Featured Speakers

• 

  Guy Barnett

  Minister, Energy and Emissions reduction, Government of Tasmania, Australia

  X

  

  Guy Barnett

  Minister, Energy and Emissions reduction, Government of Tasmania, Australia

  Guy Barnett has a Master of Laws at the University of Tasmania.  Working then in a Melbourne and Washington DC law firm, Guy went on to establish and manage his award winning government and public affairs business based in Hobart and Canberra.

  After almost a decade representing Tasmania in the Senate, Mr. Barnett was elected to the Tasmanian State Parliament in 2014 and now serves as the Minister for State Development, Construction and Housing, Energy and Renewables, Resources, and Veterans Affairs.

  He is also Diabetes Australia Ambassador and an author of several books including, ‘Our Heroes, Tasmania’s Victoria Cross Recipients’ and ‘Make a difference – a practical guide to lobbying’.

• 

  Roberto Cingolani

  Minister, Ecological Transition, Prime Minister's office of Mario Draghi, Italy

  X

  

  Roberto Cingolani

  Minister, Ecological Transition, Prime Minister's office of Mario Draghi, Italy

  Roberto Cingolani was sworn in as minister for ecological transition, Italy, in 2021. From 2019 to 2021 he was the chief technology and innovation officer of Leonardo, an Italian multinational company specialised in aerospace, defence and security. Since its foundation in 2005 until 2019 he was scientific director of Fondazione Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia (Italian Institute of Technology Foundation—IIT), an internationally acknowledged research centre. He launched the interdisciplinary programme “Humanoid Technologies”, based on the idea that the technological imitation of nature and its processes may provide solutions to improve the quality of human life.

  In 2000 Mr Cingolani was appointed full professor of general physics in the engineering faculty of the University of Lecce (Italy). In 2001, he founded the National Nanotechnology Laboratory of the National Institute of Nuclear Physics in Lecce, which has become one of the largest international nanotechnology laboratories. Earlier he was a staff member at the Max Planck Institute in Stuttgart and a visiting professor at Tokyo University and Virginia Commonwealth University (US).

  Mr Cingolani is author and co-author of more than 1,100 papers and holds more than 100 patents in the fields of materials science, semiconductor technologies, nanotechnologies, chemistry of materials, sensor technologies, optoelectronics and photonics, and robotics.

  He has served as a technical adviser for the Ministry of Education, University and Research in the fields of nanotechnologies, new materials and new production systems. He has received many national and international awards, including the honorific title of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic of Commendatore della Repubblica. He obtained a PhD in physics from Scuola Normale Superiore in Pisa.

• 

  Michael Williamson

  Section chief, energy division, United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific

  X

  

  Michael Williamson

  Section chief, energy division, United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific

  UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific

  Michael Williamson is section chief in the energy division of the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP). Mr Williamson works on regional co-operation for sustainable energy across ESCAP’s 53 member countries, in areas spanning intergovernmental dialogue, technical assistance and research. Prior to this, he was the acting director of ESCAP’s subregional Office for South and South West Asia, overseeing ten countries in the region. He was previously chief of staff and senior adviser to the executive secretary of ESCAP. Mr Williamson began his UN career in 2013 as the head of the Asian and Pacific Centre for Transfer of Technology, ESCAP’s regional institution based in India.

  His experience over the past 20 years covers the private sector, government and international organisations with a focus on sustainable development, energy, technology and climate change.  He worked for Australian governments at the state and federal level in climate change, sustainability and energy policy and in humanitarian assignments with the International Committee of the Red Cross.

  Mr Williamson holds a master of science in renewable-energy technology from Loughborough University, UK, an honours degree in civil engineering from Monash University, Australia, and a post-graduate diploma in management from the Australian Institute of Management. He is also a graduate of the UN leadership course at the United Nations System Staff College.

• 

  Pradeep Kurukulasuriya

  Director, Nature, Climate and Energy; executive coordinator - Environmental Finance Bureau for Policy and Programme Support ,Global Policy Network (GPN), United Nations Development Programme (UNDP)

  X

  

  Pradeep Kurukulasuriya

  Director, Nature, Climate and Energy; executive coordinator - Environmental Finance Bureau for Policy and Programme Support ,Global Policy Network (GPN), United Nations Development Programme (UNDP)

  Pradeep Kurukulasuriya leads UNDP’s Nature, Climate and Energy team at UNDP’s Headquarters in New York, as well as overseeing more than 200 policy and technical advisors located in UNDP’s 5 regional hubs (Addis Ababa, Amman Bangkok, Istanbul,  and Panama). He also has overall responsibility for the strategic  leadership and management of UNDP’s engagement with the global environmental vertical funds (GEF, GCF, AF, CBIT), overseeing a portfolio of over $5 billion in grant financing across 142 countries, covering ecosystems and biodiversity; forests; ocean and water governance; climate strategies and policy; climate change adaptation and mitigation; energy; and sustainable management of chemicals and waste.

