Solid Waste Management for Resource-efficient Systems: Circularity in Action

Richa Singh is currently working with the Centre for Science and, New Delhi, as a Deputy Programme Manager in the municipal solid waste division. She has completed her doctoral research at the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, India, on management strategies and technologies for municipal solid waste and hazardous wastes, focusing on converting wastes into green construction products for gainful applications. She holds a master’s degree, with a gold medal, in Environmental Science and Technology from Banaras Hindu University. She has worked with Ramky Enviro Engineers Limited (a hazardous waste management firm in India) as an Assistant Manager at their hazardous waste treatment, storage, and disposal facility in Indore before joining her Ph.D. At CSE, she has been engaged in research and advocacy related to solid waste management in India and actively working on establishing a sustainable solid waste management system in Asian and African countries. She has conducted various roundtables, seminars, workshops, and training programmes for the officials of urban local bodies across India and Africa.

Dr. Sanjeeb Mohapatra works as a Marie Skłodowska Curie Postdoctoral (MSC) Fellow at the Faculty of Civil Engineering and Geosciences, Delft University of Technology, The Netherlands. Prior to this position, he worked as a Postdoctoral Research Scientist at the National University of Singapore. His research interest broadly covers the monitoring of emerging contaminants (ECs), photoelectrochemical (PEC) degradation of ECs, the role of dissolved organic matter in deciding the fate of such contaminants, and the circular economy approach to wastewater treatment. He is a recipient of the Water Advanced Research Innovation (WARI) Fellowship awarded by the Department of Science and Technology (DST), India, University of Nebraska Lincoln, USA, Daugherty Water for Food Global Institute (DWFI), USA, and Indo-U.S. Science and Technology Forum (IUSSTF). He is a recipient of the Newton-Bhabha Fellowship jointly awarded by DST, India, and British Council, U.K. He is also a recipient of the DST-INSPIRE fellowship offered by DST, India.

Dr. Jong obtained her PhD in Environmental Engineering at Newcastle University, United Kingdom (2019). Her research straddles sustainable management of anthropogenic wastes and environmental quality assessment. She completed a PhD thesis focusing on low-energy wastewater treatment technology for decentralised application, especially suited for application in low-middle-income countries, where waste treatment is not universal. She launched her career at the National University of Singapore, working as a postdoctoral researcher under the NUS Environmental Research Institute. Here, she expanded her area of research to studying marine plastics and microplastics, including field occurrence, ecotoxicity in exposed biological systems, and fate of plastic-bound co-contaminants (e.g., antibiotics and organic compounds). Some of Dr. Jong’s international achievements include: 1) “Top 10 finalist for the Young scientist Awards” at the 27th SETAC-Europe Conference, Brussels (2017); 2) awardee for the 1st Cohort of National PhD Training Programme (Medical Research Foundation) in Antimicrobial Resistance Research, UK (2018); and 3) the invited keynote speaker for the United Nations World Antimicrobial Awareness Week’s webminar (2021). She actively enhancing and contributing her research knowledge by reviewing manuscripts, acting as independent reviewer for international journals including Water Research, Cleaner Waste Systems, Journal of Hazardous Materials, and Marine Pollution Bulletin. Presently, she has been selected as the intern editor for the journal “Reviews of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology”. Dr. Jong joined the Tsinghua Shenzhen International Graduate School in October 2022, as an assistant professor.