Lucy is a Senior Consultant at NNFCC. She has been working in the
bioeconomy for 13 years, of which the last 5 have been at NNFCC. Lucy has a
broad knowledge of the bioeconomy and her expertise is in industrial
biotechnology (IB), anaerobic digestion (AD) and sustainability.
Lucy supports UK AD plants with regulatory compliance and maintains
NNFCC’s UK biogas and biomethane greenhouse gas calculator, keeping up to date with regulatory developments including RED II. She
also provides advice to potential investors and policy makers on biomethane
markets, feedstocks, supply chains, digestate management and sustainability. As
a fluent German speaker, Lucy also has a good knowledge of AD and biogas policy
and technology in Germany and other German-speaking countries.
Lucy’s knowledge of carbon accounting goes beyond AD and she carries out
life cycle analysis (LCA) for various biobased products, particularly those
derived from IB. She is proficient in SimaPro LCA software and familiar with ecoinvent
and other relevant lifecycle inventory databases.
Lucy has also carried out a range of market research projects on biotech-derived
products such as muconic acid, itaconic acid and L-cysteine, as well as biomass-extracted
polymers such as gelatine and latex.
Lucy has a special-interest area in innovative food and food
ingredients, particularly when derived from biotech. This includes a focus on processing
technologies used for making food and food ingredients, feedstocks and
sustainability for innovative foods, and market issues around regulation and
voluntary labelling schemes.
Prior to working at NNFCC, Lucy spent 6 years working in research in
Austria, at the Austrian Centre for Industrial Biotechnology (acib GmbH) and
BOKU University. Her research topics included C1 gas fermentation, enzymatic
degradation of lignocellulose, anaerobic digestion, and the flow behaviour of
fibre-rich slurries. Lucy has a bachelor’s degree in Biotechnology from the
University of Edinburgh and a master’s degree in Biochemical Engineering from
University College London (UCL).
Recent projects
- Evaluation of the potential supply of
biomethane for transport uses in Scotland.
- Market review of AD feedstocks and digestate
in Europe (for a gas-infrastructure company).
- Lifecycle analysis (LCA) of a novel [fermentation-derived] single-cell
protein made using CO2 as a carbon source (for a technology
developer).
- RHI application support – helped AD plants
apply for RHI tariffs prior to its closure in 2021, carried out due
diligence for scheme.
- AD GHG reporting – regular reporting of
greenhouse gas emissions from biogas feedstocks to ensure compliance with
RHI / FIT.
- Marketing restrictions on GMM-derived food
ingredients – determined food safety and food labelling issues for food
ingredients made from GM microorganisms (for a technology developer).
Lucy co-ordinates NNFCC’s involvement in the WASTE2FUNC project, a
BBI-JU Demo project focussed on using IB to convert waste into biosurfactants
and lactic acid as functional ingredients. In this project, NNFCC is evaluating
feedstock availability, researching market segments for biosurfactants and
lactic acid, and investigating barriers to market uptake of waste-derived ingredients,
co-ordinating specific focus groups on these topics. NNFCC will develop full
business cases in support of deploying large-scale flagship plants for these
products.