PROGRAM SCHEDULE
PRE-CONFERENCE SHORT COURSES
Course 1: 2:00 Noon – 5:00 p.m. — Fundamentals of Batch and Furnace Operations
C. Phillip Ross, President, Glass Industry Consulting
Course 2: 3:00 – 5:00 p.m. — Understanding Electrical Power in a Glass Manufacturing Plant
Stanley F. Rutkowski II, Senior Applications Engineer, RoMan Manufacturing
5:00 – 11:00 p.m.
HOSPITALITY SUITES at the Toledo Hilton Garden Inn
PROGRAM SCHEDULE
8:00 – 8:45 a.m.
EXHIBITS OPEN
8:45 – 9:00 a.m.
WELCOME
Kerry Ward, Conference Director/Executive Director, Glass Manufacturing Industry Council
2025 GLASS INDUSTRY AWARDS PRESENTATIONS
Stanley F. Rutkowski, III President, Glass Manufacturing Industry Council/RoMan Manufacturing
PROGRAM INTRODUCTIONS
K. Sundaram, PhD, Program Director, Alfred University
9:00 – 10:30 a.m.
PROGRAM TRACK: Melting
Chairs: Glenn Neff, Vice President, Glass Service USA; Jan Schep, Melting Strategist Refractory and Steel, O-I
9:00 – 9:30 a.m.
Optimizing burners to improve oxy-fuel furnace operation; Daniel Johnson, Manager Glass Technology, Libbey, Inc. and Jesse Cates, Mechanical Design Engineer, Linde
9:30 – 10 a.m.
Energy economics and the future of melting glass; Johnathan Blevins, Sr. Furnace Design Engineer, Toledo Engineering, Co., Inc.
10 – 10:30 a.m.
High TRL glass melting technology ready for decarbonization; Wolf Kuhn, PhD, Chief Expert in Glass, Fives Stein
10:00 – 10:30 a.m.
BREAK & EXHIBITS
11:00 – 12:00 p.m.
PROGRAM TRACK: MELTING CONTINUED
11 – 11:30 a.m.
Optimizing glass and refractory development through the advantages of gradient furnace; Artem A. Trofimov, Senior Application Scientist, The Edward Orton Jr. Ceramic Foundation
11:30 – 12:00 p.m.
Revolutionizing glass furnace operations through AI-based batch coverage detection and NIR-B 2K thermal imaging; Philippe Kerbos, Global Industry Manager, AMETEK LAND
11:30 – 12:00 p.m.
Revolutionizing glass furnace operations through AI-based batch coverage detection and NIR-B 2K thermal imaging; Philippe Kerbos, Global Industry Manager, AMETEK LAND
12:00 – 1:00 p.m.
LUNCH AND EXHIBITS
1:00 – 2:30 p.m.
PROGRAM TRACK: DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY PROJECTS
Chairs: S. K. Sundaram, PhD, Program Director, Alfred University; Kerry Ward, Conference Director/Executive Director, GMIC
1:00 – 1:30 p.m.
Overview: Deeper technical background into the challenges of electric melting, learnings about glass behavior in this project that cuts across the technical challenges, industry alignment on the project including industry advocacy plan, next steps: Scott Cooper, PhD., Technical Director and Katelyn Kirchner, PhD., Glass Process Science, CelSian
1:00 – 1:30 p.m.
Overview: Deeper technical background into the challenges of electric melting, learnings about glass behavior in this project that cuts across the technical challenges, industry alignment on the project including industry advocacy plan, next steps: Scott Cooper, PhD., Technical Director and Katelyn Kirchner, PhD., Glass Process Science, CelSian
1:30 – 1:50 p.m.
Technical Challenge 1: Reduction of foaming of reduced glasses; Jesse Lang, Scientist, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
1:50 – 2:10 p.m.
Technical Challenge 2: Improving quality/fining of oxidized glasses; Eric Muskovin, Laboratory Project Leader, CelSian
2:10 – 2:30 p.m.
Technical Challenge 3: Furnace lifetime and modeling insights; Jonathon Blevins, CFD Engineer, TECO
3:00 – 4:30 p.m.
PROGRAM TRACK: DECARBONIZATION
Chairs: Robert Thompson, Manager Raw Materials & Glass Technology, Corning; Daniel Johnson, Glass Process Engineer, Libbey, Inc.
3:00 – 3:30 p.m.
ZeroCO2 glass advancing the path to carbon-neutral container manufacturing; Dominik Orzol, Managing Director, International Partners in Glass Research e. V. and ZeroCO2-glass – investigations on meltability of CO2-free glasses; Tomasz Englemann, M. Sc. RWTH Aachen University
3:30 – 4:00 p.m.
