Italy Renewable Energy Showcase - Biographies

Professor Salvator Roberto Amendolia - Scientific Attaché, Italian Embassy

Scientific Attaché at the Italian Embassy in London since March 2005. Full Professor of Physics at the University of Sassari, Italy. He worked since 1971 as a High Energy physicist, carrying out research and leading experimental teams at the largest particle accelerator laboratories in Europe and in the US. The activities included the discovery of the raising proton-proton cross-section, the measure of the charmed mesons’ lifetimes, the discovery of the top quark in 1997. Since 1993 he has also worked in the field of applications of High Energy Physics technologies to Bio-medicine (in particular, innovative techniques for PET and Computed Tomography, for data handling, for image processing). He has been promoter and manager of several national and European projects, including the industrial development of a solid-state high-resolution mammography unit, the application of physics simulation methods to economics, the creation of Grid-enabled medical-knowledge databases for research and healthcare. Between 2001 and 2004 he led the Promotion Section of the Technology Transfer Group of CERN (European Laboratory for Particle Physics) in Geneva. Under his leadership the Science Office of the Italian Embassy has organized several conferences dealing among the rest with energy production technologies, climate change issues, medical problems, health care strategy, food chain’s sustainability, biodiversity, eco-building. These conferences are promoted in collaboration with government bodies, research institutes, universities and industries of Italy and the UK. In 2009 Professor Amendolia has been elected Chairman of the London Diplomatic Science Club, gathering together the Science Officers of all the diplomatic missions in London. Since 2006 he is Honorary Visiting Professor at the City University of London.

Professor James Barber - FRS, Visiting Professor, Politecnico di Torino, and Ernst Chain Professor of Biochemistry, Imperial College London

James Barber FRS, is the Ernst Chain Professor Biochemistry at Imperial College London and President of the International Society of Photosynthesis Research. After graduating from the University of Wales in Chemistry he gained a MSc and PhD in Biophysics from the University of East Anglia. Following a postdoctoral year in The Netherlands, he joined the academic staff at Imperial College London as a Lecturer in 1968. Much of his research has been on the molecular processes of photosynthesis with a particular focus on the reactions involved in splitting of water. He has contributed greatly to this subject by elucidating the structure of the catalytic centre for this reaction which is contained within an enzyme known as Photosystem II. His work is helping to provide a blue-print for the for improving biofuel production and for the design of chemical catalysts which can use solar energy to power the extraction of hydrogen from water. He has been awarded many medals and prizes for his research contributions and was elected to the European Academy (Academia Europaea) in 1989, to the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in 2003 and to a Fellowship of the Royal Society in 2005. He has received many acknowledgements of his research contributions including the 2002 Flintoff Medal of Royal Society of Chemistry, 2005 Italgas Prize for Energy and the Environment, 2006 Biochemical Society Novartis medal and prize and the 2007 Wheland Medal and Prize from the University of Chicago. He is frequently requested to give lectures both in the UK and overseas and in 2008 he delivered the Lee Kuan Yew Distinguished Visitors Lectures in Singapore and the keynote lecture on Energy at the 2009 G8 University Summit in Turin. He has strong links with Piemonte Region where he is a Visiting Professor to the Politecnico di Torino and founder of the BioSolar Laboratory conducting bio-energy research.

Ivano Canteri - Global Marketing Manager, Ceipiemonte

Global Marketing Manager at Ceipiemonte - Piemonte Agency since January 2008.

He has grown an extensive expertise in territorial and place marketing during four years as Managing Director of MKTP, a specially focussed private company publicly controlled by the regional authorities of Piemonte.

His professional background is deeply rooted in fifteen years of strategic marketing and marketing communication for multinational industrial customers as Senior Director and Supervisor of international projects and programmes.

He also cumulates a three years experience as Managing Director of a web marketing company and a significant track record in education and training in marketing and local development related topics at major national institutions and universities.

Dott Mattia Cavanna - Finmeccanica

Mattia Cavanna was born in Novara, Italy, in 1971. He grew up in Milan and spent part of his childhood in Paris, France.

After graduating as Engineer at the Politecnico di Milano he moved to United Kingdom where he worked for HR Wallingford, an environmental engineering company, while pursuing Business Studies at the Oxford College. In 1998 he joined the consulting firm ACCENTURE where he worked seven years as a strategic consultant in the Energy, Utilities and Public sectors, engaged in major business and organizational change programs, also covering the role of Project Manager in charge of the Corporate Social Responsibility initiatives of the Accenture Italian Foundation.

Since 2005 he works for FINMECCANICA, the main Italian industrial Group operating globally in the aerospace, defence, security, helicopters, energy and transportation sectors. He is currently Vice President of Logistics, Energy & Global Service in Finmeccanica Group Services, managing programs at international level to reduce energy spend and to achieve synergies in transportation, logistics and sites operations, while lowering greenhouse-gasses emissions. He is coordinator of the Group Renewable Energies Program involving Ansaldo Energia, sits in the Group Steering committee on Sustainability Reporting and headed the start-up of the Group’s Procurement Office in China.

His personal and professional interest in the field of sustainability took him to chair the 2007 World Energy Council Roundtable on Energy Conservation and to participate as a speaker to conferences such as the Italian Energy Summit and the international Aerospace & Defence Conference on Climate Change held in London in November 2009.

He is engaged in the Advisory Board on Energy & Environment of the Major of the City of Rome, and has been lecturer and industry testimonial on energy management and innovative industrial services at Confindustria’s Scuola di Alta Formazione and at Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna in Pisa. In 2004 he has been elected member of the Aspen Junior Fellows, and in 2008 he took part to the Marshall Memorial Fellowship Program. In 2009 he was selected for the Young Leaders Program held in Chicago, sponsored by the Council of the United States and Italy. As part of his executive education program in 2010 he attended the Financial Seminar for Senior managers at the London Business School.

He currently lives in Rome with his wife, son and daughter. In his spare time he loves playing records, reading and drawing.

Giancarlo Potenza - ENEL Italy

Giancarlo Potenza, Master in Materials Science and Technology Engineering and phD from the University of Lecce (Italy). Experienced in wind and ocean energy since 2006 when he joined ENEL R&D Department and currently involved in the scheduling and planning of long term R&D activities for the ENEL Group.

In 2009 he has been involved, as visiting scientist, in a collaboration Programme with Laboratory for Ship and Platform Flow at MIT about a feasibility study for the development of different designs of floating offshore wind turbines. The study is referred to sites with different characteristics and furthermore the possibility of integration with ocean energy converters has been investigated.

Currently he is involved in an EU Programme within the FP7 (ORECCA) based on a coordination action on off-shore renewable energy conversion platforms.

Maura Turolla - Telecom Italia

In Telecom Italia, Maura Turolla is currently managing the “Terminal Innovation Division “in the Strategy & Innovation Department. She is working on devices, SIM cards, machine to machine services and network evolution, promoting and selecting innovative technologies. She received her degree in Electronic Engineering from “Politecnico di Torino”; in Telecom Italia she has been involved in the launch of new handset technologies and mobile services.

She is author of several papers, publications and patents dealing with the mentioned topics.