Natalia Yaremenko

Global Sales Director Electrodes & Corporate Marketing
Tokai Cobex

Natalia Yaremenko is the Global Sales Director Electrodes & Corporate Marketing at Tokai Cobex, responsible for Group Marketing and Global sales of Carbon Electrodes. She has 20 years of experience in World carbon and graphite industry in the areas of Sales, Marketing, PR and Product Development with expertise in carbon, graphite electrodes, cathode blocks and pastes. Holds an MBA Strategic Management Degree from Cal State East Bay University.

Estelle Tran

Steel Prices Analyst
CRU

Estelle Tran joined CRU as a steel and ferroalloy prices analyst in October 2017. Based in Pittsburgh, Estelle covers the US bulk ferroalloys market and is also the main contact for the data providers who contribute to the CRU Midwest flat roll indices. She started covering the US steel industry as an editor for S&P Global Platts in 2011, and over the years has covered the flat rolled steel, long steel, and primary aluminum markets as well as trade issues. Estelle has served as the president of the Pittsburgh Chapter of the Association of Women in the Metal Industries since 2017. She earned a B.A. in English writing and history from the University of Pittsburgh.

Greg Smart

Ferroalloys Prices Editor
CRU

Greg Smart manages the CRU ferroalloys pricing team and ensures that CRUs pricing service is reflective of the market, and as robust as possible. Before joining CRU, he worked in the pricing and analysis of various metal markets at S&P Global Platts, and Argus Media. Greg also worked in the research and trading of cobalt and cadmium metal at SFP Metals.

Sveinbjorn Finnsson

Senior Business Analyst
Landsvirkjun

Sveinbjörn Finnsson is a Senior Business Analyst at Landsvirkjun, the National Power Company of Iceland. Mr. Finnsson is responsible for monitoring and analyzing medium- to long-term trends in markets relevant to Landsvirkjun as well as supporting business development and PPA negotiations. Among the markets he focuses on are international power markets and markets in which the company’s international power intensive clients operate (e.g. silicon metal and aluminium producers). Landsvirkjun follows renewable trends and low-carbon policies in order to identify opportunities as a 100% renewable power company. Mr. Finnsson is an Engineer by training and earned an M.Sc. degree in Energy Science and Technology from ETH Zurich in Switzerland.

Ross Cunningham

Senior Cost Economist
CRU

Ross Cunningham joined CRU as a Cost Economist in early 2018, bringing technical experience from the oil and gas industry to this critical role. He manages CRU’s macroeconomic cost platform which covers 31 countries in-depth and is utilized in all of the cost models and cost curves that CRU provides to its clients across the metals, mining and fertilizer sectors. Prior to joining CRU in early 2018, Mr Cunningham worked as a Subsurface Consultant advising multinational oil companies on geological processes using advanced modelling software. He has also worked as a Geologist for an oil and gas operator, focussing on development geology. Mr Cunningham has an MSc in Petroleum Geoscience from the University of Aberdeen, Scotland and a BSc with Hons in Geosciences from the University of Edinburgh, Scotland.

Gregory Wittbecker

Senior Analyst
CRU

Greg Wittbecker is based in Pittsburgh. In this capacity he supports North American and Global fundamental aluminum analysis. Mr Wittbecker joined CRU in January 2018, following his retirement as Vice President, Industry Analysis, Alcoa. During his 14 years at Alcoa, he held director roles in analysis, logistics, recycling policy and corporate strategy. During 2016-2017, Mr Wittbecker was Managing Director of Alcoa China, Shanghai, where he led Alcoa’s comprehensive analysis of the Chinese upstream markets. Before joining Alcoa in 2003, he was Global Manager of Physical Metal Trading for Koch Supply & Trading. From 1988-2001, Mr Wittbecker served as Vice President, Wise Metals Group, responsible for risk management and primary metal trading. He began his career with Cargill Inc, holding a progression of operational and trading roles within grains, metals and ocean freight.

