Marios Avraamides

Marios Avraamides is a policy officer at the European Commission, Directorate General Environment, Unit C.4 – "Industrial Emissions and Protection of the Ozone Layer" since February 2007. He is in particular involved in the monitoring, implementation and development of EU policies on fluorinated greenhouse gases. Before joining the European Commission, Marios Avraamides was a Research Associate at the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Cyprus. He holds a Master of Engineering in Civil Engineering with Environmental Management (UMIST) and a Master of Science in Sustainable Waste Management (University of Leeds).

Antoine Azar

Antoine graduated from the University of Liège in Belgium, with a Master's degree in electro-mechanical & energy engineering. Antoine worked at the Coca-Cola Company for 16 years. Between July 2011 - December 2016 he held the position of global program director of Coca-Cola’s sustainable refrigeration program. Prior to that, Antoine performed as the maintenance manager and worked in various departments including engineering, design and innovation, quality control and telecommunication.

Bruce Badger

Bruce Badger is the President of the International Institute of Ammonia Refrigeration IIAR following a six year assignment in Shanghai, China, as the Managing Director of Asia Pacific Operations and Corporate Vice President for Evapco, Inc. Badger was a member of the American Chamber of Commerce in Shanghai, Chairman of the Manufacturer’s Business Council and is a member ASHRAE. As chairman of an ASHRAE Standards Committee he co-authored technical standards applied in marine, air conditioning and industrial refrigeration applications.

He received his BS degree, Marine Engineers license and US Navy commission at the US Merchant Marine Academy at Kings Point and served 4 years as a ship’s officer followed by 12 years in the US Navy Reserve.

Andy Campbell

Andy Campbell started his career as a refrigeration mechanic in 1991 at the Dublin fruit markets and emigrated to Australia in 1997 where he worked as a senior design engineer for the Hussmann Corporation. Graduated with a diploma in mechanical engineering in 2000 from Brisbane T.A.F.E. college he returned to the northern hemisphere where he worked as a design engineer while attending London South Bank University (LSBU) and graduated with a first class honours degree in 2005.

Campbell was awarded the Institute of Refrigeration’s Ted Perry award for his research into CO2 refrigeration in 2005. He is currently enrolled in LSBU’s PhD program researching natural refrigerant systems in supermarkets and as head of refrigeration environmental at Tesco, Campbell is leading a change to natural refrigerants within the company.

Didier Coulomb

Didier Coulomb is the Director of the International Institute of Refrigeration (IIR), an intergovernmental organisation comprising 61 Member countries and many private and corporate members. In previous roles he worked for the French Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry where he was more specifically in charge of technology and innovation (1984-1993). He then worked at the French Research Ministry, in particular as Deputy Director for innovation and technological development (1994-2002), and as General Secretary to the CIRAD Centre for General Cooperation in Agronomic Research for Development till 2004.

Didier Coulomb is a qualified engineer of the Ecole Polytechnique de Paris (1982) and the Ecole Nationale du Génie Rural, des Eaux et des Forêts (1984), and of the Institut des Stratégies Industrielles (1995).

Nicholas Cox

Nicholas Cox is considered a leading authority on environmentally friendly refrigeration and air conditioning. Throughout his long career, he has presented many papers on the subject. A fellow of the Institute of Sales and Marketing Management, he was awarded a graduate ship of the City and Guilds of London Institute for his work on how industry could better utilise natural refrigerants and energy efficiency. He has advised both the UK Government and the EU Commission on environmental aspects of refrigeration and air conditioning, and he has carried out reviews and submitted written responses to proposed and pending policy documents and legislation regarding refrigerant issues.

Clive Efford

Clive was elected as the MP for the Eltham constituency in 1997. From 2001 until October 2008 he was a member of the influential parliamentary Transport Select Committee.

In October 2008 Clive became the Parliamentary Private Secretary to the housing minister Margaret Beckett MP.

