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Management Team
Professor Julia Stegemann
Julia is Professor of Environmental Engineering at UCL and PI and Director of the UKRI Interdisciplinary Circular Economy Centre for Mineral-based Construction Materials and leading Challenge 1.
She has Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in Chemical Engineering from McMaster University and a PhD from Imperial College London, as well as more than 30y of research experience gained at UCL, Oxford University, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, and Environment Canada.
She is a founding Director of CircEL, the UCL Circular Economy Laboratory, a hub for research and education on resource efficiency that spans the breadth and depth of UCL expertise in this area. Much of her work is in collaboration with industry, and she has experience in laboratory characterisation of materials, development of technologies and test methods, preparation of regulatory guidance documents, implementation and evaluation of technologies at field scale, and databases and computer modelling.
Current projects include investigation of the geochemical basis of the metabolism of toxic metals in the cement kiln during co-processing wastes, waste prevention in the built environment, and development of tools to enable use of anthropogenic resources.
Professor Leon Black
Leon is Professor of Infrastructure Materials at the University of Leeds and co-director of the UKRI Interdisciplinary Circular Economy Centre for Mineral-based Construction Materials, leading challenge 2, looking at technical solutions to circular construction materials.
He has over 25 years’ experience researching the durability of various construction materials, with the past 15 years focussing on the durability of low-carbon concrete. In particular, his work has looked at how the use of industrial wastes and by-products can be used in concrete. Leon is Editor of the ICE Publication Advances in Cement Research.
He is PI for the National Centre for Infrastructure Materials in Leeds, a multi-million pound centre to investigate the weathering and long-term performance of a range of construction materials.
Professor Mohamed Osmani
Mohamed is a Professor of Sustainable Design and Construction in the School of Architecture, Building and Civil Engineering at Loughborough University and co-director of the UKRI Interdisciplinary Circular Economy Centre for Mineral-based Construction Materials, leading challenge 3, looking systemic enablers to circular construction materials.
He has over 20 years’ experience in material resource efficiency, designing out waste, and construction and demolition waste recovery and optimization. He is currently leading two H2020 projects on ‘Circular Economy Business Models’ and ‘Circular Plasterboard’ respectively; ‘Enabling Long-term Material Circularity in Infrastructure (funded by HS2); and ‘Integrating Circular Economy Principles into Building Projects’ (funded by BRE Trust).
He leads 5 international panels and expert groups on material resource efficiency, including BS 8895 series, and IWWG Construction and Demolition Waste Task Group. He sits on the UK Government Green Construction Board Task Group to develop a routemap to achieve the target of the Resources & Waste Strategy for England for avoidable waste in the construction sector by 2050.
Dr Aiduan Borrion
Aiduan is an Associate Professor and Co-Director of the Circular Economy lab (CircEL) at UCL. She has over ten years’ experience in life cycle assessment (LCA). She’s performed and researched LCA for a wide range of applications in the engineering, design, food and drinks, packaging, consumer goods, and energy sectors.
She contributed her LCA expertise to the £27m BBSRC sustainable bioenergy centre (BSBEC) and is currently leading LCA research in both UK- and EU-funded projects, including the €5.5m H2020 project on developing biofertiliser from biogas effluent, and the £4.4m Innovate UK project on solid state battery design.
Alongside her research, Aiduan runs an internationally renowned CPD training course entitled “Conducting a Life Cycle Assessment: from Theory to Practical Application” which attracts participants from all over the world. In addition, Aiduan regularly provides LCA consultancy services to a wide range of organisations, both large and SMEs.
Dr Ramya Venkataraman
Dr Ramya Venkataraman is a senior project manager at the ICEC-MCM and overseas it's daily operations and the implementation of its strategic vision. Ramya worked in industry in the fuels and energy sector for many years where she held R&D as well as technical and commercial project development roles. Prior to joining the ICEC-MCM she spent 2 years working closely with a local authority in London implementing climate action projects, of which, a big part was a borough-wide circular economy capacity building project to drive down consumption-based waste in the local area.
Aisha Khan
Aisha is the communications and events officer at the ICEC-MCM, focusing on implementing the centre’s dissemination strategy.
She previously worked at QS Quacquarelli Symonds where she was responsible for managing and creating student-facing content, including interviews with staff and students from top-ranked universities across the world.
She has also experience working in the UK Civil Service, producing briefings and correspondence on behalf of senior ministers from various departments.