Speakers

Ben van Beurden became Chief Executive Officer of Royal Dutch Shell plc with effect from 1 January 2014.

He joined Shell in 1983, after graduating with a Master’s Degree in Chemical Engineering from Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands.

Ben’s career in Shell spans both Upstream and Downstream activities. He has held a number of operational and commercial roles, including some 10 years in the LNG business, as well as a variety of positions in Downstream, and has been based in The Hague, Sudan, Malaysia, London and Houston.

In January 2005, Ben became Vice President Manufacturing Excellence (Houston, United States of America). In this role he was responsible for standards in operational excellence and high-performance initiatives in refining and chemicals manufacturing.

In December 2006, he was appointed Executive Vice President Chemicals (London, United Kingdom). During his tenure in this role, Ben was appointed to the boards of a number of leading industry associations including the International Council of Chemicals Associations and the European Chemical Industry Council.

Ben became a member of the Executive Committee in January 2013 as Downstream Director, with regional responsibility for Europe and Turkey.

In 2015, he became a member of the Advisory Board of the School of Economics and Management Tsinghua University in Beijing.

Ben, a Dutch citizen, is married to Stacey and has three daughters and a son. He enjoys reading, running and travelling with his family.

Ms Monika Bieri has joined the Solar Energy Research Institute of Singapore (SERIS) in 2014 as a research associate within the Solar Energy System Cluster to enhance the team with her utility and finance background. Her expertise is in economic viability assessments of renewable energy applications and fundamental power market analysis including future power price scenario modelling.

Before joining SERIS, Monika was responsible for covering the European power sector for the fixed income team at UBS Global Asset Management for nine years. This provided her in depth knowledge for fundamental analysis of power markets and forming investment recommendations to portfolio managers for water, gas and electricity companies. She got here bachelor degree of economics in 1999 at the University of Applied Science in Business Administration in Zurich, Switzerland, finished the Chartered Financial Analysist (CFA) in 2003 and completed the executive programme ‘Diploma of Advanced Studies in Renewable Energy Management (REM-HSG)’ at the University of St. Gallen in 2013.

Dirk Biermann, born in 1969, is a member of the management board of 50Hertz and holds the position Chief Officer Markets and System Operations since April 2012. Before he was appointed, he headed the Energy Management department in the company with responsibility for the energy business like market design, congestion management, ancillary services and renewables. After his PhD studies at RWTH Aachen, Dirk Biermann started his carrier at former VEAG in 1999. In 2002 he changed to Vattenfall Europe where he was appointed as a manager with the responsibility for grid strategy in 2004.  

Dirk Biermann is member of the supervisory boards of EEX in Leipzig and TSCNET in Munich and member of the board of Coreso in Brussels.

Mr. Bishoen has over 15 years of extensive experience in energy supply chains. From 2013 onwards, he developed a LNG-driven revenue model for Tangshan Caofeidian Development Investment Group (asset base in excess of USD 20 bln). In its 2015 report, the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences identified Caofeidian Industrial Zone as the preferred area for the development of a Chinese energy trade & delivery hub for North East Asia.

His advisory portfolio exists out of Ambassadors (country related strategy implementation), State-Owned and Private Enterprises (value chain optimization/ energy security / activating dormant value of assets) and guiding senior management.

Currently, Mr. Bishoen is developing an evolutionary gas-based industry model in China, which involves creating turn-around strategies for different asset bases in the international energy chain.

With a wide variety of experiences from financing, supply chain security & designing industrial zones to other parts of the energy value chain, Mr. Bishoen is in the unique position to engage in large scale projects. Due to his expertise he has been a frequently invited speaker at global energy events such as PowerGen – Financial Forum, Singapore International Energy Week, CWC Global LNG Series, International Forum for Clean Energy, and the Global Forum for Energy Security. He even addressed the Chinese Energy Security on CCTV 9.