Waste & Materials Management conference

Jonathan Atkinson

Technical Director, CL:AIRE

After 34 years in the Environment Agency and the KCC Waste reg team Jonathan has recently moved to work with CLAIRE, an industry leading organisation dealing with best practice guidance and frameworks for positive materials management on sustainable development sites, enabling land contamination issues to be dealt with comprehensively.

He has worked on risk assessment of developed closed landfill sites, landfill engineering and environmental controls enforcement on permitted sites, and a variety of land contamination projects. He was part of a team of GW&CL specialists and a national advisor on a number of specific projects related to soil remediation and waste management, including DoWCoP and emerging substances like PFAS.

Chris Berryman

Technical Director, Environmental Permitting & Regulatory Compliance, Stantec

As a Chartered Resource and Waste Manager, Chartered Environmentalist and Fellow of the Institute of Quarrying, Chris supports clients in development, infrastructure, minerals, and waste. He leads projects which include the designing out of waste for significant infrastructure, regulatory consenting, due diligence, and the management of the complex interface between planning, EIA and waste regimes. Ultimately, he aims to encourage clients to consider waste early in a project lifecycle to achieve long term compliance and sustainability benefits.

Chris leads a team specialising in Environmental Permitting across all industry sectors and acts as project Director for a wide range of clients and projects including permitting/compliance and the “designing out” of waste for major infrastructure and EIA schemes. He is a Qualified Person under the CL:AIRE Definition of Waste Code of Practice (DoW CoP) and Lead Author on CIRIA research project RP1124 which is seeking to provide new UK guidance on the sustainable reuse of soils and aggregates. Chris is an active participant on industry forums and working groups including with the Mineral Products Association and Society for the Environment. He has authored several prominent articles in the regulatory/legal sections of industry journals and is also an active public speaker at various industry and professional organisation events.

Sarah Bullock

Associate Director in Contaminated Land and Materials Management, Atkins

Graeme Duggan

Senior Policy Officer, Soil Policy | Access, Landscape, Peatland and Soil Division, DEFRA

Graeme leads on urban soils and contaminated land within the Soil Health Policy team at Defra. The Soil Health Policy team is working on a number of different initiatives in order to deliver on the government’s 25 Year Environment Plan ambition to achieve sustainably managed soils by 2030. This includes the recently announced Soil Health Action Plan for England, which will focus on preventing soil degradation and improving soil health, and look at how land management practices and planning can be adapted to help protect soil from the impact of climate change. 

Graeme recently joined Defra following a 15 year career in local government where he worked in a range of policy areas including Housing, Community Safety and Contaminated Land. Graeme is passionate about environmental protection issues and has an Environmental Science BSc Hons Degree from the University of Leeds and a Graduate Diploma in Agriculture from the Royal Agricultural University.

Martin Garrett

Associate Consultant- Waste & Resource Management, SLR Consulting

Martin Garrett is an Associate consultant on SLR’s Waste & Resource Management team. Martin specialises in data driven waste management projects, with clients in the UK and abroad including national governments, regulators, local authorities, lenders, and waste operators. His expertise include options modelling, surveys, carbon assessment, due diligence, and procurement.

Kevin Goldberg

President, SoilFLO

Kevin Goldberg began his career working for a company handling liquid solidification on subway tunnel spoils. After experiencing the pain of handling disposal paperwork, the Western University environmental engineering grad began exploring a venture to solve this problem. In 2019, he and a fellow engineer started SoilFLO, software that enables users to manage the movement of excess material across construction projects.

Started in Ontario, Canada, the company has since expanded internationally, with customers in the United States, United Kingdom, and Australia. The company and its crew of 10 helps hundreds of customers across the world confidently manage their earthworks operations. 

A disruptor in the earthworks industry, five years ago, digital soil tracking was unheard of and project owners and environmental consultants had few ways of verifying the proper handling and disposal of excess material. Goldberg’s work has brought a new layer of environmental control to an industry that otherwise did not exist. Quarries and other various rehabilitation projects across the Globe can now confidently import soil with a lower risk of contamination. 

