1. Prof. Kazuo YAMAMOTO

Professor Emeritus, The University of Tokyo
Professor, Research and Development Initiative, Chuo University
Visiting Professor, Kindai University
President, Water Reuse Promotion Center, Japan

Presentation topic: Membrane technologies for used water management in a fast changing world

2. Prof. Chang-Ping Yu

Professor, National Taiwan University, Taiwan

Presentation topic: Plant Microbial Fuel Cells for Remediation of Metal Contaminated Soils and Valorization of Plant Biomass

3. Prof. Ken KAWAMOTO

Professor, Graduate School of Science and Engineering, Saitama University

Presentation topic: Emerging Role of Geoenvironmental Engineering for Developing Appropriate Technologies on Environmental Pollution Control and Infrastructure Development

Prof. Ken Kawamoto currently works at the Graduate School of Science and Engineering, Saitama University, Japan. He received his Ph.D from the University of Tokyo in 2002. He has specialized in the research areas of Geoenvironmental Engineering, Material cycles and waste management, and Soil Science.

When considering his research carrier, Prof. Ken Kawamoto worked as a Research Associate from year 1997 to 2007, at the Faculty of Engineering, Saitama University, and worked as an Associate Professor from year 2007 to 2012. He was also a Visiting Assistant Professor at Aalborg University, Denmark, from year 2006 to 2007 and was a Visiting Professor at University of Philippines-Diliman, Philippines, in year 2009. Currently, he is a Visiting Professor at National University of Civil Engineering in Vietnam.

Prof. Kawamoto supervised more than 40 Master students and 10 PhD students for their dissertation works. He published research outcomes in academic journals and has more than 80 international peer-reviewed journal papers and 300 conference proceedings papers. He was awarded as Outstanding Research Award from Japanese Society of Agricultural Engineering in 2005, Saitama University President’s Award in 2007 and 2018, and many best paper awards from Japanese and international conferences.

Due to his expertise in the research areas, Prof. Kawamoto was appointed as a JICA expert in Sri Lanka, Vietnam, and East Timor. From year 2011 to 2016, he worked as the principal investigator of the JST-JICA SATREPS Project in Sri Lanka. Currently, he is the project manager of SATREPS Project in Vietnam on Construction and Demolition Waste Management and Recycling, and also a visiting Professor of National University of Civil Engineering, Vietnam.

4. Prof. Nguyen Viet Anh

Professor, National University of Civil Engineering

Director, Istitute of Environmental Science and Engineering (IESE)

Vice President, Vietnam Association of Civil Engineering Environment (VACEE)

Head of Science and Technology Department, Vietnam Water Supply and Sewerage Asociation (VWSA)

Presentation topic: Selection of Appropriate Water and Wastewater Technologies for Urban and Indurstrial Areas in Vietnam

Professor, Dr. Viet-Anh Nguyen is the Director, Institute of Environmental Science and Engineering (IESE), National Civil Engineering University, Vietnam. He has about 23 years’ experience in the field of water and wastewater engineering, spending number of efforts in research and development of efficient water supply, low-cost decentralized sanitation systems, sludge and fecal sludge management and resource recovery, appropriate for the developing countries. 

Professor Nguyen has experiences in water sector capacity building, and strong national and international networking. He acts as a resource person for a number of international organizations working in the water and environment field.

Professor Nguyen has been involved in a number of water and wastewater projects with a role of project planning and design consultant, project appraisal and evaluation expert, construction/installation/training and technology transfer manager. He has been also working on water sector policy development, preparation of sector design standards.

Professor Nguyen has published about 30 papers published in prestigious/high indexed international journals, 90 papers in national journals, 14 textbooks, monographs and reference materials. He has been awarded with 5 patents, and some medals/awards.

 5. Prof. Kazuichi Hayakawa

Emeritus Professor, Institute of Nature and Environmental Technology, Kanazawa University

Presentation topic: Comparison of Atmospheric Pollution of Beijing and Kanazawa Caused by Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons and Nitropolycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons

Kazuichi Hayakawa was born in 1950 in Japan. He received his B.S. degree in 1974 from the University of Tokyo. In 1977, he withdrew from the Graduate School of Pharmaceutical Sciences at the University of Tokyo and joined the Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences of Kanazawa University as an Assistant Professor. He received his Ph.D. degree in 1982 from the University of Tokyo. In 1986-1987, he studied at Kansas University as a postdoctoral fellow, USA under the supervision of late Professor Takeru Higuchi, and then returned back to Kanazawa University to continue his research. He was promoted to Professor in 1997 and served as the leader of the 21^st Century COE Program in 2002-2006. He has been honored with the Academic Prize from the Japan Society of Atmospheric Environment in 2011, the Award from the Japan Society of Analytical Chemistry in 2013, the Award from the Pharmaceutical Society of Japan and the Award from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, Japan. He retired in 2016 and after then continuing his research as Professor Emeritus. His research interests include development of environmental chemicals such as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons and its application to the study of their environmental behaviors and toxicities.

