Prof. Dr. Frederic Coulon is Professor of Environmental Chemistry and Microbiology at Cranfield University (UK), with a 20-year international career in environmental chemistry, diagnostic strategy, and risk. He is research active in treatment and remediation processes for pollution control across contaminated land, industrial and hazardous waste, and wastewater sectors. His research influenced policy development, waste disposal strategies and provided pragmatic, risk-based solutions for the management of contaminated environments.

Dr. Cécile Nouet is a researcher at the University of Liege, specializing in environmental engineering. With a Ph.D. in Molecular and Cellular Genetics, Dr. Nouet's research focuses on soil and water management, particularly in the areas of soil contamination remediation and sustainable land management practices. She is coordinator of the Waste2Bio S3 Initiative and board member of NICOLE (Network for Industrially Contaminated Land in Europe).

Dr. Hilde Passier is geochemist at Deltares. She obtained her PhD in Marine Geochemistry (1998) at Utrecht University, The Netherlands. She has had management roles on the interface of knowledge development and application of knowledge since 2006, as knowledge manager and department head. She is leader of the strategic research program Ecosystem Health at Deltares and coordinator of the applied-knowledge program of Deltares for the Dutch Ministry of Infrastructure and Water Management on water and soil quality and nature. She is working on the development and execution of applied research projects and programs for numerous clients and consortia, on the quality of water and subsurface, environmental science, water resource management, climate change and sustainable use of subsurface and water. Key in her work are mission-driven approach, knowledge entrepreneurship, co-creation and collaboration with knowledge partners and other parties.

She has been employed at Deltares/TNO since 2003. Before that, she worked as a researcher at the department of Geochemistry (PhD student) and at the Paleomagnetic Laboratory (Postdoc) at Utrecht University, and as a consultant on water and ecology for Royal Haskoning.

Ir. Marissa Frambach is an environmental researcher working at Deltares, specialising in soil quality and subsurface governance and planning. She is an active board member of the association for young professionals(<35yr) in the Netherlands and editor of the national soil magazine.

Dr. Margaux Lognoul in an engineer from Gembloux Agro-Bio Tech (Liège University, Belgium). Having experience in diverse fields from soil GHG emissions to river restoration and hydraulics, she is passionate about bringing creative solutions to environmental challenges.

Margaux works for the Public Water Management Company (Société Publique de Gestion de l'Eau) in Wallonia, Belgium as the coordinator of the Strategic Innovation Initiative "H2O - Water in Action". The Initiative aims to foster collaboration between stakeholders in the water sector to bring innovation to the next level.

Marta Popova, is currently a Project manager at the Operationnal research department at SPAQuE company based in Liège, Belgium. She brings experience from previous roles in several European projects funded under Interreg and H2020 programmes in the fields of the recovery of raw materials from brownfields and landfills and soil remediation. She holds a MBA degree from the IFAG - Université de Nantes, France.

Dr. Marc Viñas, is PhD in Biology (2005) specialized in Environmental Microbiology and Biotechnology (University of Barcelona). After a postdoc stay at TNO-Deltares (Utrecht), and GIRO Technological Centre (Spain), Marc started a position as a senior permanent researcher at IRTA (Spain) since 2012. He has more than 15 years of experience on bioremediation and biodegradation of polluted soil-water systems. Marc specializes in the environmental biotechnology and its microbial processes involved in carbon and nitrogen cycling, including biodegradation of contaminants in polluted sites, the mitigation of GHG emission, as well as  the assessment of nitrogen and organic carbon dynamics in soil-water systems in agrosystems . He has published more than 50 SCI papers in International journals in the field of Environmental Biotechnology, Chemical Engineering  and Environmental Microbiology.

Dr. Nina Tuxen is a scientist specializing in environmental remediation. Her research focuses on soil and groundwater contamination caused by chlorinated solvents, pesticides, PFAS, and other emerging pollutants. 

Nina’s academic journey began at the Technical University of Denmark. After this she transitioned into the consulting field, accumulating eight years of experience. During this period, she actively engaged in practical implementation and strategic management across various contaminated sites. 

Currently, Dr. Tuxen holds the position of Innovation Manager in the Capital Region of Denmark. Her interest lies in the boundaries between research/new methods, practical implementation and strategic management of multiple sites threatening soil and groundwater.

Wouter Gevaerts is a geologist with more than 30-year experience in contaminated land management, dealing with site investigation, risk assessment and site remediation for all types of contamination. At Arcadis he has been leading the contaminated land business, and later on the environmental business in Belgium. Later on, he became solution leader on contaminated land in Europe. In this role he was stimulating the exchange of knowledge, promoting innovative technologies and coordinating programs for international clients.

