Stephen is a Research Fellow in Sustainable Systems at the Bath Institute of Sustainability and Climate Change (ISSC) in the University of Bath. With a chemical and energy engineering background and over ten years of research experience in sustainable energy and chemical technologies, Stephen’s work focuses on the holistic and optimal deployment at scale of biomass-based, circular, and low carbon technologies by using quantitative methods at the intersection of process modelling, techno economic analysis, life cycle assessment, material flow analysis, value chain modelling and optimisation, and sectoral productivity analysis.
He began his career as an experimentalist at the University of the Philippines before transitioning into computational research during his PhD at the University of Bath, wherein Stephen modelled and examined the interactions between biomass value chains and the environment-food-energy-water nexus in the Philippines. Subsequently, he pursued postdoc positions at Bath and Imperial. In his postdoc at Bath, in collaboration with the Universities of Manchester and Aberystwyth, Stephen modelled decarbonisation pathways for the UK’s petrochemical sector. In another postdoc at Bath, Stephen collaborated with researchers at Universities of Bath, Cambridge and California Santa Barbara researchers to develop an MFA-LCA-based global petrochemicals carbon calculator that can aid in understanding mitigation measures for achieving net-zero chemicals systems. In his postdoc at Imperial, Stephen collaborated with experts in chemical engineering and technology & innovation management to holistically diagnose the UK’s Fine Chemicals Sector and develop recommendations for its future competitiveness and sustainability.
In his return to Bath as a Research Fellow, Stephen is developing an independent, multidisciplinary research programme aimed at designing and enabling net-zero industrial systems that are compatible with economic, societal, and environmental goals through industrial ecology-inspired chemical and process systems engineering. His current research interests include defossilised chemical systems, critical mneral recycling ecosystems, and community-led future integrated systems.
