Chem4Energy 2025

Keynote speakers (confirmed to date) 

Prof. James Darkwa

James Darkwa holds a BSc (Hons) degree in chemistry from Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (Ghana) and a PhD in chemistry from University of New Brunswick (Canada). He has spent the better part of his academic career in South Africa and is currently on a post-retirement contract as Professor of Chemistry at University of Johannesburg.

His research over the years has focused on late transition metal complexes as catalysts and as metallodrugs. From 2017 to 2022 he was employed as Lead Researcher at the Botswana Institute for Technology Research and Innovation, where he led a team to develop hydrometallurgical processes to beneficiate copper-nickel concentrate to high purity battery grade salts.

University of Johannesburg, South Africa
(https://www.uj.ac.za/members/james-darkwa/)

Prof. Jan Philipp Hofmann

Technical University of Darmstadt, Germany
(https://www.mawi.tu-darmstadt.de/of/das_fachgebiet_of/of_team/of_mitarbeiter_details_115456.en.jsp)

Prof. Graham Hutchings

Cardiff University, UK 
(https://profiles.cardiff.ac.uk/staff/hutch) 

Prof. Khomotso Maenetja

Khomotso Portia Maenetja is an Associate Professor of Physics at the University of Limpopo based at the Materials Modelling Centre. She obtained her PhD (Physics) in 2017 at the University of Limpopo. In her MSc, she was granted a student exchange programme award to do her research at University College London (UCL). She is also the recipient of the ESRC-NRF Newton collaborative research grant whilst she was starting her Post doc research at Cardiff University. When she started her job as a Senior Researcher, she was awarded the NRF Thuthuka Grant based on an innovative research concept that was designed to unravel the surface interactions on discharge products in metal-air batteries with RuO¬2.  

Prof Maenetja’s focus area is in, energy storage materials, using computational methods. She has been working on enhancing oxygen reduction reaction and oxygen evolution reaction in metal-air batteries and currently working surface studies in cathode materials in Li-ion batteries aiming to improve cycling performance of secondary Li-ion batteries and preventing Manganese dissolution. Prof Maenetja is a recipient of several recognitions, amongst them, as one of the Inspiring Top 50 Women in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (2021). She is the founding member and a chairperson of Women in High-Performance Computing (WHPC-SA).

University of Limpopo, South Africa 
(https://za.linkedin.com/in/khomotso-maenetja-a2050552)

Dr Thelma Ngwenya

Mintek, South Africa 
(https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Thelma-Ngwenya)
(https://za.linkedin.com/in/thelma-ngwenya-phd-wits-62590a153)

Prof. Richard Catlow 

University College London & UK Catalysis Hub, UK 
(https://www.ucl.ac.uk/chemistry/people/richard-catlow)

Programme 

Information on the full programme will be available soon.