SmartBuild: Speakers

Jason Leadbitter, INOVYN ChlorVinyl

Jason has had 24 years’ experience working within the PVC industry, most of that time with his former employer Hydro Polymers and now in a much larger capacity as Sustainability and Compliance Manager at INEOS ChlorVinyls (now INOVYN ChlorVinyls), Europe’s largest PVC producer.  He has an active European role in a number of trade associations, especially on environmental and waste management issues.  He is the current Chairman of the Controlled-Loop Recycling Committee of VinylPlus – the European PVC industry voluntary commitment.

Jason is the author of a number of books and publications especially on issues relating to sustainability.  He has an Honours Degree in Materials Science and a PhD in Polymer Chemistry (Bradford University).  He has been an honorary lecturer at several universities including Strathclyde University, Scotland and BTH University, Sweden and visiting lecturer at Birmingham, Aston, Manchester and Loughborough Universities in the UK as well as INSEAD Fontainebleau, France and Nyenrode Business School, The Netherlands.

Thomas Hülsmann, AGPU

Thomas Hülsmann studied at the University of Osnabrück, Germany materials engineering and graduated in 1988. Since 1988 Thomas is working in the European PVC-industry. Most of that time he held leading functions at Europe´s No. 1 PVC producer INEOS ChlorVinyls (formerly ICI and EVC and now INOVYN ChlorVinyls) in Technical Service and Environmental Affairs. During this period he was also member of the AGPU Management Board and supported the sustainable development of PVC. Before joining AGPU in 2013 Thomas was Managing Director of a Medium Sized Stabilizer Producer with the focus on Sales and Marketing.

Beside his roles in the industry he took responsibility in positions of various organisations, he was Congress Chairman at the SKZ and held a teaching position at the University of Wilhelmshaven. Since January 1st 2014 Thomas Hülsmann is Managing Director of AGPU (Arbeitsgemeinschaft PVC und UMWELT e.V.) the German PVC Network association in Bonn.

Roger Mottram, Vinyls Group Chairman

Roger joined ICI in 1984 after graduating with First Class Honours in Materials Science from Bradford University and has worked in the chemicals and polymers industry ever since. Roger's first involvement with the PVC industry was in 1989 when he was seconded from ICI to European Vinyls Corporation.
 
Roger has held a variety of technical, commercial and communication roles, but has specialised in environmental and regulatory affairs and sustainable development activities for the PVC industry during the last 16 years. With the coming together of INEOS Chlor and INEOS Vinyls in 2006 the environmental and regulatory affairs role has been extended to cover all chlor-alkali products. A recent 2015 merger with Solvay then saw INEOS ChlorVinyls become INOVYN ChlorVinyls.
Roger is currently active on many industry committees especially with the BPF, ECVM, PlasticsEurope, EuroChlor and ECSA. A founder member of the BPF Vinyls Group, he is now chairman of the group.

Jane Gardner, Axion Recycling

Jane Gardner joined resource recovery specialists Axion Consulting in 2005 and since then has developed particular expertise in setting up and running successful industry led collection and recycling trials and schemes.  Axion has managed Recofloor, the award winning vinyl take back programme on behalf of flooring manufacturers Altro and Polyflor since its launch in 2009. Axion is also the UK agent for Recovinyl and Jane has been part of the team responsible for setting up the scheme in the UK since its inception.

Jane lives in Bramhall near Manchester and is bilingual in German and English.

Lance Rowell, Architen

Lance Rowell is a founding member of the British tensile fabric industry and Managing Director of Architen Landrell Associates. With experience in working with fabric spanning over 35 years, Lance has been involved in some of the most complex and exciting fabric structures built including the National Football Centre, Will Alsop’s Spiky Pod at the Queen Mary University, U2’s 360 Degree World Tour Stage, the Olympic 2012 Aquatic Centre and Waterpolo Venue, and most recently, the Serpentine Sackler Gallery.

Simon Nicol, BRE

Simon Nicol is Group Director for Housing and Energy at the Building Research Establishment in Watford. He has some 35 years experience working on housing, energy and health surveys. He is perhaps best known for managing BRE’s contribution to the English Housing Survey for the last 17 years. Prior to working at BRE, Simon was a Government research manager at the DOE (now DCLG) where he produced guidance on housing renewal, including Neighbourhood Renewal Assessment, Housing Surveys  and the Housing Health and Safety Rating System.

Derek Hughes, BRE

Derek joined BRE in 1987 and has been involved in a number of activities in this period but with a theme of construction product sustainability, marketing, and working to develop effective research, testing and certification partnerships across the EU.

Between 2009 and the present Derek has been involved in a range of construction certification topics.  These included the development and taking to market of an innovative scheme (BES 6001) to certify the responsible sourcing characteristic of construction products.  This experience led to the work with Vinyl Plus to develop a similar scheme for the PVC marketplace – the VinylPlus label.
 
Derek has recently taken up a new role at BRE around helping clients to meet their requirements under the CPR and associated CE marking through the development of product testing programmes against harmonised European standards and in the development of bespoke testing programmes for innovative products.

Derek is married, lives near Hemel Hempstead, and has a daughter currently studying Geology the University of Leicester.