus Platform, the German P Platform and a member of several NGO committees dedicated to nutrient and water management as well as circular economy transformation.