  Mr. Kurukulasuriya previously served as the senior technical advisor for Climate Change Adaptation and the head of programming for the Green Climate Fund (GCF) within the UNDP Global Environmental Finance Unit. There, he led UNDP’s support to countries’ access to vertical funds for climate adaptation, nurturing a portfolio spanning more than 90 countries and $1.2 billion in grant financing managed by UNDP. Prior to joining UNDP, Pradeep worked with the World Bank’s Agriculture and Rural Development Department and Environment Department, and the Munasinghe Institute for Development, an NGO/think tank in Sri Lanka.

  A natural resource economist by training, he holds a M.Phil. from Cambridge University (UK) and a Ph.D. from Yale University (USA). He continues to publish new research in leading international economics journals on the valuation of climate change impacts and the economics of adaptation to climate change.

• 

  Zhang Lili

  Senior scientist, A*STAR’s Institute of Sustainability for Chemicals, Energy and Environment (ISCE2­)

  X

  

  Zhang Lili

  Senior scientist, A*STAR’s Institute of Sustainability for Chemicals, Energy and Environment (ISCE2­)

  Lili Zhang is a senior research scientist at the Institute of Sustainability for Chemicals, Energy and Environment (ISCE2), established by the Agency for Science, Technology and Research, Singapore (A*STAR). Her expertise is in green catalysis, sustainable processes, waste upcycling, hydrogen gas production, carbon-based materials, and their applications in energy storage and catalysis. 

  Ms Zhang worked as a process engineer at Micron between 2004 and 2006, and as a research engineer in 2010 and 2011 at the National University of Singapore. She then continued her research at the University of Texas at Austin in 2011 and 2012 as a research fellow. 

  She has been listed as a global Highly Cited Researcher, which recognises world-class researchers with the greatest impact on the research community. Her research interest is in advanced materials for energy storage and conversion, fundamental materials chemistry and physics, electrochemistry, electrocatalysis, and synthesis and study of novel catalytic materials. Her research has led to more than 90 publications in high-impact international peer-reviewed journals with more than 19,000 citations. She received her BEng and PhD degrees in chemical and biomolecular engineering in 2004 and 2011, respectively, from the National University of Singapore.

• 

  Tim Gould

  Chief energy economist, International Energy Agency

  X

  

  Tim Gould

  Chief energy economist, International Energy Agency

  Tim Gould was appointed chief energy economist of the International Energy Agency in 2021. In this role, he provides strategic advice on energy economics across a wide range of IEA activities and analysis. Mr Gould is also head of the division for energy supply and investment outlooks, in which capacity he co-leads the World Energy Outlook, the IEA’s flagship publication, and oversees the agency’s work on investment and finance, including the World Energy Investment report. 

  Mr Gould joined the IEA in 2008, initially as a specialist on Russian and Caspian energy, and in recent years he has designed and directed the World Energy Outlook together with the IEA’s chief energy modeller while contributing to the Outlook as a principal author. Prior to joining the IEA, Mr Gould worked on European and Eurasian energy issues in Brussels and has ten years of experience in Eastern Europe, primarily in Ukraine. He graduated from Oxford University and has a post-graduate diploma from the School of Advanced International Studies of Johns Hopkins University.

• 

  Sanjay C Kuttan

  Chief technology officer, Global Centre for Maritime Decarbonisation

  X

  

  Sanjay C Kuttan

  Chief technology officer, Global Centre for Maritime Decarbonisation

  Sanjay Kuttan has held various positions in the private and public sectors across his career. Prior to joining GCMD, he was the executive director of the Singapore Maritime Institute. He also spent more than two years as a programme director and senior scientist at the Energy Research Institute at Nanyang Technological University, where he managed the National Research Foundation–funded Smart Multi-Energy System project. 

  His experience in the private sector has primarily been in the oil and gas and energy sectors. His roles have included line management and business development at ExxonMobil; management consulting at McKinsey in the areas of refining operational improvements, fuels and lubes retail strategy, and transformation of corporate performance culture; director of industry development for the Energy Market Authority, where he oversaw three key clean-technology projects; and business leadership with DNV GL, where he was engaged in smart grids and power systems, renewables and grid integration, energy efficiency, electricity markets and energy policy. 

  Mr Kuttan is currently a council member of the Sustainable Energy Association of Singapore (2011) and a member of the Singapore Ministry of Trade and Industry’s Pro-Enterprise Panel (2019). In 2020, he was appointed to the management committee of Ecolabs Centre of Innovation for Energy, advisory board for Qi Square and district councillor for the Central Singapore Community Development Council.