He is the senior chairman of the Nicole Service Provider Group. 

Dr. Thomas Track has been passionate about water and soil for over 30 years, with a particular focus on industrial water and soil management, as well as water resource management. He is deeply integrated into the (industrial) water and soil community at both national and international levels, engaging in application-related projects, expert networks, specialist committees, and expert activities.

He eagerly anticipates advancements in water and soil resource recovery within the context of the Circular Economy and European Green Deal, alongside a strong emphasis on prevention.

He firmly believes that digital tools will play a crucial role in enhancing our understanding of soil/water systems and their interactions, as well as identifying and optimizing integrated solutions for upcoming challenges.

Dr. Nora Sutton is Associate Professor at Wageningen University in the Department of Environmental Technology. Nora's research focuses on understanding biodegradation of organic micropollutants like pharmaceuticals, pesticides, personal care products, and other trace organic contaminants. By understanding biodegradation, she aims to harness this biological activity to produce clean resources for the circular economy. Sutton researches natural attenuation processes and stimulated biodegradation processes for organic micropollutants in soils, sediments, groundwater, wastewater and drinking water.

Renato Baciocchi is professor of sanitary-environmental engineering at the University of Rome Tor Vergata, where he is currently director of the Department of Civil Engineering and Computer Science Engineering and leads the Technology Transfer spoke of the "Rome Technopole" innovation ecosystem funded by the EU recovery plan.  He is author of more than 100 papers in the field of environmental engineering, with research interest mostly on the management of contaminated sites, including monitoring, risk assessment and physico-chemical remediation technologies. He is also coordinator of several R&D and Technology Transfer projects on environmental topics with private companies and public institutions. 

Marco Fanconi's primary role at ISPRA revolves around providing technical support to the Ministry of Environment for the 42 contaminated sites of national interest. He is extensively involved in authoring reports and guidelines on land and contaminated site management in collaboration with Italian and international institutions.

As the chair of IMPEL and a member of the European Environment Information and Observation Network (EIONET) as NRC for soil, Marco holds key positions within the environmental community. His collaborations span across various international institutions such as the EEA, European Commission, JRC, UN Environment, UNDP, and FAO, covering diverse aspects related to soil and groundwater management, as well as Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs).

Moreover, Marco's engagements extend to academic spheres, collaborating with several universities in Europe and other continents, including Georgia State University, Metropolitan College of New York, University of Madison, University of Liege, Hebei Safea-China, and Rajagiri-India. His multifaceted contributions reflect a deep commitment to advancing environmental protection and remediation efforts on a global scale.

Dietmar Müller-Grabherr works with Environment Agency Austria (EAA) since 1989. National main responsibilities include supervising the national program and the working group “Risk assessment of contaminated sites” at the Austrian Standards Institute. By the background of his national function, he is involved to science-policy dialogues with regard to soil and groundwater related EU policies for more than 20 years. Since September 2017 he is General Secretary to COMMON FORUM on Contaminated Land in Europe (www.commonforum.eu) and represents the European network of policy advisors and regulators in contaminated land management at the Soil Expert Group supporting the European Commission with regard to the implementation of the EU Soil Strategy for 2030.

Dr. Anjali Jayakumar is a Lecturer (Asst. Prof) in Chemical Engineering at the School of Engineering at Newcastle University, UK since December 2022. She designs sustainable materials and processes from renewable resources such as biomass, mineral wastes, and microorganisms and utilise them to improve food-energy-water security. She specialises in engineering thermochemical conversion processes such as pyrolysis for biochar and biochar-based composite production for clean energy and the environment, especially for water remediation and soil applications.

Cécile Le Guern currently works at BRGM (French Geological Survey). She is senior researcher in Environmental Geochemistry (soils, subsoils, groundwater...), Cartography and Geoinformatics (GIS). Cécile has been coleading since 2011 a researchers’ teams on Urban Soils at IRSTV, an interdisciplinary research federation on the city, linked to CNRS. She is involved in research and operational projects. Her skills include the characterisation of degraded soils and groundwater by searching pollutant origin (through historical land use, environmental setting, field sampling), the mobility of contaminants from soils to groundwater, and the management of polluted soils using nature based solutions. She is also involved in the development of (GIS) tools to promote taking into account soils and subsoils quality in territorial spatial planning and supports developers in the ecological transition. She is currently leading the French national project PermePolis, which aims at producing a methodology to co-build desealing strategies with the actors of the territory by taking into account environmental, legal and social aspects.