Free Appropriate Sustainability Technology (FAST) Research Group

I am co-chairing the Strategy, Techno-economics, and Sustainability track at ICAM this year Monday-Tuesday along with: Jaideep Bangal Ramona Fayazfar, Marius Lakomiec Asya Lou Arvind Rangarajan. Here is the line-up: Powder Sustainability: A Powder Manufacturer’s Perspective Yevgeni Brif, Powder as a Value Chain Lever for Productivity and Sustainability in Titanium AM Amir Nobari Jérôme Pollak Arslane Bouchemit Industrializing Circular Feedstocks: From Waste and Biomass to Scalable, Low-Carbon Additive Manufacturing Ramona Fayazfar, Additive Manufacturing's Contribution to Sustainability from a Production Support Perspective Asya Lou Arun Muley Gracio Lobo Dr. Bhavna Sharma Real Time Sustainability Assessment for Additive Manufacturing - A Digital Cradle to Gate Approach Faisal Iqbal Amar Patel Lampros-Gerasimos Giourntas The Application of Recycled Thermoplastic Materials in the Distributed Additive Manufacturing of Deck and Post Frame Building Footings Kevin McGuire Maryam Mottaghi Liam Stone Emily Bow Pearce, Riya Roy Alessia Romani Fatemeh Salami Ramona Fayazfar, Joshua Pearce Managing Laser Powder Bed Fusion Manufacturing for Scaled Production Tad Steinberg, Daniel Cassar Beyond “Print & Pray” - Predictable Quality with Less Material, Less Rework, Fewer Test Builds Huba Horompoly High-Speed Additive Manufacturing for Ground Transportation and Heavy Machinery: Deployment Pathways through Brake Discs, Rail Infrastructure Repair, and Hydraulic Cylinder Rods Oleg Raykis Simone Maffia Tobias Stittgen Area Printing: Architectural Scalability in Metal Additive Manufacturing for Industrial Production Andrew Bayramian Craig Coleman James DeMuth Bridging the Gap between Process Development and Production in Additive Manufacturing Joe Tucker Additive Manufacturing Creates Tremendous Value: Why are So Few Organizations Reaping the Rewards of that Value Creation? Brent Stucker Strategic Role and Position of AM In Line with Current Data Driven Innovation Marius Lakomiec Expanding the Additive Manufacturing Application Space through Lean Manufacturing Matt Tusz Reading the Policy Signal: How Legislative and Geopolitical Dynamics are Reshaping Market Structure and Strategic Opportunity in Advanced Manufacturing Mahdi Jamshid(nia) Revved Up but Stalled: A Tale of High Hopes and Low Volumes Ante Lausic, Additive Manufacturing at the Digital Frontier Edward D Herderick Standards Development towards Model Based Qualification of Metal 3D Printed Parts Guglielmo Vastola A Copilot for Additive Manufacturing Process Selection to Support Multi-Criteria Decision Making Stefania Cacace, Alessandro Capelli, Quirico Semeraro, Bianca Maria Colosimo ASME’s Initiatives Standardizing Advanced Manufacturing Methodologies and Practices Justin Cassamassino Building the Infrastructure for Scale: Digital Transformation, Standards and the Industrialization of Advanced Manufacturing Thomas Kelly SAFETY: BUILD a CULTURE between NONEXISTENT and DRACONIAN Kimberly Ziolkowski

Very excited to share that I have received an Honorable Mention for the 2026 MRS Bulletin Postdoctoral Publication Prize from the Materials Research Society (MRS)! Seeing my research in additive manufacturing, sustainable materials, and plastic upcycling recognized, together with my efforts in science communication, is something I am truly happy about. Making materials knowledge, tools, and technologies more open and accessible is an important part of why I do this work. This recognition feels meaningful to me because it brings together the work I developed during my years at Politecnico di Milano and the research I am pursuing today at Western University, two important chapters of my research journey. A special thank you to Marinella Levi and the Piulab team (Dipartimento di Chimica, Materiali e Ingegneria Chimica "Giulio Natta" - Politecnico di Milano), and to Valentina Rognoli (Department of Design - Politecnico di Milano) for their support and encouragement when I was at Politecnico di Milano as a research fellow and PhD researcher. I am also very grateful to Joshua Pearce and the Free Appropriate Sustainability Technology (FAST) Research Group (Faculty of Engineering at Western University) for their continued support, collaboration, and encouragement during my work as a postdoctoral associate. I would like to thank the MRS Bulletin selection committee for recognizing my work in the materials field. Congratulations to this year's prize recipient and to my fellow Honorable Mention recipients! More details about the prize and the honorable mention are available at: https://lnkd.in/g4if3Qew #MRSBulletin #MaterialsResearchSociety #MaterialsScience #AdditiveManufacturing #SustainableMaterials #ScienceCommunication