Glass furnace hydrogen firing; Kyle Sword, R&D Director North America NSG Pilkington
4:00 – 4:30 p.m.
Sorg’s “Viking®” foreheart – a modelling exercise; Dirk Schnurpfeil, Manager R&D, Nikolaus SORG GmbH & Co. KG
4:30 – 5:30 p.m.
PROGRAM TRACK: ENVIRONMENTAL
Chairs: Shrikar Chakravarti, Associate Director, Glass Business Development, Linde, Inc.; Kenneth Bratton, Manager of Research and Development, Bucher Emhart Glass
4:30 – 5:00 p.m.
Considerations for flue gas in high humidity oxygen and fuel upgraded furnaces; Gerald Norz, Sr. Business Development Manager, Durr Systems, Inc.
5:00 – 5:30 p.m.
Sustainable interleaving powders for glass separation and stain protection; Bret Penrod; BASF Chemetall
7:00 – 11:00 p.m.
HOSPITALITY SUITES at the Toledo Hilton Garden Inn
PROGRAM SCHEDULE
8:00 – 9:00 a.m.
EXHIBITS OPEN
9:00 – 10:30 a.m.
PROGRAM TRACK: Sensors
Chairs: Glenn Neff, Vice President, Glass Service USA; Jan Schep, Melting Strategist Refractory and Steel, O-I
9:00 – 9:30 a.m.
Glass defect reduction in the tin bath – using sensors, automation and artificial intelligence to improve glass quality & manufacturing; Michael J. Gallagher, PhD, Air Products and Chemicals, Inc.
9:30 – 10 a.m.
Infra-red monitoring of glass futures furnace heat-up ambient air to operating oxy-fuel; Neil George Simpson, Consultant, Simpson Combustion & Energy, Ltd.
10 – 10:30 a.m.
Life beneath the pavers. Operating furnaces for years after glass breaches; Mohit Gohel, Technical Sales Director, PaneraTech, Inc.
10:00 – 10:30 a.m.
BREAK & EXHIBITS
11:00 – 12:00 p.m.
PROGRAM TRACK: Modeling
Chairs: James M. Uhlik, Vice President Technical Services, Toledo Engineering Co. Inc. (TECO); Justin Wang, Senior Process Engineer, Guardian Industries
11 – 11:30 a.m.
From Siemens to simulation: understanding and optimizing regenerators; Malte Sander, Business Development Manager, Glass Service
11:30 – 12:00 p.m.
Modification to the VFT equation for compositional dependence; Daniel Swiler, Scientist, Celsian Glass
12:00 – 1:00 p.m.
LUNCH AND EXHIBITS
1:00 – 2:30 p.m.
PROGRAM TRACK: REBULD AND REFRACTORY
Chairs: Eric Dirlam, Master Furnace Engineer, SSOE; Michael Gallegher, PhD, Lead Engineer, Glass Combustion Applications, Air Products and Chemicals, Inc.
1:00 – 1:30 p.m.
Ensuring safety and compliance in glass furnace rebuilds: strategies for risk mitigation and efficiency; Dragan Savic, Senior Vice President, SCT Operations, Inc.
1:30 – 2:00 p.m.
Increasing melter throughput, efficiency, and life through design of mullite crown performance; Kristen Pappacena, Principal Scientist, Saint-Gobain SEFPRO
2:00– 2:30 p.m.
How development of high yield/low rebound ceramic welding material is transforming service life expectations and influencing asset life extension; Sean Gilbride, VP Global Technical Operations and Manufacturing, and Kevin Pendleton, Technical Manager, Fosbel, Inc.
2:30 – 3:00 p.m.
BREAK
3:00 – 5:00 p.m.
PROGRAM TRACK: FREESTYLE
Chairs: Jan Schep, Global Melting Strategy and Integration Leader, O-I; David Girvin, Float Manager, Vitro Architectural Glass
3:00 – 3:30 p.m.
DPH alloys – innovative precious metal solutions for the glass industry; Matthias Wegner, Head of Innovation, Heraeus Precious Metals
3:30 – 4:00 p.m.
Innovative glass processing: unlocking efficiency and sustainability in the circular economy glass processing; Thomas Wesian. Ing., Binder+Co AG
4:00 – 4:30 p.m.
Global divergence of priorities and technologies; Aston Fuller, General Manager, Glass Futures, Ltd.
4:30 – 5:00 p.m.
CONFERENCE WRAP-UP
5:00 – 5:30 p.m.
GMIC MEMBERS MEETING
**All Conference Events will take place at Glass City Center, Toledo, Ohio, USA
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