Materials, Minerals & Mining for People, Places, Planet

Rt Hon Charles Hendry HonFIMMM

Visiting Professor, Business School & Academy of Government, University of Edinburgh

Charles Hendry was Minister of Energy in David Cameron’s Coalition Government.  

He was subsequently appointed as the Prime Minister’s Trade Envoy to Central Asia.  Since leaving Parliament in 2015, after 23 years as an MP, he has focussed on issues of energy and resource security and the transition to Net Zero.  He is an Honorary Professor at the University of Edinburgh Business School, teaching on the Climate Change Masters course.

---

Jon Bolton FIMMM

Chair, Materials Processing Institute

Jon is the co-chair of the UK Steel Council recently established to develop a steel strategy for the UK steel industry. 

One of the most widely respected figures in the UK steel industry Jon has over 40 years’ experience in steel on both sides of the Atlantic. Following various engineering and operational roles in the UK Jon was seconded to the USA for 5 years when he was part of the leadership team that constructed and ran a mini mill in Alabama. Between 2000 and 2019 Jon led primary and secondary steel businesses in the UK and Continental Europe. He was also a Non-Executive Director of Sheffield Forgemasters from 2016 to 2018.

Jon was the Chair of UK Steel from 2013 to 2015 and jointly chaired a previous incarnation of the UK Steel Council with the Secretary of State for Business and Industry for two years. During this time Jon also chaired a group that formed the UK Metals Council.

He is currently the Chair of the Materials Processing Institute based on Teesside and a Main Board advisor to Emirates Steel.

He has a passion for developing the skills of young people and is The King's Ambassador for Industrial Cadets, a scheme gives young people direct experience of industry. He is a Trustee of the Engineering Development Trust (EDT) which manages the Industrial Cadets programme.

Jon also chaired the Stakeholder Steering Group for “Transfire”, part of the Government's Transforming the Foundation Industries Challenge.

Jon is a Fellow of the Institute for Materials. Minerals and Mining and was awarded the Bessemer Gold Medal for outstanding services to the steel industry in 2019

---

Mary Creagh CBE MP

Minister for Nature. Labour MP for Coventry East,

Mary Creagh was appointed Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs on 18 July 2024. She was elected as the MP for Coventry East in July 2024.

As Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Minister for Nature) Mary is responsible for:

• circular economy
• planning and land use framework
• domestic biodiversity
• tree planting and forestry
• international nature and wildlife
• environmental targets and EIP
• Official Development Assistance (ODA) programme
• green finance
• Protected Landscapes (National Landscapes and National Parks)
• lead for Office for Environmental Protection
• lead for Natural England
• lead for Forestry Commission
• lead for Joint Nature Conservation Committee
• lead for Kew

 

---

Mary Creagh CBE MP

Minister for Nature. Labour MP for Coventry East,

Mary Creagh was appointed Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs on 18 July 2024. She was elected as the MP for Coventry East in July 2024.

As Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Minister for Nature) Mary is responsible for:

• circular economy
• planning and land use framework
• domestic biodiversity
• tree planting and forestry
• international nature and wildlife
• environmental targets and EIP
• Official Development Assistance (ODA) programme
• green finance
• Protected Landscapes (National Landscapes and National Parks)
• lead for Office for Environmental Protection
• lead for Natural England
• lead for Forestry Commission
• lead for Joint Nature Conservation Committee
• lead for Kew

 

---

Libby Peake

Senior Fellow & Head of Resource Policy, Green Alliance

Libby Peake is senior fellow and head of resource policy at Green Alliance, an independent charity and think tank focused on achieving ambitious leadership for the environment. She works closely with other NGOs, academics and businesses to promote better use of resources throughout the economy. This includes managing the Green Alliance convened Circular Economy Task Force, a forum for business thinking on resource efficient policies, which has recently argued for greater ambitions for ecodesign, advocated for a systemic approach to tackling plastic pollution, a more targeted approach to reducing resource use, and a smarter strategy on critical raw materials that focuses on energy demand reduction. She also sits on the government’s Circular Economy Taskforce. Libby’s recent reports include Measuring up: the potential of targets to reduce resource use, Ready steady grow: how the Treasury can mainstream circular business and Mission critical: safeguarding resources for UK energy security.

---

Professor Mark Miodownik MBE FREng CEng HonFIMMM

Professor of Materials & Society, University College London

Mark Miodownik is the UCL Professor of Materials & Society.  He received his Ph.D in turbine jet engine alloys from Oxford University, and has worked as a materials engineer in the USA, Ireland and the UK. For more than twenty years he has championed materials science research that links to the arts and humanities, medicine, and society. This culminated in the establishment of the UCL Institute of Making, where he is a director and runs the research programme.  Mark also recently set up the Plastic Waste Innovation Hubto carry our research into solving the environmental catastrophe of plastic waste. Mark is the multi-award winning author of New York Times bestselling book Stuff Matters. He regularly presents BBC TV and radio programmes on materials science and engineering.  In 2014 he was elected a fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering. In 2018 he was awarded an MBE for services to materials science, engineering and broadcasting.

