International Online – Conference

PFAS – Dealing with contaminants of emerging concern

30th Nov–1st Dec 2020

SPEAKERS

Jochen Flashbarth, State Secretary of the German Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety. Prior he was President of the German Environment Agency from 2009 to 2013. He studied economics and was employed in various positions in nature conservation and environmental protection.

Dr. Regina Dube, Director General for “Water Management and Resource Conservation” at the German Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety. Prior to joining the Federal Ministry in July 2018, Dr. Dube headed the Agency for Air Pollution Control and Industrial Plants (Amt für Immissionsschutz und Betriebe) of the citystate of Hamburg and served for many years in leading positions in Hamburg’s Agency for Environmental Protection and Energy. Dr. Dube was program manager for GIZ – Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit in India from 2008 until 2015. She studied environmental engineering in Berlin and holds a Ph.D. in engineering.

Prof. Dr. Dirk Messner, President of the German Environment Agency since 2020. He previously served as Director of the Institute for Environment and Human Security of United Nations University (UNU-EHS) in Bonn, Germany, and Vice Rector of the United Nations University (UNU). Prior to becoming Director of UNU-EHS in October 2018, Prof. Messner had been Director of the German Development Institute from 2003-2018. Prof. Messner is an internationally recognised expert on globalisation / global governance, transformation pathways to sustainability, decarbonization of the global economy, sustainability and digital change, and international cooperation and societal change. Prof. Messner has also been a member of a number of high-ranking policy advisory councils, including co-chairing the German Advisory Council on Global Change (WBGU) and the Sustainable Development Solutions Network Germany and is member of the China Council for International Cooperation on Environment and Development (CCICED).

Arlene Blum PhD, biophysical chemist, author, and mountaineer is executive director of the Green Science Policy Institute and a Research Associate in Chemistry at UC Berkeley. The Institute’s scientific research and policy work with government and business has contributed to preventing the use of “Six Classes” of harmful chemicals including flame retardants and PFAS in consumer products world-wide. Arlene Blum led the first American—and all-women’s—ascent of Annapurna I, one of the world’s most dangerous and difficult mountains, co-led the first women’s team to climb Denali; completed the Great Himalayan Traverse across the mountains of Bhutan, Nepal, and India; and hiked the length of the European Alps with her baby daughter on her back. She is the author of Annapurna: A Woman’s Place and Breaking Trail: A Climbing Life.

Cristina de Avila is Head of the Sustainable Chemicals Unit of the European Commission’s Environment Directorate-General. She has been working on EU chemicals policy since 2004, being involved in the co-decision negotiations and the implementation of the REACH Regulation since its adoption. Before joining the Commission, Cristina worked as policy analyst and lobbyist in two public affairs consultancies in Brussels and in an NGO in Spain. Her main area of expertise was EU environment policy, in particular the sectors on waste and product policy. Prior to her specialisation in EU law and community environment policy, Cristina worked as a lawyer for over two years. Cristina studied law in the University Complutense of Madrid, has a post-graduate diploma on International Relations from the Institute of Social Studies in The Hague and an LL.M in European Business Law from the University of Amsterdam.

Prof. Dr. Tanja Schwerdtle, food chemist, is the new Vice President of the German Federal Institute for Risk Assessment (BfR). On 1 March 2020, she moved to the BfR from the University of Potsdam, where she holds a professorship in food chemistry. She has received numerous awards for her scientific achievements and is a member of several scientific committees, such as the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) where she is Chair of the working group “PFAS in food”. Since 2013, she has been a member of the BfR's Scientific Advisory Board and its Chair since 2017. Stays abroad led her to the Universities of Oxford in the United Kingdom and Leiden in the Netherlands.

Nannett Aust German Environment Agency, Head of Chemicals Section. Studied Geoecology, Worked in brownfield restoration for 12 year, since 2006 scientific officer in UBA, worked in Biocide Section and REACH section, active role in Twinning Project for brownfield restoration and chemicals management in Romania and Egypt, since 2016 head of section, main tasks regulation of substances, analysis of gaps an overlaps of REACH and other legislations dealing with chemicals.

Dr. Griet van Gestel works as a policy coordinator in the Soil Management Department of OVAM, the Public Waste Agency of Flanders. She is responsible for the coordination of research on management and remediation of contaminated soils. Her main domain of expertise is risk assessment of soil and groundwater contamination.

Johan Ceenaeme is a bio-engineer and engineer in environmental remediation. He started at OVAM (Public Waste Agency of Flanders) in 1995 as an engineer for the management of complex soil contaminations. He led the departments responsible for the investigation and remediation of contaminated soils. In 2015, he was appointed as Flemish soil expert within the Soil Management department. Among other things, he is responsible for the development of the soil legislation in Flanders. He is a member of Common Forum and also participates in European initiatives for a soil policy, where he is a member of the Soil Expert Group for Belgium.

