Isabel Schestak
Our team member Dr Isabel Schestak from Bangor University presented at the SDEWES conference end of May, which for the first time was held in Vlorё, Albania. SDEWES stands for Sustainable Development of Energy, Water and Environment Systems and the conference brought together academics from various disciplines involved with sustainable solutions in water and energy use or waste management. Session topics of the conference included circular economy concepts for cities and industries or waste and wastewater treatment technologies. Innovation in research and policy and management strategies were also part of the focus, including economic implications from the European Green Deal.
Isabel presented her work on the calculator for commercial kitchens, which enables kitchen owners to estimate their individual potential for recovering heat from drain water and the associated environmental and economic benefits. She specifically explained the background data and how the tool is going to include further European countries soon, expanding the Ireland-UK based version of the tool and increasing attraction of the tool to users around all of Europe. For the first time, Isabel also had the opportunity to chair a conference session, which covered presentations on waste(water) treatment and reuse. Isabel said: “It was a great new and enjoyable experience for me to facilitate the scientific discussion around topics outside my area of research by chairing the session.” The conference was organised in a hybrid mode, enabling participants to both present and comment contributions online or in person. Though rather a small conference in terms of participants with around 200 international researchers joining online or in person, it was a great opportunity to disseminate the work of the Dŵr Uisce project and especially suitable for networking with researchers from all over the globe.
A big thank you to the funding from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) through the Interreg Ireland-Wales Cooperation Programme for the opportunity to present at the latest SDEWES conference!