The winners of the 2023 AD and Biogas Industry Awards were revealed at a prestigious gala ceremony in Birmingham, UK, on 29th March. Run by the Anaerobic Digestion and Bioresources Association (ADBA) and the World Biogas Association (WBA), the Awards celebrate excellence and innovation in the global anaerobic digestion (AD) and biogas sector across 12 categories. Among the fifteen winners and thirteen highly commended, representing thirteen countries and four continents, women and women’s organisations were extremely well represented.
“Congratulations to this year’s winners and highly commended entries”, said Chris Huhne, ADBA chairman and host for the evening. The quality of the 2023 submissions made the task of the judges particularly difficult – this is reflected by the number of multiple winners in some categories – and we thank them for their dedication. Commiseration to those who did not receive a prize – they must however hold their heads up high and be proud of belonging to the crème de la crème in a vibrant and fast expanding industry. In a world in crisis, anaerobic digestion and biogas are offering mature solutions to climate change and energy and food security, with recent investments by global players signalling the growing recognition of its commercial viability as well. The future is bright for this sector so keep up the good work and we look forward to an even more successful Awards competition in 2024. ”
Charlotte Morton, WBA Chief Executive, added “This is a very special year as we received an unprecedented number of entries from over 20 countries reflecting the rapidly growing interest in this exciting global industry, which alone could deliver half of the Global Methane Pledge, one third of today’s global natural gas consumption, and a 10% reduction in total global greenhouse gas emissions.”
Our redaction was happy to notice a ‘Women in Biogas’ award among the categories. The award has been introduced in 2022 and was a huge success, according to a proud Ms. Morton: “The ‘Women in Biogas’ award introduced last year has once again been the most successful. I feel very passionate about this award and whilst ADBA and WBA are doing extremely well on that front, this is not the case for most of our industry. Yet, the evidence is clear that companies which embrace diversity perform better than those that do not, so we must campaign hard to attract more women into the sector. I am also delighted to see that the new ‘Research and Innovation’ award received numerous submissions, demonstrating the innovative nature of our industry. We were also proud to introduce the Education Campaign of the Year award – highlighting a critical factor in supporting the growth of the sector.”
“Congratulations to all our winners, highly commended and finalists. We thank everyone for your fantastic submissions and encourage you all to continue doing what you do to make our industry shine.”
The Women in Biogas award went to Kathy Puffer from Biogas Education Hub in Tillson, USA. NNFCC Limited’s Lucy Hopwood (York, UK), was ‘highly commended’ in this category. Kathy’s Biogas Education Hub was also highly commended in the Education Campaign of the Year class. The Brazilian Women in Biogas network Rede Mulheres do Biogas (Sao Paulo) was one of the AD Hero of the Year Award winners. Yadira Bajon Fernandez from Cranfield University (UK) was highly commended in this class. Finally, one of the winners of the Rising Star awards was Kristina Rabecaite from PPAYA (Lanarkshire, UK).
Source: ADBA press release
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