Dr. Fernando Preto is the Team Leader for Biomass Conversion at CanmetENERGY-Ottawa laboratories of Natural Resources Canada. He has also served as Executive Director of The Canadian Bioenergy Association. Since obtaining his PhD in Chemical Engineering from Queens University at Kingston he has been instrumental in advancing bioenergy developments in Canada and bringing together industry, government, and academic stakeholders from the agriculture, forestry, and energy sectors. In addition to his research and project work, Dr. Preto has extensive knowledge and experience of the factors and regulations impacting bioenergy development domestically and internationally. He has carried out numerous techno-economic assessments, developed a market-based economic approach suitable for evaluating biorefinery technologies and served as a task force member for the Forest Products Association of Canada’s Biopathways initiative.