 6. Dr. Eldon Raj

Department of Environmental Engineering and Water Technology, UNESCO-IHE Institute of Water Education, Delft, The Netherlands

Presentation topic: Biological processes for waste-gas and wastewater treatment: Performance and neural network modelling

 Eldon R. Rene is currently working as a Senior Lecturer at IHE-Delft, Institute of Water Education, The Netherlands. Eldon’s broad research interests are related to the development of biological treatment processes for wastewater and waste-gas treatment, resource recovery, and the use of artificial intelligence tools for environmental monitoring and environmental process control. He has published 3 books, more than 190 research/review articles in scientific journals, 38 book chapters, ~140 conference papers and 7 monographs. As a part of his educational campaign and capacity building activities on improving scientific writing and communication skills for non-English speaking students, he regularly conducts scientific writing workshop at all the major conferences. Since 2015, he has conducted these workshops to more than 2250 MS, PhD students, as well as early career staff members from Asian countries. He is also affiliated as a life member at the International Forum on Industrial Bioprocesses (IFIBiop).  

 7. A/Prof. Ikuro Kasuga

Professor, Department of Urban Engineering, The University of Tokyo.  

Professor, Environmental Engineering Program, Vietnam-Japan University

Presentation topic: Drinking Water Quality Management After Treatment: Risks of Microbial Regrowth in Distribution System and Premise Plumbing

8. Prof. Yasui HIDENARI

Professor, Faculty of Environmental Engineering, The University of Kitakyushu 

Lecturer, Vietnam Japan University, Hanoi, Vietnam

Presentation topic: Case study: Integration of kinetic modelling and microbial population dynamics

 Professor Hidenari Yasui has more than 25-year professional experience in a Japanese engineering company as a principal engineer for wastewater, solid waste and water treatments. He has more than 100 patents and almost 100 peer-reviewed papers in the fields, which are engaged with arious kinds of cutting-edge treatment systems and theories. His research interests are in mathematical modelling, biological wastewater & sludge treatments (Activated sludge, Anaerobic digestion), minimisation of sludge production and enhanced energy recovery processes from anaerobic systems. He is also interested in developing user-demand technologies for industrial wastewater treatments.

Professor Hidenari Yasui has been actively involved in international projects, especially Vietnam since he moved to the university in 2008. Since then he invited over 30 Vietnamese students and cumulatively 20 Vietnamese professors to his laboratory for short, mid and long-term trainings (despatched from Hanoi University of civil engineering, VNU-Hanoi University of science, Danang University of science and technology and VAST IET Hanoi). In addition to this, he supervised many Vietnamese students at his laboratory from 2008 until present (2 doctor course students, 2 master course students and 2 undergraduate students). The 2 doctor course students appreciated to receive full scholarship from his projects whilst the 2 master course students obtained his continuous financial support or JP governmental full scholarship (JICA and MEXT) thanks to his attractive arrangement. He also successfully allocated the JP governmental full scholarships to other 5 Vietnamese students at his graduate school on water science and biological technology.

He has more than 30 contracts for joint project and consulting with JP government, JP municipalities, industries and overseas universities. For Vietnam he built MOUs to exchange human resources and technologies with IESE HUCE, CETASD-HUS, VAST IET Hanoi, Danang Univ. and VNU. Nine out of which projects are closely relating to Vietnam, and about JPY60,000,000 has been invested for 8 years. One of the most successful outcome was a development of low-cost municipal wastewater treatment process using modified trickling filter, which was jointly demonstrated and evaluated with Vietnamese universities and a JP engineering company, leading to remarkable saving of operating cost. This alternative system to conventional activated sludge processes is soon built in a new wastewater treatment plant in Hoi An by JICA fund.

During the above researches he was aware of the distinct Vietnamese municipal wastewater characteristics from those in developed countries (low BOD and high N due to continuous urban developments and presence of septic tank systems), which resulted in wrong/inappropriate design calculations by consultancies. To tackle the challenge, he initiated a new project to list typical Vietnamese wastewater constituents using an integrated mathematical model developed by his pioneering work in 2000s. Once the pollutant concentrations are expressed in mathematical manner, accurate prediction of effluent qualities in any kinds of biological treatments including wastewater, drinking water and organic sludge becomes feasible. In addition to this, the technique makes it possible to perform systematic selection of appropriate technologies. He believes that this approach surely assists the sustainable development of Vietnam to protect water environment.

 9. Dr. Luong THi Mai Huong

Hitachi Zosen Coporation

Presentation topic: Waste to Energy (WTE): A sustainable approach for developing country from the experience of Hitachi Zosen