Rene van Gerwen

Rene van Gerwen joined Unilever in 2000 where he is responsible for all R & HVAC activities in Unilever, being one of the largest end-users of refrigeration in the world. A major part of his work is related to large industrial refrigeration plants for the production of ice cream, margarines and other chilled/frozen foods, mainly using ammonia as refrigerant, and to plug-in display freezer cabinets for the sales of ice cream. For these cabinets, he developed a global programme for using hydrocarbons as refrigerant. Before joining Unilever, Rene was heading the Department of Refrigeration & Heat Pump Technology in the R&D & Testing Company TNO, where he was working on energy saving, safety, alternative refrigerants & technologies since 1987. Rene has an MSc degree in Mechanical Engineering (Refrigeration & Climate Control) at Delft University of Technology, Netherlands.

Steve Gorman

Steve Gorman has been the World Bank's GEF Executive Coordinator since 2004. In this capacity he is responsible for coordinating the Bank’s programming involving the GEF and for facilitating the expansion and strengthening of global partnerships, including those under the GEF and other global environmental financing mechanisms, and with NGOs, donors and multilateral financing institutions. He also serves as the team leader of the Montreal Protocol Operations Team since October 1998 through which he provides strategic advice on the development and implementation of activities that enable developing countries to phase out the use, as well as the production, of ozone depleting substances. Gorman also represents the Bank at international meetings on global environmental issues on a regular basis.

Thomas Grammig

Thomas Grammig advises on CDM project and methodology development. He designed a Public-Private Partnership of Bosch/Siemens and GTZ-Proklima that produced the CDM methodology for replacement of households refrigerators, AMS III.X. Currently, he is working on Programme of Activities (PoA) CDM for this methodology. He received a MSc in Chemical Engineering and and PhD in Anthropology. He has published on aid project management and technology transfer. All his consulting work since 1985 has been on energy, mostly for USAID, World Bank and GTZ. Grammig started to design Kyoto Protocol courses in 1996, when directing the LEAD-Europe Foundation.

Torben M. Hansen

Torben M. Hansen has worked with refrigeration during his entire professional career. Among the merits is an ASHRAE research project as well as more than 30 published international papers on refrigeration and former CDIG board membership. He is the Director and Cofounder of ADVANSOR A/S, a manufacturer of CO₂ refrigeration and heat pump technology. Since November 2011, Advansor was acquired by Hill Phoenix (US) and Torben Hansen is thrilled with the new commitments in making CO₂ a global commercial technology.

Volkmar Hasse

Volkmar Hasse has been directing the Proklima program since 2003. For 27 years he has implemented various GTZ programs, living in five developing countries. He holds a PhD in Applied Biology.

Proklima is a GTZ program commissioned by the German Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development. It currently assists about 30 countries in complying with their obligations under the Montreal Protocol. 9 projects of the International Climate Initiative of the German Ministry of the Environment were added in 2008 and are currently under implementation. Since its inception in 1996, Proklima has developed and promoted concepts and technologies addressing equally important environmental, health and social issues.

Bernd Heinbokel

Bernd Heinbokel has been Manager in Project Engineering for energy efficiency and natural refrigerants since 2008. His responsibilities include technical assistance lead to sales departments to promote advantages of energy efficient refrigerating systems, including heat recovery and the use of natural refrigerants. Bernd began his career in 1995 at Carrier Kältetechnik GmbH as an Engineer specialized on liquid chillers. He was then promoted as a Manager on a project based on CO₂ as refrigerant for MT and LT in supermarkets. His development work resulted in the innovative pilot store COOP Wettingen in Switzerland for which Carrier Kältetechnik obtained in 2005 the highly-coveted RAC cooling industry award, category "Environmental Pioneer Refrigeration". In 2007, Bernd took the head of Product Management Refrigerating Systems.

Bernd holds a Chemical Engineering degree from the Technical University of Karlsruhe.

Brent Hoare

As a Political and Media Consultant Brent Hoare is providing lobbying, media and stakeholder liaison services to Australia’s natural refrigerants industry association. His involvement includes the attendance at the 2007 Bali climate conference, and the 2008 Montreal Protocol Open Ended Working Group in Bangkok. Hoare is the Executive Director of the Green Cooling Association promoting genuinely climate friendly refrigerant solutions, including CO₂, ammonia, and hydrocarbons.

