Dr. Hanson Lee joins Breakthrough Energy’s Innovator Fellows program from Green COP in Singapore. As co-founder and CEO, he leads the company’s mission to convert agricultural waste into clean, sustainable energy. Dr. Hanson’s expertise is rooted in his doctoral research at the National University of Singapore, where he developed the novel biochemical processes that now form the core of Green COP’s technology.

Green COP is tackling two major global challenges: the pollution from burning billions of tons of agricultural waste and the urgent need for sustainable fuels in hard-to-abate sectors like shipping and transportation. The company uses a patented, low-energy process to convert this waste into an advanced bio-butanol, a clean, ‘drop-in’ fuel that can power existing engines without modification. Through the Fellows program, the Green COP team aims to de-risk the technology at a commercial scale and forge the partnerships needed to build their first full-scale production plant.

In his free time, Dr. Hanson is passionate about exploring how circular economy principles can be applied to solve everyday environmental challenges. He earned a Bachelor of Engineering in Chemical Engineering from the University of Malaya (UM), followed by a Doctor of Philosophy in Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering from the National University of Singapore (NUS).