Researcher

Gwenny Thomassen

Research Expertise (University of Antwerp):My expertise consists of the integrated environmental and economic analysis of new technologies. During my doctoral research, I integrated two methods, being the techno-economic analysis and the life cycle analysis into one new method. This method has been tested on multiple case studies of microalgal-based biorefineries. With this method, an accompanying framework was designed to enable the application during each stage of technology development, ranging from the first idea until final market commercialisation. This method has been further extended with a multi-objective optimalisation, in which the optimal value chains for both the economic and environmental potential have been identified. During my postdoctoral research, I will focus on technologies who have just entered the market. These new technologies are still expensive and have a high environmental impact compared to established technologies. This can be explained by the learning curve these technologies still need to experience, in which the efficiency of the production of the technology will still increase. In my research, I study these learning effects to investigate how these learning effects contribute to the economic and environmental potential of a new technology. Here, I focus in specific on circular technologies.

Keywords (University of Antwerp):BIOBASED ECONOMY, INVESTMENT ANALYSIS, TECHNOLOGY ASSESSMENT, LIFE CYCLE ASSESSMENT, MICRO ALGAE, Economics and applied economics
Keywords (Ghent University):Learning effects, Environmental Sustainability, Environmental impact assessment, Circular economy, Waste management, Material flow analysis, Sustainability, Life Cycle Assessment

Disciplines (University of Antwerp):Environmental impact and risk assessment, Life cycle engineering, Agricultural and natural resource economics, environmental and ecological economics
Disciplines (Ghent University):Environmental impact and risk assessment, Environmental engineering modelling, Sustainable development, Natural resource management, Agricultural and natural resource economics, environmental and ecological economics

Research techniques (University of Antwerp):Environmental techno-economic assessment, life cycle analysis, techno-economic analysis, multi-objective optimalisation, programming in Excel, programming in Matlab

Users of research expertise (University of Antwerp):Technology developers, policy makers