Karen Marie Haug is a senior advisor at Norwegian Environment Agency. Prior to 2020, she worked mainly with regulation of industrial activities, such as wastewater discharge and air pollution emissions. She is currently working mainly with remediation of PFAS-contamination on airports, and with regulation and pollution control of landfills

Vanja Alling is a senior advisor at Norwegian Environment Agency, with main working task to coordinate and prioritize the remediation of PFAS contaminated sites in Norway. She is also involved in setting new threshold values contaminated soil, including thresholds values for PFOS and other PFAS, and to develop guidance materials for risk assessment and remediation of contaminated sites. She has a background from research and a PhD in Applied environmental science from Stockholm university.

Arjen Wintersen is an environmental researcher at the Dutch National Institute for Public Health and the Environment with over 15 years of experience in the field of assessment of substances in soils, sediments and groundwater. RIVM provides risk limits and tools for assessing soil and groundwater quality that are used both by the national government and local government bodies. At RIVM, Arjen Wintersen is the coordinator of the research activities that are aimed at underpinning the national framework for PFAS in soils and sediments, and the development of a generic new framework for assessing substances of emerging concern in soil.

Paolo Ronco is the Head of the Center for Water Resources of Veneto (Centro RIVE) Ph.D. in Hydrodynamic and Environmental Modelling, project manager and researcher in water resources management and risk assessment. Extended experience in management of international scientific research and development cooperation projects with relevant field experience in Africa, with JRC – EU Commission and with NGOs. Author of several publications about environmental engineering, risk assessment and geosciences

Gisella Pitter, Public Health Specialist in the Veneto Region is a medical doctor and specialised in hygiene, epidemiology and public health. Her professional activity covers health planning, coordination and monitoring in the field of environmental health. Member of the management board of the LIFE PHOENIX project. Author of several publications in the field of chronic disease and environmental epidemiology.

Katja Stolzenberg-Hepp from the PFC Function Unit of the Regional Council Karlsruhe studied law at the University of Mainz and worked several years as a lawyer and now for five years within the environmental administration of Baden-Württemberg

Dr. Gabriel Striegel from the PFC Function Unit of the Regional Council Karlsruhe studied Geoecology at the University of Bayreuth and did his doctors degree at the University of Jena. He had different positions within the environmental administration in Baden-Württemberg.

Nicola Powell is an official in the Australian Government Public Service, with thirteen years’ experience in civil service and fifteen years’ experience in public relations and communications. For the last three years, Nicola has led the Australian Government PFAS Taskforce, which is responsible for whole-of-government, national coordination of PFAS contamination responses. Prior to this she worked in various government agencies on a wide range of policy initiatives, such as improving the Australian health system, and countering violent extremism. Nicola’s passion is facilitating genuine two-way communication between government and community, to inform policies that will have a positive and meaningful impact on people’s lives and the environment.

Dr. Thomas Held, microbiologist, has extensive experience in the field of investigation and remediation of environmental contamination, especially in the field of in-situ remediation and environmental biotechnology. He has led numerous projects for site investigation and remediation of soil, air and groundwater contamination and is today responsible for the development and implementation of innovative technologies, including the remediation of new pollutants (emerging contaminants) and for the internal education and training of junior and prospective experts. He is a member of various national and international professional associations. Most of his work has been published in numerous publications, lectures at conferences and a handbook (in situ technologies for the remediation of soil and groundwater contamination). Dr. Held is a publicly appointed and sworn expert.

Claudia Olazábal is holder of a Bachelor’s degree in Chemistry and Radiochemistry from the University of Strasbourg and a Master’s degree in Science from the University of Texas at Austin. She worked for three years in the Sustainable Resources - Consumption and Waste Unit, then became Policy Officer and Head of the Soil Sector dealing with the development of Community policy on soil protection in the Agriculture, Forests and Soil Unit. She was for 4 years the Deputy Head of the Biodiversity Unit and was appointed Head of the Agriculture, Forests and Soil Unit in 2013, which became the Land Use & Management Unit in 2016. All these positions are held in the Directorate General for the Environment of the European Commission.

Dietmar Müller-Grabherr works at the Environment Agency Austria (EAA). National main responsibilities include supervising the national program, chairing the working group “Risk assessment of contaminated sites” at the Austrian Standards Institute, and acting as associated expert to the Austrian parliaments Commission on the Remediation of Contaminated Sites. During the period from 1998 until 2014 he was regularly involved to European R&D activities (e.g. BRIDGE, EURODEMO, RISKBASE, TIMBRE) focused to land management and remediation. Since September 2017 he is General Secretary to COMMON FORUM on Contaminated Land in Europe (www.commonforum.eu) and ICCL (www.iccl.ch), the European and the global network of policy advisors and regulators in contaminated land management.

Johan De Fraye is head of Environmental Affairs at Signify (formerly known as Philips Lighting) where he is responsible for managing global environmental liabilities. He is also the chair of NICOLE, the European industrial network that groups industry, service providers and academics in solving contaminated land issues. Mr. De Fraye holds a MSc in Earth Sciences from Leuven University in Belgium and has been working for both industry and service providers as an environmental professional for over 30 years.

