
Leading Vulcan's integrated lithium and renewable energy project Our Team.
Outstanding major project, technical and finance experience at the Executive and Board level.
Board of Directors.
The Vulcan expert team is supported by a Board with decades of leadership and expertise in the lithium industry, geology, and investment banking.



Executive Chair Dr Francis Wedin
Dr Wedin is a battery materials and renewable energy industry executive, focused on developing global scale decarbonisation opportunities. Dr Wedin founded Vulcan Energy and its integrated sustainable lithium and renewable energy business, a dual renewables and lithium chemicals company and the world’s first zero fossil fuels, carbon neutral lithium project.
Dr Wedin was previously Executive Director of ASX-listed Exore Resources, where he developed two new lithium resources, on two continents. He is bilingual, has a PhD and BSc (Hons) in geology, an MBA in renewable energy, is a Fellow of the Geological Society, London, and a member of the Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy.



Managing Director and CEO Cris Moreno
Mr Moreno has over 20 years’ global experience in successfully delivering major, unique, and challenging projects, including in the lithium chemicals, cathode, and LNG sectors.
In the LNG sector, he has held leadership roles with Santos, Woodside, and Shell, including working on the Browse, Gorgon, and Prelude LNG projects. Prior to joining Vulcan, Mr Moreno worked in the lithium chemicals and battery cathode sector in Europe, as Senior Director Programs for Northvolt–Cathode Active Material (CAM) Business Unit, and Vice President – Engineering and Development for Aurora Lithium, Northvolt’s lithium hydroxide refinery in Europe.



Lead Independent Director and Deputy Chair Angus Barker
With over 30 years of professional experience, Mr Barker is a Director of listed companies who brings a wealth of expertise in mergers and acquisitions, capital markets, and strategic advisory. He held senior executive roles at top-tier global investment banks across Australia, the United Kingdom, and Asia, including 12 years based in Hong Kong, and has advised public company boards and CEOs on strategic mergers and acquisitions, as well as complex capital markets transactions. Mr Barker’s deep industry knowledge spans the natural resources, financial services, infrastructure, and technology sectors, where he has guided boards and executives through complex financial decisions.
In addition to his corporate advisory roles, Mr Barker served as a Senior Adviser to Australian Government Ministers in key economic portfolios, shaping policies related to superannuation, financial services, the digital economy, trade, and foreign investment. He is the Chairman of Australian Rare Earths and a Non-Executive Director of WAM Capital.



Executive Director and Group Chief Financial Officer Felicity Gooding
Ms Gooding is a Senior Finance executive and leader with over 20 years’ experience in strategic and financial analysis, debt funding, corporate finance, mergers and acquisitions, management and financial accounting and governance within Australia, Singapore, London, and Washington D.C.
Her experience has been gained across multiple industries relevant to Vulcan including energy, mining, and infrastructure. Most recently Ms Gooding was CFO and Global Head of Commercial at Fortescue Future Industries, where she led the finance team, including the specialist project financing team responsible for securing finance to enable financial investment decisions for green energy projects.



Non-Executive Director and Chair of the ARESG committee Josephine Bush
Ms Bush is a qualified solicitor and chartered tax advisor, as well as earning the CFA ESG investing qualification and a sustainable finance certification. She has an MA in Law from Cambridge University. She built and led the UK and Ireland Renewables Tax Practice and developed latterly the EY global renewables business plan. Ms Bush was a member of the Ernst & Young Power and Utilities Board and UK&I Governance Board and was a senior partner at EY for 14 years.



Non-Executive Director and Chair of the POC committee Dr Günter Hilken
Dr Hilken has over 35 years’ experience and a deep understanding of the German chemicals, renewables, and infrastructure investment sectors, and, through leading industry advocacy associations, the German Government at the State and Federal levels. Dr Hilken is a Senior Advisor to Macquarie Asset Management, Director of Currenta, and President and Chairman of the Board of the German Federation of Industrial Energy Consumers (VIK).



Non-Executive Director Dr Heidi Grön
Dr Grön is a chemical engineer by background and an accomplished business leader with over 22 years’ experience in the chemicals industry. Since 2007, Dr Grön has been a senior executive with Evonik, one of the largest specialty chemicals companies in the world, with a market capitalisation of €14B and 32,000 employees.
Board Advisors



Special Advisor and Co-Founder Dr Horst Kreuter
Dr Kreuter is a highly experienced businessman and engineering geologist, with an extensive and distinguished record of project development and consulting in the geothermal sector. He worked successfully in geothermal project development and permitting in Germany and worldwide and is a Co-Founder of Vulcan ZERO CARBON LITHIUM™️ Project, as well as Ex-CEO of Geothermal Group Germany GmbH and GeoThermal Engineering GmbH (GeoT). Dr Kreuter has a widespread political, investor and industry network in Germany and Europe. He is based in Karlsruhe, local to the project area in the Upper Rhine Valley.



Special Advisor Julia Poliscanova
Ms Poliscanova is a senior director with the EU’s Transport and Environment. She is instrumental in shaping policies around EU vehicle CO2 standards and sustainable batteries. Ms Poliscanova previously worked for the Mayor of London as a senior EU policy officer. She is also on the steering committee for the Battery CO2 Passport program of the Global Battery Alliance.
Leadership Team.
Seasoned, highly experienced Leadership Team to ensure successful execution.



Managing Director and CEO Cris Moreno
Mr Moreno has over 20 years’ global experience in successfully delivering major, unique, and challenging projects, including in the lithium chemicals, cathode, and LNG sectors.
In the LNG sector, he has held leadership roles with Santos, Woodside, and Shell, including working on the Browse, Gorgon, and Prelude LNG projects. Prior to joining Vulcan, Mr Moreno worked in the lithium chemicals and battery cathode sector in Europe, as Senior Director Programs for Northvolt–Cathode Active Material (CAM) Business Unit, and Vice President – Engineering and Development for Aurora Lithium, Northvolt’s lithium hydroxide refinery in Europe.



