Speakers

André Evette (FRANCE)

André Evette is a researcher in restoration ecology at INRAE Grenoble (France) and is interested in nature-based solutions applied to riverbanks and riparian environments.
He conducts applied research programs and expert appraisals at national and international level on soil and water bioengineering in collaboration with managers. Working in partnership with researchers from other disciplines, he adopts an interdisciplinary approach combining ecology, hydraulics, engineering and social sciences.
His work aims to push back the limits of soil and water bioengineering, whether mechanical (slopes, flows, solid transport), climatic (alpine, tropical, drought), linked to herbivores (beavers, coypu) and invasive exotic plants, or to management practices.
It relies on experiments in laboratories, nurseries and canals, as well as on experimental works built with managers. It produces scientific articles as well as popularization articles, guides for managers, videos and podcasts.
He has leaded and participated to numerous national and international research programs and expert appraisals.

Andreu González (SPAIN)

Forestry Engineer from the University of Lleida and Agricultural Engineer from the Polytechnic University of Catalonia. Founder and director of the Mountain Forest Project / Bergwaldprojekt foundation. He has a background of sixteen years of experience in bioengineering works in mountain ravines and slope stabilization in the Pyrenees. His technical experience is based on the adaptation of bioengineering techniques from the Swiss Alps. His work focuses on involving and engaging civil society (rural and urban citizens, companies, technicians and public administrations) in promoting mountain ecosystems through direct action, training and dissemination.

Henning Günther (GERMANY)

Henning Günther studied landscape architecture at Dresden University of Technology, specializing in ecological watercourse development. He gained professional experience in the planning, implementation, and monitoring of revitalization measures for watercourses. As part of his doctoral studies, he investigated natural floating mats to research the processes responsible for buoyancy and floating and to develop and soil and water bioengineering construction method. This principle was recognized with the ECOMED Award in 2018.
Henning Günther now teaches and conducts research as a professor of landscape engineering at the Dresden University of Applied Sciences. In an international Erasmus Mundus master’s program, he teaches soil and water bioengineering topics and content together with an interdisciplinary team. His research focuses on the development of plant-based elements of green infrastructure for the design of urban waters and green spaces.
He is also a member of several societies, including the Soil and Water Bioengineering Society, the Swiss Association for Bioengineering and the Ecological Engineering Society.

Gianluigi Pirrera (ITALY)

Iengineer with an holistic approach combining technical expertise with sensitivity to sustainability and landscape. His experience ranges from SWB to Ecological Restoration. He developed expertise in technosoils with recycled materials for renaturalization and the fight against desertification. His most significant works includes consulting for the UN, managing LIFE Nature & LIFE Environment and environmental compensation for EXPO 2015. In 2024, he founded Biocity Soil & Water Bioengineering. A project from this company is currently exhibited at the 2025 Venice Biennale, confirming the importance of his work in the architectural and landscape debate. He currently serves on the EFIB Board, as a representative of AIPIN Italy, and on the board of SIEP-Iale for Landscape Ecology.

Federico Preti (ITALY)

Hydraulic Civil Engineer
Professor of Agricultural Hydraulics and Hydrological-Forest Systems at the University of Florence.
President of AIPIN (Italian Association for Naturalistic Engineering) and head of international cooperation at EFIB (European Federation of Bioengineering).
He has more than 300 scientific publications in the fields of environmental and agro-forestry hydraulics, particularly on erosion and sediment transport processes at the basin scale, among others.
He has extensive international experience, having participated in projects in Africa and Latin America.

Carla Rolo Antunes (PORTUGAL)

Biophysical Engineering (1993), Master in Hydraulics and Water Resources (1996) and PhD in Hydrology (2010). It is an Assistant Professor the University of Algarve since 2010.
From 1995 to 2010 she worked as an engineer at the company Hidroprojecto, Engenharia e Gestão, S.A., in the areas of Hydraulics, Water Resources, Spatial Planning and Environmental Studies.
Director of the Master’s Degree in Sustainable Management of Rural Areas and since 2021 she has been Vice-Director of the Faculty of Science and Technology of University of Algarve. Member of MED-Mediterranean Institute for Agriculture, Environment and Development and President of Portuguese Association of Natural Engineering (APENA).
She has developed her scientific activity in the area of water resources, soil and water conservation, river restoration and land use planning, being the author of several articles and book chapters on these topics.