Paul Homsy

Homsy joined Nestlé 21 years ago in France and worked in China for three and a half years. In 2000 he was Project Manager for Nestlé’s first CO₂/NH₃ cascade system (2’400 kW at -50°C) in a London coffee freezer drying factory. He is now based in the international head office of Nestlé in Vevey – Switzerland. Paul is a Diploma Engineer in Food Industry Sciences from ENSAIA (École Nationale Supérieure d'Agronomie et des Industries Alimentaires), a "Grande Ecole" (Graduate Engineering School) in Nancy - France.

Hirotaka Ito

Hirotaka Ito graduated from the Department of Mechanical & Electrical Engineering of the School of Science and Engineering at Waseda University. In 1987 he joined Nihon Itomic, where he was appointed Director in 1990, Executive Director in 1996, and Senior Executive Director in 2001. In 2008, he was awarded a Certificate of Gratitude from the Heat Pump & Thermal Storage Technology Center of Japan for his contribution to promote heat pump technology. Ito has been actively involved in the successful commercialisation of CO₂ Eco-Cute heat pump water heaters in Japan.

David Kanter

David is a consultant to Greenpeace International on their F-gas campaign, having worked on and off for Greenpeace over the past three years. Born and raised in Brussels, he completed a BSc in Chemistry and Law at the University of Bristol in the summer of 2009. His dissertation focussed on how to reform the system of international regulation of fluorinated greenhouse gases, particularly hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs). He will begin his PhD at Princeton University in February 2010 continuing his focus on how to apply mechanisms that have been key to the success of the Montreal Protocol to the problems of climate change.

Kuniaki (Nick) Kawamura

Kuniaki Kawamura has a degree in Applied Physics from Waseda University, Japan. He has been working for Mayekawa Mfg. Co., Ltd since 1973 for the development of screw compressors, screw expanders and heat pumps. In 2002, Kawamura became the Executive Director of the Japanese company.

Kawamura is the Vice President of  the Japanese Society of Refrigerating and Air Conditioning Engineers (JSRAE) and he is the President of Commission D1, IIR. His main areas of interest include the development of NH₃ refrigeration systems with misible oil, as well as the development of CO₂ heat pumps and air cycle for low temperature applications. 

Lambert Kuijpers

After receiving his PhD thesis for work on nuclear fusion at the Technical University Eindhoven, Lambert Kuijpers started work in the 1980s at Philips Research Labs Eindhoven, NL. He steered a research group dealing with heat transfer and thermodynamics, specifically in the area of refrigeration. Since 1988-89, Kuijpers has been particularly involved in the Technology and Economic Assessment Panel (TEAP) and the Refrigeration Technical Options Committee under the Montreal Protocol, which he both co-chairs. After having left Philips (in 1993) the work for UNEP has been the main emphasis (co-chairmanships of Panel, Committee and Task Forces).

Uwe Lahl

Uwe Lahl is currently Director-General for Environmental Health, Immission Control, Safety of Installations, Traffic and Transport and Chemical Safety at the German Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety.

He obtained his first degree in chemistry and his Ph.D. from the University of Bremen. At that time he was also involved in establishing the Bremer Umweltinstitut (environmental institute, Bremen), a private spin-off of the University of Bremen. From 1986 to 1991 – being a deputy mayor of the city of Bielefeld - he was responsible for the departments of environmental protection and health. From 1992 to 1994 he had been appointed as Staatsrat (state secretary on Länder level) for environmental protection and urban development of the Land of Bremen.

Christian Meineke

Christian Meineke is Head of the Division IG II 1 - Fundamental aspects of Chemical Safety, Chemicals legislation - of the German Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conversation and Nuclear Safety in Bonn. The division is dealing with chemicals regulations, e.g. REACH, and the Protection of the Ozone Layer and the fluorinated greenhouse gases.

Christian Meineke obtained a Doctor of Laws at the University of Kiel and joined the Federal Environment Ministry in 1988. In the Ministry he worked on radiation protection, noise protection and chemicals safety.