Executive Director and Group Chief Financial Officer Felicity Gooding
Ms Gooding is a Senior Finance executive and leader with over 20 years’ experience in strategic and financial analysis, debt funding, corporate finance, mergers and acquisitions, management and financial accounting and governance within Australia, Singapore, London, and Washington D.C.
Her experience has been gained across multiple industries relevant to Vulcan including energy, mining, and infrastructure. Most recently Ms Gooding was CFO and Global Head of Commercial at Fortescue Future Industries, where she led the finance team, including the specialist project financing team responsible for securing finance to enable financial investment decisions for green energy projects.



Chief Operating Officer Carsten Bachg
Mr Bachg brings more than 25 years of global project management experience in capital projects in the petrochemical and chemical industry for Engineering contractors like Jacobs and Worley. Mr Bachg managed the Supply Chain of one of the largest European IT companies and helped to develop Jacob’s organisation from scratch to approximately 350 people.



Chief Technology Officer Dr Stefan Brand
Dr Brand brings over 25 years of extensive industry experience in specialty chemicals, with expertise in process innovation, optimisation, sustainability, and commercial leadership. He joins Vulcan from Clariant, a world-leading specialty and sustainable chemical solutions company. With his background, Dr Brand is ideally positioned to lead Vulcan’s lithium technical team, providing crucial technical support to the execution and operation teams at Vulcan’s integrated lithium and renewable energy project.



Chief Commercial Officer Christian Freitag
Mr Freitag brings 20 years of global experience from the chemicals, oil & gas and battery materials industry. All his jobs revolved around preparing and delivering large industrial investment projects in various functions.
He joined Vulcan from BASF where he was the Vice President for Battery Materials Investment Projects, being responsible for the engineering and execution of a portfolio of several projects around the world for Cathode Active Material (CAM) and Battery Materials Recycling plants.



Head of Sustainability Samantha Langley
For over 20 years, Ms Langley has worked in the mining industry, with a career spanning site-based environmental and sustainability management, operational compliance and reporting, climate change action planning and decarbonisation project delivery across complex mining and mineral processing value chains.
With Ms Langley’s leadership, passion and experience delivering world-leading projects that advance sustainability, Vulcan will reach new heights as we progress towards delivering our integrated sustainable lithium and geothermal renewable energy project.



Vice President Subsurface Dr Kerstin Müller
Dr Müller has 20 years of international experience in the oil and gas sector. She was previously General Manager Exploration Europe and General Manager Exploration Mexico, as well as Deputy Senior Vice President Global Exploration at DEA Deutsche Erdöl AG. Dr Müller brings in experience within the management of geothermal projects as well as Business Development expertise within the geothermal sector.
As Vice President Subsurface, Dr Müller is responsible for all subsurface work related to exploration and field development planning, active licence portfolio management and design of comprehensive subsurface monitoring systems.



Vice President Government Affairs and Innovation Dr Norbert Pralle
Dr Pralle, with a background in geology, geophysics, and geotechnical engineering, holds degrees from Rice University, Houston, and the University of Karlsruhe. With over 20 years of experience with construction companies including ZÜBLIN and STRABAG, his expertise initially focused on tunneling engineering and design before expanding to encompass roles in R&D, innovation, corporate responsibility, and patent management at the group level. Dr Pralle is also actively involved in advisory boards and associations within the industry.



Vice President Communications Annabel Roedhammer
Ms Roedhammer brings over 18 years of experience as a global senior marketing, strategy, and commercial leader working in green energy, agriculture, and engineering industries across Australia and Europe. Powering and feeding the world in a sustainable way has always been her core focus and this is exactly what she will continue to do at Vulcan Energy. Most recently Ms Roedhammer worked at Fortescue Future Industries as Head of Corporate Affairs and was previously European Hub Marketing Lead for Nufarm GmbH, based in Germany.



Vice President Production Dr Christian Tragut
Dr Tragut brings more than 30 years’ global chlor-alkali project execution and production experience. Prior to joining Vulcan, Dr Tragut worked as Vice President for BASF.



General Counsel and Company Secretary Daniel Tydde
Mr Tydde is an experienced corporate lawyer with ~20 years’ experience across a wide range of corporate, commercial, and finance areas including corporate regulatory compliance; corporate governance; equity and debt capital raisings; asset and share sales and purchases; initial public offerings; corporate restructuring and re-organisations; and litigation. Most recently, he held a senior position at Steinepreis Paganin and, prior to that, worked at Clayton Utz and Phillips Fox (now DLA Piper). Mr Tydde holds a Bachelor of Laws and a Bachelor of Commerce from the University of Notre Dame Australia.



Chief Development Officer Thorsten Weimann
As Chief Development Officer, Mr. Weimann oversees the overall project development. His responsibilities include managing drilling operations and securing all necessary permits to ensure the successful execution of projects.
Mr Weimann can look back on more than 25 years of professional experience in the fields of geothermal energy and drilling technology. He is the technical managing director of the German Geothermal Association.
Vulcan’s visionary and Experienced Team.
Vulcan has proven itself to be a competent, experienced, and reliable partner when it comes to realising projects in the fields of geothermal energy and district heating. The OneVulcan Team is also dedicated to conducting research and development and strives to innovate and improve existing processes and adapt and combine commercially proven technologies to decarbonise lithium chemicals for batteries. The commitment of the whole OneVulcan Team to research also helps to make work processes more efficient in terms of materials and resources, in the field of geothermal energy for green energy solutions.
Where passion meets purpose, and together, we will shape a greener, more sustainable future.