Sustainable and Innovative Natural Resource Management Ghent University

Overview

The increasing demand for raw materials, their price volatility, the production concentration and the market distortions imposed by some countries, confront Europe and other world regions with a number of challenges along the entire value chain. To tackle this supply risk challenge and to deal with environmental problems arising from too large emissions of waste (such as CO2), technological innovation is required with respect to exploration of new resources and sustainable primary mining, sustainable use of resources in specific products and production processes (e.g. substitution of critical metals in materials), prevention of waste generation, valorisation of secondary (alternative) resources and recovery/recycling of resources from end-of-life products. 

Learning outcomes

The International Master of Science in Sustainable and Innovative Natural Resource Management programme from Ghent University gives students a broad view on the entire value chain in its different aspects. They learn about the different (technological) options for optimizing flows of natural resources in the different parts of the chain, ranging from resource exploration over sustainable materials use and use of resources in production processes to recovery/recycling of resources from end-of-life products. SINReM graduates have an entrepreneurial mind-set, a multidisciplinary view and creative innovative problem-based technology development skills. They are qualified for a professional career in the private (supporting companies in making processes, products and services more sustainable), research (applied research at universities, research institutes or companies) or public sector (consulting in local, regional and (inter)national administrations, defining and implementing sustainable development policies). Moreover, SINReM promotes networking and exchange of knowledge and experience between different nationalities, between academic and non-academic partner and between scholars and students from European and non-European countries which are rich in natural resources and/or can be considered as rapidly growing markets for sustainable products, processes and services.