🎉 New Research Publication! I’m happy to share our latest research publication in the Journal of Sustainability Research. 📄 “Open-Source Machine Learning Framework for Fully Electrified Residential Load Prediction: A Temperature-to-kWh Model Using XGBoost ” This study presents an open-source XGBoost-based framework for accurate residential electricity load prediction, supporting smarter energy management and sustainable electrification. 🔗 Read the paper: https://lnkd.in/d42mbC2d A special appreciation to Shafquat Rana for leading this research and driving the work forward with great dedication. I’m also grateful to Joshua Pearce for providing valuable guidance, mentorship, and direction throughout the research. Proud to be part of this collaboration and excited to continue contributing to impactful research in AI, energy forecasting, and sustainability. 🌱🤖 Free Appropriate Sustainability Technology (FAST) Research Group LPU School of Computer Science Engineering Lovely Professional University #Research #Publication #MachineLearning #XGBoost #Sustainability #EnergyForecasting #ResearchCollaboration

ALLFED’s leaf protein research is part of our broader food-system resilience work: understanding how we can keep people fed if major disruptions affect food production, while examining approaches that may also have practical applications today. Our paper explores leaf protein concentrate (LPC) — a protein-rich ingredient made by extracting juice from leafy plants, separating the protein with heat, and drying it. It considers how integrated biorefineries could produce more food from existing farmland and grasslands, including in severe global food-system disruptions. This is not simply a laboratory concept. Green leaf protein has already been produced at industrial scale in Europe, while companies are now refining leaf proteins into Rubisco— the main protein in green leaves — for use in consumer food products and ingredients. (TIME recently profiled this emerging field: https://lnkd.in/drvPPQWq) Alongside this research, people can contribute through Citizen Science Project: the Leaf Protein Concentrate Experiment. Using safely identified leafy plants and ordinary household equipment, participants will test how much protein can be extracted outside a laboratory — helping build a clearer picture of what could be achieved in real-world conditions. 📄  Read the paper: https://lnkd.in/eJK5jAFh 🔬 Take part in the citizen-science project: https://lnkd.in/gAHVxqn5 #FoodSecurity #FoodSystemResilience #FoodInnovation #AlternativeProtein #CitizenScience #GlobalCatastrophicRisk Joshua Pearce Juan B. García Martínez. David Denkenberger

Excited to share that our latest article, “From fossil fuel infrastructure to sustainable land use: agrivoltaics on oil and gas pipelines in Alberta, Canada,” has been published in the Journal of Cleaner Production by Elsevier. This study explores how Alberta’s existing 60 m-wide oil and gas pipeline buffer corridors, land already disturbed and constrained for other uses, could be repurposed for agrivoltaic systems. Key findings: - Pipeline buffer corridors across Alberta could theoretically support up to 1,723 GW of fixed-tilt PV capacity, generating approximately 2,123 TWh of electricity annually - Estimates suggest the systems could generate enough electricity to exceed 30× Alberta’s current annual electricity demand - Agrivoltaic systems could achieve simple payback periods of approximately 11 years - Under high electricity-price assumptions, the 30-year electricity value could reach CAD $6.6 trillion, exceeding the projected CAD $5.2 trillion value of Alberta’s oil and gas sector over the same period - Agrivoltaic deployment could maintain agricultural production while generating approximately 5.69 million tonnes of wheat, including an additional 165,590 tonnes valued at ~CAD $1.6 billion annually, or support approximately 5.54 million sheep valued at ~CAD $1.0 billion - Over 30 years, the systems could potentially avoid up to 27,869 Mt of CO₂ emissions by displacing fossil-fuel-based electricity generation The broader finding is that existing fossil fuel infrastructure does not necessarily have to become stranded or remain an environmental liability. Pipeline corridors could potentially be transformed into productive landscapes that simultaneously generate clean electricity, support agriculture, create economic opportunities, and contribute to land restoration and climate mitigation. Special thanks to Hana Darvishi and Dr. Joshua Pearce for the support and insights throughout this research. Read the full article here: https://lnkd.in/gYyPuHpz Western University Faculty of Engineering at Western University Agrivoltaics Canada Free Appropriate Sustainability Technology (FAST) Research Group #Agrivoltaics #AgriPV #RenewableEnergy #SolarEnergy #EnergyTransition #SustainableAgriculture #CleanEnergy #ClimateMitigation #Alberta #Canada #FoodSecurity #LandUse #AgriculturalResilience #EnergySecurity #Sustainability #JournalOfCleanerProduction #Photovoltaics #FossilFuels