Alexander Cohr Pachai

Alexander Cohr Pachai started in the refrigeration industry in 1978 and has been working with hydrocarbons since 1995 and CO₂ since 1997. He worked with both R&D, production, sales and installation of systems using these natural refrigerants. Pachai has sold and commissioned the first HC/CO₂ system in Auckland for a supermarket as well as the largest HC/CO₂ supermarket system in the UK. As a pioneer in the field of natural refrigerants, he has also sold, built and commissioned the first larger supermarket system using CO₂ in Denmark and the first large scale HC AC system for computer cooling. Currently he is involved with the phase-out of R22 worldwide and the implementation of natural refrigerants. Pachai has carried out a lot of training for technicians and engineers in using the above-mentioned natural refrigerants in modern refrigeration plants. He is also experienced with the usage of the refrigerants ammonia and water.

Christianna Papazahariou

Christianna Papazahariou heads the Government Affairs department of shecco in Brussels. She graduated from La Sorbonne University in Paris, France where she studied law. She is a qualified lawyer and has been dealing with European and international lobbying for the past six years.

In past positions she has worked as an adviser for European retailers on environmental policy before managing the European Cold Storage and Logistics Association. Christianna is also an accredited expert on environmental policy with the European Economic and Social Committee and is member of the Greek Chamber of Commerce.

Andy Pearson

Andy Pearson graduated from Strathclyde University with bachelors degrees in Engineering and Manufacturing Science in 1986, and returned there to complete a PhD thesis on the use of carbon dioxide as a refrigerant in 2005.

Dr Pearson is the President of the Institute of Refrigeration (IoR) for the period 2010 - 2013. He served a six-year term as a Director of the International Institute of Ammonia Refrigeration (IIAR) and recently edited the guide book “Ammonia as a refrigerant” and the soon-to-be-published "Carbon Dioxide as a refrigerant" on behalf of the International Institute of Refrigeration (IIR). He currently serves as a member of the refrigeration safety committees of the British Standards Institute, the European Standards Commission and the International Standards Organisation. He is a lead author for the United Nations Environment Program’s Refrigerant Technical Options Committee.

Giacomo Pisano

After obtaining his Masters degree in Mechanical Engineering in 2002, Giacomo Pisano worked for one year as a Project Manager for General Electric's Oil & Gas division, where the core business is turbomachinery applied to the oil & gas industry. He joined DORIN in 2003 in the R&D department, taking responsibility of the CO₂ compressor development and being in charge of the product's technical qualification. Giacomo Pisano then took over several application engineering roles and is currently responsible for the CO₂ compressors' business development. In the meantime he joined several ASERCOM working groups and was the Chairman for the association's CO₂ working group for many years.

Marc Schreurs

Marc Schreurs has been a Teacher in thermodynamics and physics at the KHLim (Limburg Catholic University College) since 1989. In 2003, he has started with the research group www.irefrigeration.eu. This group has a history in the making of e-learning modules for refrigeration. Currently the group is working on a transcritical CO₂ supermarket system with heat recovery, adsorption cooling and absorption cooling with solar energy as well as heat pumps working with CO₂. Schreurs is project leader for the EU-funded project NARECO₂ enhancing R744 knowledge transfer across Europe.

Rajendra Shende

Rajendra Shende is a Chemical Engineer graduate from the prestigious Indian Institute of Technology. He then gained extensive and varied corporate business experience that included mainstreaming of cleaner production, environmental impact assessment, energy efficiency, and renewable energy in the manufacturing processes. After a stint at corporate management level, he joined the international programme at UNEP Division of Technology, Industry and Economy in Paris in 1992. He is a policy advisor to the developing countries and countries with economies in transition in implementing the Montreal Protocol. Expert on international technology transfer and technology cooperation to deploy the environment friendly technologies, he built the OzonAction Programme.

Jürgen Süss

Dr.-Ing. Jürgen Süss is today Vice President of Research and Development of the Automatic Controls Business Unit of Danfoss A/S in Denmark and takes responsibility for the future portfolio of controls and line components of Danfoss. Before that, he held various positions within the company and was among those heading the technological development of the Refrigeration and Air Conditioning Division at Danfoss and additionally lead the Advanced Engineering department.

Dr. Süss holds a Ph.D. in refrigeration and compressor technologies and joined Danfoss in September 1998 from the “Institut für Kältetechnik” at the University of Hannover. He is active in Commissions of the IIR and ASHRAE, as well as in various scientific committees and international refrigeration associations.