: http://www.plasticwastehub.org.uk
: @@markmiodownik

---

Iain Gulland

Chief Executive, Zero Waste Scotland

Iain Gulland is Zero Waste Scotland’s founding Chief Executive and was the Programme Director of the predecessor programme, WRAP Scotland. 

Previously Iain worked with initiating recycling systems in the public, private and third sectors and led the Community Recycling Network, Scotland until 2008.   Iain has recently been appointed President of the Association of Cities and Regions for Resource Management (ACR+) and is a member of several Scottish Government Programme Boards including those covering low carbon and manufacturing. 

Iain was named the ‘most influential person in the UK waste and resource efficiency sector’ by Resource Magazine (2014) and was granted fellowship of the Chartered Institution of Wastes Management in 2016. 

: https://www.linkedin.com/in/iain-gulland-ba74573b/

---

Dr Patrick Foster CEng FIMMM

Head of Camborne School of Mines & Professor in Mine Safety, University of Exeter

Dr Patrick Foster is the Head of the Camborne School of Mines and Professor in Mine Safety at the University of Exeter where he lectures and undertakes research into the health, safety and working environment aspects of mining and quarrying. His particular research interests are in safety risk management, health & safety management systems, human factors and the effects of climate change in the mining industry.

He graduated in Mining Engineering from the University of Nottingham and continued there to undertake a PhD looking into safety risk assessment in the mining industry supported by British Coal. He then joined International Mining Consultants Ltd as a Mine Safety Consultant where he was involved in health & safety management system audits, risk assessment training and research in the South Africa, India and the UK.

---

David Knowles FREng CEng CSci FIMMM

CEO, Henry Royce Institute

David is the CEO of the Henry Royce Institute and Professor of Nuclear Engineering at Bristol University. He has extensive knowledge and experience in materials selection and structural integrity/life assessment of industrial pressure equipment and rotating plant. Specifically he has internationally recognised expertise in failure assessment, fitness for service and environmental/thermal degradation of materials in the energy sector.

David has published over 100 papers in journals and invited conferences, given numerous workshops and courses on materials selection, high temperature life assessment, materials degradation and constitutive modelling and acted as an expert witness in a number of large legal cases.

Whilst at Atkins and the University of Bristol David has worked on integrity assessment, materials selection, fabrication specifications and corrosion protection of Advance Gas Nuclear Reactors, subsea tanks, pipelines, offshore wind turbine foundations, offshore platforms and nuclear graphite cores.

---

David Knowles FREng CEng CSci FIMMM

CEO, Henry Royce Institute

David is the CEO of the Henry Royce Institute and Professor of Nuclear Engineering at Bristol University. He has extensive knowledge and experience in materials selection and structural integrity/life assessment of industrial pressure equipment and rotating plant. Specifically he has internationally recognised expertise in failure assessment, fitness for service and environmental/thermal degradation of materials in the energy sector.

David has published over 100 papers in journals and invited conferences, given numerous workshops and courses on materials selection, high temperature life assessment, materials degradation and constitutive modelling and acted as an expert witness in a number of large legal cases.

Whilst at Atkins and the University of Bristol David has worked on integrity assessment, materials selection, fabrication specifications and corrosion protection of Advance Gas Nuclear Reactors, subsea tanks, pipelines, offshore wind turbine foundations, offshore platforms and nuclear graphite cores.

---

Gavin Mudd BEnv Eng (Hons), PhD

Director, Critical Minerals Intelligence Centre, British Geological Survey

Dr Gavin Mudd has over 25 years’ experience researching the environmental and sustainability issues of modern mining. Starting from groundwater, his career has expanded to look at environmental impacts of mining, key sustainability trends, life cycle assessment, governance, regulation, global mineral resource assessments and critical minerals – Dr Mudd's experience includes how we mine and use almost the entire periodic table and is a world-renowned scholar in sustainable mining and critical minerals. Moving from academia in Australia, Dr Mudd joined the British Geological Survey in December 2023 as Director of the Critical Minerals Intelligence Centre.

---

Philippa Glover

Director, Foundation Industries Sustainability Consortium (FISC)

With a 20-year career in manufacturing, Philippa Glover is a leading contemporary industrialist and recognised thought leader in manufacturing. After earning a master’s in chemistry from the University of Sheffield, she held senior leadership roles, including MD of an SME providing robotics solutions to the manufacturing community. In 2024, she was honoured as a Senior Fellow of Industrial Automation and Innovation at the University of Liverpool. Philippa founded her own business in 2024 and now works as a portfolio Director working with RTOs, academia, SMEs and start-ups to shape the future of industry. She is currently the Director of Foundation Industries Sustainability Consortium (FISC) and holds other sector advisory roles at a national and regional level in the Northwest of England, promoting growth in UK manufacturing and positive societal impact.

---

Dr Jo Bray OBE

Director, Advanced Manufacturing, Department for Business and Trade

Jo Bray OBE is an experienced, inclusive senior leader in central government with an in-depth knowledge of business, manufacturing, trade, environment, and food issues.
 

---

Ed Conway HonFIMMM

Economics Editor, Sky News

Ed Conway is the Economics Editor of Sky News and the author of several books. In 2023, he published Material World - A Substantial Story of Our Past and Future, which has received a multitude of awards since. Ed will share his perspectives on the material challenges facing humanity.

---