Kevin remains an active member of the industry, involved in engagement groups, conferences and industry associations. These include, CL:AIRE in the UK, the Ontario Sewer and Watermain Association, Ontario Home Builders association and Ontario Environmental Industry Association. 

SoilFLO and Kevin have continued to take a leadership position in Sponsoring soils conferences in different jurisdictions and exporting his knowledge to all areas which SoiLFLO operated. Kevin has worked on total project values in excess of $10 Billion Dollars and tracked over 10 million cubic meters of excess soil through SoilFLO.

Sarah Haines

Principal Engineer, The Environmental Protection Group Ltd

Sarah is a Principal Engineer at The Environmental Protection Group Ltd. Sarah is a Member of the Chartered Institution of Water and Environmental Management with over 25 years’ experience in the brownfield redevelopment industry, with specialist skills in the investigation and assessment of ground gas. Sarah has previously worked as an independent consultant and spent a number of years as a local authority contaminated land manager. Sarah is co-author of the Local Authority guide to ground gas. 

Paul Hatch

Principal Planning Officer (Planning Policy), Lancaster City Council

Paul Hatch is a Principal Planning Officer working for Lancaster City Council. Paul has worked in local government for over 20 years, developing local plans in both West Lancashire and Lancaster. Most recently, Paul has been working on the preparation of a new Area Action Plan for growth of Bailrigg Garden Village to the South of Lancaster which will seek to be a transformative development looking to reflect the low carbon ambitions of the Council’s Climate Emergency Declaration of 2019.

Amy Juden

Associate, The Environmental Protection Group Ltd

Amy is an Associate at The Environmental Protection Group Ltd where she specialises in ground gas risk assessment.  She is a Chartered Geologist and is enthusiastic about providing efficient and innovative risk assessment and remediation solutions for complex contamination problems. Amy has recently authored new ground gas guidance to be published by NHBC and serves as a judge for the Brownfield Briefing Awards.  She has been working in the geoenvironmental industry for over ten years. 

Carrie Rose

Associate Technical Director, Atkins

Profile coming soon...

Laura Tainsh

Partner, Davidson Chalmers Stewart LLP

Laura Tainsh is a partner and head of the environmental team at Davidson Chalmers Stewart LLP. An environmental lawyer with a particular specialism for dealing with the waste and resources sector. Chartered with the Chartered Institution of Wastes Management and Vice-Chair of the Scottish Centre Council of CIWM. Law Society of Scotland Accredited Specialist in Environmental Law and an active member of Law Society of Scotland Environmental Law Committee and of the Scottish Committee of the UK Environmental Law Association. Member of the Management Committee of the Resource Management Association Scotland and board member of Circular Communities Scotland.

Dr Anna Willetts

Partner, Gunnercooke LLP and President, CIWM

Anna is an environmental criminal lawyer, specialising in defence work in the waste and recycling industry.  She is dual-qualified, having completed a PhD in geochemistry and worked as an environmental consultant before qualifying as a lawyer. 

She represents waste and recycling businesses and directors who are prosecuted by the regulators (Environment Agency and local authorities) for environmental and waste offences. She is President of the Chartered Institution of Wastes Management and a Trustee of the Board.  She is also Co-Convenor of UKELA’s Waste Working Party. 

Anna is co-authoring a book on the practical application of waste management law with a barrister and an environmental consultant.

Graham Winter

Senior Advisor, Circular Economy Strategy, Environment and Business, Environment Agency

Graham is a senior advisor with over 20 years’ experience with the Environment Agency. He has led engagement with the C&D sector for over 12 years, working closely with the Green Construction Board on initiatives such as Halving Waste to Landfill (2012) and Zero Avoidable Waste (2050). Graham is currently pulling together numerous Circular Economy initiatives across Environment Agency Regulation and represents the Agency on several governmental and NGO groups progressing Circular Economy.