Thomas Verheye

Thomas Verheye is an official of the European Commission where he is Deputy Head of Unit of the Unit C.4 in DG Environment dealing with "Industrial Emissions and Protection of the Ozone Layer". His main responsibilities relates to the Regulation on ozone depleting substances (implementing the Montreal Protocol) and the Regulation on certain fluorinated gases (implementing the Kyoto Protocol). Prior to this post Verheye held positions in the Climate Change unit and the Economic Analysis unit.

Before joining the European Commission he worked for Ernst and Young as a Senior Auditor, the International Monetary Fund as a member of the Treasurer's Department, and the Bank of New York as Vice President responsible for Product Development. Verheye holds a degree in Business Economic and a Masters in Accounting and Finance from the University of Gent.

Fionnuala Walravens

Fionnuala is a consultant for EIA’s climate team. She first joined EIA in 2007. During her time there she developed EIA’s pioneering supermarket refrigeration campaign-Chilling Facts, which helped kick start a global shift towards natural refrigerants. She also led an investigation into illegal trade in E-waste leaving the UK destined for West Africa. Her areas of focus have included; the Montreal Protocol, the EU F-gas regulation, illegal trade in ODS and F-gases and removing HFC-23 from carbon trading schemes.

After leaving school with a European Baccalaureate she studied Anthropology at University College London where she graduated with a B.Sc (hons) and has a Masters of Research in Primatology from Roehampton University, London.

Keilly Witman

Keilly Witman works to protect the earth’s ozone layer in the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Stratospheric Protection Division. She runs EPA’s GreenChill Advanced Refrigeration Partnership, which is a cooperative alliance with the supermarket industry to reduce its impact on the ozone layer and climate change.  Prior to joining the EPA, Keilly attended Vermont Law School, where she received a Juris Doctor Degree (cum laude) and a Master’s Degree in Studies of Environmental Law (magna cum laude) in 2006. Her previous career of over 10 years was in global marketing strategy for major consumer products companies.

Monika Witt

Monika Witt was elected to the chair of the eurammon executive board in 2006. She is Managing Director of the Th. Witt Kältemaschinenfabrik GmbH in Aachen. Witt studied mechanical engineering at the RWTH Aachen and finished with a diploma in the field of process engineering. In 1991, she started as a project engineer for air separation plants at Messer Griesheim GmbH in Krefeld and moved in 1993 to MG Industries USA. In 1996, Witt joined the family business Th. Witt Kältemaschinenfabrik where she took over the managing position in 1998.

eurammon, the European initiative for natural refrigerants, is a joint initiative by companies, institutions and individuals committed to increasing the use of natural refrigerants. It sees itself as a centre of competence for the use of natural working fluids in refrigeration.

Frank Wolf

Frank Wolf finished his studies of engineering at the Technical University of Munich in 1991. The following 10 years he spent working for air conditioning departments of major automotive system suppliers in Europe, Japan and the United States before joining OBRIST Engineering, Austria in 2002.

As CEO of OBRIST Engineering GmbH and OBRIST Technologies Inc. he is responsible for marketing, sales and purchasing. In the field of R744 the company has invented, licensed and developed several compressor technologies, components and systems.

Marek Zgliczynski

Marek Zgliczynski studied at the Turin Politechnic in Italy where he earned his degree in mechanical engineering. In 1979, after completing his degree, Marek began his career as a researcher and project leader of new product development at Aspera Spa. 

A few years later, Marek transitioned to Embraco, becoming the Manager of Compressor Design. His successful efforts led to many promotions, including European Commercial Product and Technology Manager, Commercial Refrigeration Product Corporate Director and Corporate Fellow Researcher for the Commercial Refrigeration Segment. 

His main responsibility includes the development of household and light commercial refrigeration products. He also provides technical assistance to the sales team in order to promote Embraco products that align with customer feedback. 

Throughout his career, Marek has earned three U.S. patents and Gold Whirlpool Quality Team Award and he has published several pieces of literature for international conferences and events about refrigeration technology. In 2016, he was elected to a Chair of the IEC/SC61C Committee, in charge of the development of international product safety standards for refrigeration segment. He is also member in several other standardization bodies like ISO TC86/SC1/WG1, CEN TC182WG6 and WG12, IEC SC61DWG16 and UL STP471, Ashrae Member.