Lucia Rigamonti is an environmental engineer graduated at Politecnico di Milano in 2003 cum laude (title of the thesis: Environmental assessment of energy recovery from waste). She accomplished in 2007 a PhD in Sanitary and Environmental Engineering with a thesis on the topic of Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) applied to different integrated municipal solid waste management systems. The thesis was awarded of the first prize in the competition Best thesis2008 organized by ORSA (Scuola di Alta Formazione Ambientale in Palermo). During the PhD she had been visiting the Columbia University (New York) in the Henry Krumb School of Mines.
She currently has a research contract (7/1/2015-6/1/2017) at the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering (DICA) of Politecnico di Milano on the project 'Urban mining for the recovery of resources: identification of new strategies toward a circular economy'. From 1/1/2011 to 31/12/2014 she was a researcher at DICA following the project 'MATER (Material and energy from waste)'. These activities follow four years of research grant (after the PhD, from 2007 to2010) on the project 'Environmental assessment of strategies for energy production'. In 2013 she spent three months at the research center Scion (Rotorua, New Zealand) in the team Clean Technologies (supervisor Kim McGrouther; Project: Development of a decision-making framework to manage technology development programmes within the BioResource Processing Alliance – BPA).
She won the Young Researcher Award LCA 2009, organized by the Italian Network on LCA.
She is member of the Technical Secretariat for the development of the Product Environmental Footprint Category Rules (PEFCR) for intermediate paper products in the context of the European Commission project 'Environmental Footprint Pilot Phase'. She founded the working group DIRE (Development and Improvement of LCA methodology: Research and Exchange of Experiences), inside the Italian Network on LCA, and she is member of the working group Management and treatment of waste of the Italian Network on LCA. She is part of the scientific board of the Italian Network on LCA and of the Research Centre MatER (Material & Energy from Refuse - http://www.mater.polimi.it/mater/en/).
She is professor for the university courses Sanitary - environmental engineering and Phenomenon of pollution (Politecnico di Milano: academic years 2012-1013, 2013-2014, 2014-2015). She gave invited lectures about LCA and waste management for the following university courses: Waste Management, University College Dublin, Ireland, February 2014; Bio-Energy and WasteTo-Energy technologies, Politecnico di Milano, academic years 2011-2012, 2012-2013, 2013-2014; Management and treatment of solid waste, Politecnico di Milano, academic years 2011-2012, 2012-2013, 2013-2014.
She has been supervisor of several bachelor and master degree theses on the subject of waste management and life cycle assessment.
She has been the project leader of some research projects stipulated between Politecnico di Milano and various organisations. Moreover, she has been involved in many other research Rigamonti Lucia – Curriculum vitae list of publications projects, about environmental and energy analyses and assessment of waste treatment and strategies. The most recent projects are the following ones: Activity of Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs) and implementation of the EPD process for carton board mills (for Reno de Medici SpA), Cost-Benefit Analysis of the Recycling of Packaging Waste (in collaboration with Istituto Superior Tecnico of Lisboa for the European Investment Bank), Life cycle assessmentapplied to the waste management system implemented in Lombardia Region: the GERLA project (for Regione Lombardia), Sustainable European Waste Systems “SEWAS” (in collaboration with Technical University of Denmark for CEWEP), Separation and recovery of metals and valorisation of bottom ashes from municipal waste combustion (for Consorzio Imballaggi Alluminio), Life cycle assessment of refuse derived fuel production and its co-combustion in Fusina plant in comparison with alternatives options (for Ladurner Ecologia).
She has authored over 100 publications, including more than 20 on ISI journals. She attended as speaker many international conferences. She is referee for different international scientific journals, such as The International Journal of Life Cycle Assessment, Journal of Cleaner Production, Waste Management, Waste Management & Research, Resources, Conservation & Recycling, Science of the Total Environment. She was nominated “Top reviewer of 2011” for the Waste Management journal.