Prof. Volker Birke, University of Applied Sciences Technology, Business and Design, Wismar Germany. Volker has around 25 years of experience in practical environmental chemistry, particularly in the destruction of hazardous wastes and toxic compounds in the environment. He has experience in remediation of contaminated sites, hazardous waste management, soil and ground water remediation, 12 years as coordinator of the large-scale German R&D cluster RUBIN for the application of permeable reactive barriers (PRBs) to ground water pollution, 20 years in the development and application of innovative ex situ and in situ remediation technologies to persistent organic pollutants (POPs).

Dr. Carmen Casado-Martinez, Swiss Centre for Applied Ecotoxicology (CH) Carmen is a marine scientist by education specialized on sediment ecotoxicology, with a PhD on the use of sediment quality guidelines and toxicity tests for the characterization of dredged material intended for open water disposal. She moved from marine to freshwater sediments in 2012, when she joined the Swiss Centre for Applied Ecotoxicology. She is leading the project for the development of a strategy for sediment quality assessment in Switzerland. She has been involved in assessing sampling strategies for sediment monitoring, in the derivation of sediment quality criteria for traditional and emerging pollutants, and the use of sediment toxicity tests for sediment quality assessment. Member of SedNet Steering Group since 2013, she co-chairs the work group on sediment quality.

Xenia Trier, Ph.D. has a background as an analytical chemist with about 20 years of developing research, compliance and enforcement methods, and giving advice to business and authorities on environmental analysis and food contact materials. She worked in a commercial environmental compliance laboratory, and from 2001-2016 at the Danish National Food Institute/Technical University of Denmark (DTU). Her PhD (2007-2011) from University of Copenhagen focused on PFAS in food paper and board using accurate mass spectrometry. Since 2016 she works at the European Environment Agency where she leads the country network EIONET ad hoc expert group on chemicals, and provides input to the European Commission on risk governance of chemicals including the EU chemical strategy for sustainability, the PFAS strategy and testing of PFAS.

Tatiana Santos Policy Manager for Chemicals & Nanotechnology, European Environment Bureau. Tatiana graduated in Chemistry specialized in Environmental and food chemistry from the University of Cádiz (Spain), she also holds a master degree in both Environmental Impact Assessment and occupational health and safety. Previously she worked for the Spanish occupational institute ISTAS and the European Trade Union Institute (ETUI).

Moderators

Thomas Straßburger

1997-2008: Policy officer for terrain management and environmental protection – German Ministry of Defence; including secondments to US Navy (studies on phytoremediation techniques and NATO (project coordinator for science programme)

2009-2015: National Expert for Soil Protection - EU-Commission (DG Environment); supporting the Soil Thematic Strategy

since 2015: Policy officer for soil protection (remedial and precautionary soil protection) – German Ministry of Environment;

since 09/19: Head of Unit for Soil and Remedial Soil Protection

Christoph Schulte,Head of the Water and Soil department at the German Environment Agency. (Umweltbundesamt, UBA). Christoph is an Ecotoxicologist by teaching and has been involved in the management and regulation of PBT-chemicals and especially PFAS since the beginning of the 2000 years. With the REACH-Team in UBA he proposed a number of European PFAS regulations already enforced (i.e. the restriction of PFOA) or in preparation. In his department, research and risk management activities are coordinated to reduce the emissions of PFAS to soil and water, and the environmental exposure with this hazardous substance group.

Sabine Neulen, since 2019 policy officer for soil conservation and remediation at the German Federal Ministry for the Environment is a geologist and environmental scientist by education. Prior she worked as project manager for large-scale remediation projects for an environmental remediation company as well as a research associate for an engineering office. 2014-2019 Sabine was the team leader at a regional authority for the planning and supervision of landfills.

Annegret Biegel-Engler holds a PhD in biochemistry and specialised in the field of chemical structure-activity relationships. Annegret gained experiences in remediation of contaminated sites at the Technical University of Cottbus in Germany from 2006 to2008. From 2008 to 2018 Annegret worked as a scientific officer at the German Environment Agency with a focus on regulation of PFAS and other emerging pollutants under REACH. In 2013 Annegret was a seconded national expert for hazard assessment at the European Chemicals Agency ECHA. Since 2018 Annegret is head of the section “measures of soil protection” at the German Environment Agency.

Joerg Frauenstein: Graduated mining engineer at Bergakademie Freiberg; working for the German Environment Agency (UBA) since 1992 in the department for water and soil; Deputy Head of section and Senior Expert on Contaminated Land management and Soil Protection Measures, Current focus: PFAS management and remediation, Implementation of IED requirements against soil and groundwater pollution, transformation processes with regard to lignite mining exit strategy; Member of Common Forum on Contaminated Land and Head of the PFAS group, Head of the LABO working IED-Group; Chief editor German scientific journal on contaminated land “altlasten spektrum” since 2020. https://www.altlastenspektrum-itva.de