Alex Nielsen

President
Polchar

Alex Nielsen has since 1996 been the CEO & President of the Polchar group of Companies with factories in Poland producing specialized chemical carbon reductants (char) for the alloy industries, mainly FeSi & SiMetal. He has through this job obtained extensive knowledge on coal and coke uses worldwide, both in specialized niches and generally for power generation. He also has considerable knowledge on the various production processes for alloys.

Alan Crawford

Owner
Alan Crawford Consulting LLC

Alan Crawford is a chemical engineer (Bachelors of Engineering; Masters of Engineering) who has focused 29 years of his career on technology and operations for conversion of metallurgical grade silicon to trichlorosilane and methylchlorosilanes for production of polycrystalline silicon and silicones. He excels in root cause identification of complex industrial problems and implementation of improved process technology focused on reduction of operating costs. Alan has worked as an independent chemical engineering consultant since 2008 in the global polycrystalline silicon and silicone industries. He formerly worked for REC Silicon and GE Silicones. 

Jim May

Founder, Chief Operating Officer
Hi Test Sand Inc

Founder, Chief Operating Officer
Hi Test Sand Inc
EDUCATION- BS/MS Metallurgical Engineering and Materials Science Univ. of Michigan. MBA Sloan School of Business. WORK BACKGROUND – 10 years in GM cast iron foundries – metallurgist, supervision. 5 years with Foote Mineral in ferroalloys production – superintendent, plant manager. 20 years with Dow Corning – Silicon Tech. Director, Procurement Director, General Manager silicon businesses. CURRENT WORK since 2003 – Owner and operator of Midand Silicon Co., LLC, May Global Business Group INC., Midland Silicon Shanghai Trading Company (China) – Silicon and ferroalloys process technology., operations, sales and procurement. Founder and Chief Operating Officer of HiTest Sand Inc. - quartz mining, silicon plant development.
Agenda Title: Carbon emissions and sustainability considerations have become increasingly important...
Agenda Time: 15:45 - 16:10
Agenda Day: 09 November 2021

Arnoud R. Willems

Partner
Sidley Austin LLP

Arnoud R. Willems leads the EU trade and customs team and co-founded Sidley’s office in Brussels. Mr Willems represents the interests of companies in high-profile trade matters and advises clients on strategies for solving market access problems and resolving other disputes that affect their business. With respect to the latter, he is a leading advocate of companies challenging EU anti-dumping regulations, with an exceptional success rate in such cases before the national and European Courts. Since 2000, Mr Willems has been continuously involved in anti-dumping cases concerning ferroalloys like silicon, ferrosilicon, ferrochrome and silicon manganese.
Agenda Title: Trade restrictions have had a substantial impact on trade flows and silicon prices in individual markets...
Agenda Time: 13:40 - 14:05
Agenda Day: 09 November 2021

Dmitry Popov

Senior Coal Analyst
CRU

Dmitry Popov has worked across several metals areas for CRU, including global aluminium markets and copper costs modelling. He is currently the editor of Crude Steel Market Outlook, but also specialises in the analysis of CIS finished and semi-finished steel and metallics markets. Dmitry holds a BEng in Engineering with Business Finance and MSc in Finance.
Agenda Title: Global power supply issues
Agenda Time: 11:55 - 12:20
Agenda Day: 09 November 2021

Jim Brosnan

Principal
Silicon & Ferroalloy Consulting

After working as Commissioning Manager in the Submerged Arc Furnace Division of Mannesmann Demag for a number of years, Jim Brosnan joined SIMCOA Operations in 1990 after overseeing the commissioning of the silicon furnaces. Mr Brosnan held a number of roles at SIMCOA up until the end of 2012, including Smelter Manager, Technical Manager, General Manager Operations and Vice President. Since 2013, he has been working as an independent consultant, providing advisory services to existing producers and new projects in the silicon industry. These services include troubleshooting/ process optimisation for existing operations and project support from prefeasibility through to commissioning for new projects.