Sustainable HEP 2026 — 5th Edition

Meet the invited speakers and panellists

Keynote speech on a life working on climate change - Dr. Jagadish Shukla 

Jagadish Shukla is a Distinguished University Professor Emeritus at George Mason University (GMU) where he founded the Department of Atmospheric, Oceanic, and Earth Sciences, and the Climate Dynamics Ph.D. program.   His scientific contributions include studies of climate change, reanalysis, atmosphere - land interactions, deforestation, monsoon dynamics and predictability of weather and climate.He was a lead author of the IPCC report which shared the Nobel Peace Prize of 2007. He is a member of the Indian Prime Minister’s Council on Climate Change and was a member of the Climate Commissions of governors of Virginia. He and his wife founded Gandhi College in the village of his birth in India for the education and empowerment of women.

Plenary talk on sustainability of gaseous gas detectors - Prof. Archana Sharma 

Archana Sharma is a distinguished Indian physicist and senior scientist at the CERN in Geneva, Switzerland. She is a member of the CMS collaboration and is internationally recognized for her work in instrumentation and gaseous detectors, specifically for her pioneering work on micro-pattern gaseous detectors. She received the Pravasi Bharatiya Samman Award in 2023 for her contribution in science and technology.

Plenary talk on Sustainability and the European Particle Physics Strategy Update - Ben Shepherd 

Ben Shepherd is the group leader of the Magnetics and Radiation Sources Group, and chairs ASTeC's Sustainable Accelerators Task Force. He has over 20 years of experience designing, building and testing novel magnetic systems for accelerators. He is passionate about sustainability and is keen to ensure that we build and operate future accelerators in the most efficient way possible.

Plenary talk on the sustainability of food systems - Dr Juan Pablo Cordero Garayar 

Juan Pablo is a data scientist with a PhD in Astrophysics from The University of Manchester, and has previously worked in large international scientific collaborations such as the Dark Energy Survey and the SkyPy collaboration. Since then he has transitioned towards environmental research, and particularly, the greenhouse emissions from food systems and socioeconomic impacts of reducing their environmental footprint. His current research focuses on the development of open source predictive models to promote transparent food policy-making. This includes developing interactive tools such as the Future Food Calculator, which bridge the gap between researchers and policy makers. He is currently part of the "Backcasting to Achieve Food Resilience in the UK" project (BAFR-UK) where he co-develops models of in-crisis food systems and the required strategies to achieve environmental and socio economic goals under external shocks and crises

From HEP to Sustainability: A panel discussion on career trajectories of particle physicists in the climate science and beyond

Dr. André Schneider - Chairman of World Climate Foundation

André Schneider plays a leading role in shaping international sustainability agendas as Chairman of the World Climate Foundation and through senior positions with Global Infrastructure Basel and Airports Council International. As CEO of Genève Aéroport, he led the Net Zero 2037 roadmap, ensured resilience through the COVID-19 crisis, and strengthened global connectivity. Earlier in his career, he built a strong technical foundation at IBM and CERN, where he contributed to the development of the first European supercomputer for high-energy physics simulations, alongside earning a PhD in Computer Science. He later spent 12 years at the World Economic Forum, helping to build and globalize its multi-stakeholder platform. Bridging public and private sectors, he focuses on aligning environmental responsibility with economic performance.

Laura Bianchi - Sustainability Officer

Laura has a background in mechanical engineering and began her career at CERN’s engineering department, where she spent five years working on thermophysical analysis and advanced mechanical sensors. Driven by a lifelong ambition to contribute to a more sustainable world, she resumed her studies in 2021 to specialize in environmental management. She started a new career in sustainability, first within the plastics industry and later as a consultant in Swiss Romandie. Since June 2025, Laura has worked as Sustainability Officer in the machine tools sector.

 

Dr. James Robinson - Engineering lead for Environmental Forecasting at the Turing Institute

James is a Lead Research Software Engineer at the Alan Turing Institute. He is passionate about increasing the impact of research by making it reproducible and reusable through the application of software engineering best practices. He has a PhD in particle physics and, prior to joining the Turing, spent ten years as part of the ATLAS collaboration at CERN. James has worked across all the strategic research areas at the Turing, on projects ranging from air quality prediction and statistical sampling toolkits to identifying online misinformation. He previously led the trusted research team, developing research platforms for securely analysing sensitive data, and is still a co-chair of the UK Trusted Research Environment community. He is currently one of the engineering leads for Environmental Forecasting where he has applied state-of-the-art AI techniques to numerical weather prediction, solar nowcasting and sea ice forecasting.

Lia Formenti - Junior Toolchain Developer GHGSAT (Methane emissions mapping)

Lia has a Master's in high energy physics from McGill University, where she characterized 54 small-strip thin gap chambers now installed in the ATLAS experiment at CERN. Honoured to have worked with so many international collaborators on such a large-scale project, she nonetheless looked outside of particle physics and academia for a position that would allow her to tackle more immediate problems in sustainability. This led her to GHGSat, a company that does greenhouse gas monitoring with satellites and aircraft, where she started as a software developer in 2023.    Lia also loves to participate in science outreach. She spent two years organizing online events for secondary students across Canada while working at Let's Talk Science. She still participates in science outreach events every chance she gets.

Dr. Raluca Crucera - Information Systems Officer - UNEP

Raluca is an Information Systems Officer at UNEP, where she leads the development of InforMEA, the United Nations portal on Multilateral Environmental Agreements. She began her career at CERN as a Technical Student in the Engineering Department while completing her Computer Science degree at the University of Manchester. After graduation, she returned to CERN and joined the ALICE experiment as a Full-Stack Software Engineer, developing large-scale data analysis systems for the global particle physics community. Today, she applies her experience in scientific computing, data management, and international collaboration to support environmental governance and sustainability initiatives. Alongside leading digital platform development, she works closely with environmental convention secretariats, governments, UN agencies, and partner organizations, supporting knowledge exchange through workshops, capacity-building activities, international events, and multilateral cooperation.