Paola Sangalli (SPAIN)

Biologist from the University of Barcelona and Master’s in Landscape Architecture from the University of Valencia. Expert in Nature-based Solutions, ecological restoration, and Soil and Water Bioengineering (SWB).
Founding member and current President of the European Federation of Soil and Water Bioengineering  EFIB www.efib.org since 2016, Founding member and President from 1995 to 2016, and current Vice President of the  Spanish Association of Landscape engineering. AEIP www.aeip.org.es
Member of the Territorial   Council of the Basque Government since 2016.
Partner and manager of the landscaping and SWB studio Sangalli Coronel y Asociados SL, located in San Sebastian, www.sangallipaisaje.com, carrying out numerous urban and peri-urban park projects, urban adaptation to climate change, river restoration, hydrological-forestry restoration, and slope stabilisation, using SWB techniques.
Author of several publications, she has been an organizer and speaker at various national and international congresses, in training courses and workshops in several university master’s degrees in Spain and Latin America.

Massimiliano Schwarz (SWITZERLAND)

Massimiliano Schwarz is a professor of Forest Soil Science and Ecological Engineering at the Bern University of Applied Sciences (BFH), in the Department of Forestry. He completed his PhD at ETH Zurich with a thesis entitled “Hydro-mechanical Characterization of Rooted Hillslope Failure: From Field Investigations to Fiber Bundle Modeling.”
For over 15 years, his group has conducted applied research within national and international projects — most recently in Vietnam, New Zealand, and Norway — focused on quantifying the effects of vegetation on soil physical properties. These properties influence key processes such as soil water balance, runoff, surface erosion, shallow landslides, and bank erosion.
Over the years, the group has developed several modeling frameworks to quantify these processes using simple and cost-effective field methods suitable for practical applications. These models and methods form the basis of software tools designed for both professional practice and education, many of which are available on the EcorisQ platform (ecorisq.org).

Montserrat Solanelles (SPAIN)

Montserrat Solanelles Ubach, a forestry engineer, has developed her professional career in the fields of hydrology, nivology and restoration. He has been working in the Project Office of Forestal Catalana SA since 2003. He has drafted projects and directed bioengineering works throughout the Catalan Pyrenees, such as the hydrological-forestry correction in the mountain of Meranges (Cerdanya) or the restoration of the damage caused by torrential rains in the mountain of Sant Miquel (Ripollès). He has recently participated in the Spanish Forestry Congress, in the round table of the LOESS project and in the conference on forest soils of the CREAF-UAB. He has taught training in the specialization course in forestry and environmental construction management of the College of Forest Engineering of Catalonia.

Albert Sorolla (SPAIN)

Biologist. Technical director of Naturalea, a company founded in 1996 that specialises in landscape restoration and is a pioneer in the design and implementation of landscape bioengineering techniques and NBS.
Winner of the 2021 Juliano Sauli International Award for Landscape Bioengineering.
Specialist in the conservation and restoration of natural spaces and landscape bioengineering techniques with 28 years of experience in the sector. Director of more than 1,600 completed projects and more than 500 drafted projects.
Member of ESWEG: European Soil & Water Engineering Group.
Member of the management team of URL Urban River Lab. (urbanriverlab.com)
Founding partner of CIREF Iberian Centre for River Restoration. ADENC and CEEM. Former President and Treasurer of AEIP Spanish Association of Landscape Engineering.
Author of 15 scientific articles and various publications, including the book Conservación (Conservation) (2022), the bioengineering section of the CEDEX Manual of River Restoration Techniques (2008) and chapter 5 of the book: Los humedales mediterráneos: el contexto ambiental y social (Mediterranean Wetlands: The Environmental and Social Context). Fundación Biodiversidad (2011), as well as contributor to various NTJs.
Lecturer on specialised courses such as the Master’s Degree in Urbanism and Health at the UIC, contributor to various master’s degrees at the UB, the ETSAV and many other courses organised by the AEIP or the CIREF.

Rosemarie Stangl (AUSTRIA)

Full Professor of Soil Bioengineering and Landscape Construction at BOKU University and Deputy Head of Department for Landscape, Water and Infrastructure.
Research focus is on Nature-based Solutions and Green-blue Infrastructure for climate change adaptation. Advancing techniques in soil and water bioengineering, vegetation and plant-based technologies and sustainable landscape construction are the core of research and academic education with focus on application-based research, monitoring and quantification of system performance and circularity in landscape construction.

Gregor Šubic (SLOVENIA) 

Gregor Šubic is a Slovenian biologist from the University of Ljubiana. He has worked as a director of documentaries related to nature, forests and biodiversity with more than thirty-five titles to his credit. He is the son of a pioneer of bioengineering in hillside restoration, Franc Subic, who worked in Slovenia, Austria, Switzerland…. He is preparing a documentary on slope bioengineering in homage to his father and will present a part of this work in progress.