UK Institute of Materials announces Dr Colin Church as new Chief Executive
August 13, 2018
Dr Colin Church will take up the position as Chief Executive of IOM3 late this year (Courtesy Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining)
Following the announcement of current Chief Executive Dr Bernie Rickinson’s end-of-2018 retirement from the UK’s Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining (IOM3), the trustees of the institute have announced the recruitment of Dr Colin Church as its new Chief Executive. Dr Church, currently Chief Executive of the Chartered Institution of Wastes Management (CIWM), is expected to take up the position towards the end of 2018 to ensure a smooth handover.
Dr Church holds a PhD in Organic Chemistry and has been Chief Executive of CIWM since 2016. He is also Chair of the Circular Economy Task Force, a Trustee of the CHEM Trust, and has been a member of the Newcastle Waste Commission. Previously, he served as Director, Environmental Quality in the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra). His responsibilities in this role included an involvement in the government’s policy decisions on adaptation to a changing climate, air quality, chemicals, industrial pollution prevention, local environment quality, nanomaterials, noise, ozone-depleting substances, pesticides, resource efficiency/waste and sustainable procurement.
He is said to have been responsible for encouraging the government’s support for waste infrastructure development, and to have led Defra on climate change mitigation. He has also previously served as a non-executive director of WRAP, the waste reduction and resource efficiency body, and worked as Director, National Climate Change in the Department for Energy and Climate Change (DECC) where he is said to have overseen the setting of the fourth UK carbon budget, implementation of the second and negotiation of the third phase of the EU Emissions Trading System, and the introduction of the Carbon Reduction Commitment.
In 2010-11, he jointly led a successful effort to reduce central government carbon emissions by 10% in twelve months, and was a non-executive director of the Carbon Trust, the carbon reduction and resource efficiency body. In 2002-06 he led the UK team negotiating the revised EU chemicals regime (REACH), culminating in an agreement to the common position under the UK Presidency in 2005. While leading the EU delegation in international chemicals negotiations during this time, he further oversaw the procurement of a new approach to tackling fuel poverty and created the holding company Nirex CLG to deal with long-term radioactive waste management issues.
