Uranium, Pegmatites, and Critical Raw Materials in Namibia

Gabi Schneider

Director Namibia Uranium Institute

Gabi is the Executive Director of the Namibian Uranium Institute. She holds an M.Sc. and a Ph.D. in Economic Geology. She joined the Namibian Geological Survey in 1985, and served as its Director from 1996 to 2016. Her professional experience covers economic, exploration, and environmental geology, and management. She is an honorary life member of the Geological Society of Namibia, an honorary fellow of the Geological Society of London, and registered with the Namibian Geoscience Council and the South African Council for Natural Science Professionals.

Dr Schneider serves on a number of working groups of the WNA and the IAEA, on the scientific committee of UNESCO's International Geoscience Programme, on Namibia's Geoscience Council, on UNESCO's Global Geoparks Council, on the Commission for the Implementation of the World Heritage Convention in Namibia, and as trustee of the Namibian Institute of Mining and Technology. She played a leading role in the Strategic Environmental Assessment of the Namibian Uranium Province.

Judith Kinnaird

University of the Witwatersrand

Judith is a Visiting Professor at the University of the Witwatersrand in South Africa. She has a B.Sc., M.Sc., and Ph.D. Her professional experience includes consultancy and research on a variety of commodities including tin-bearing granites; zinc and copper deposits; uranium mineralisation and Li-Be-Sn-Nb-Ta pegmatites. At Wits she has led a research team on the mineralisation of the Bushveld Complex for more than 20 years. In 2014, she instigated an M.Sc. course in Economic Geology. Since 2004 she has supervised >100 postgraduate research projects across a range of commodities, and has published more than 100 papers and book chapters.

She is co-director of a National Centre of Excellence (CIMERA) for Minerals and Energy Research, is a member of the UK Institution of Mining and Metallurgy, a Chartered Engineer, a Fellow of the Geological Society of South Africa and a Fellow and former President of the SEG. She has received several awards recognising her contribution to economic geology research. She has recently retired from Wits University and now divides her time between teaching and postgraduate supervision at Wits and consultancy on various projects related to Critical Metals especially Li, U and PGE.

Paul Next

University of the Witwatersrand

Paul obtained a first-class B.Sc. Honours degree in Earth Science from Oxford Brookes University in 1991 and a Ph.D. for his research on uranium mineralisation in sheeted leucogranites in Namibia from the National University of Ireland in 1997. His current research interests are in critical raw materials, particularly antimony, germanium, lithium, tin and rare earth elements, uranium mineralisation in Namibia and mineralisation in the Bushveld Complex.

Prior to joining WITS University as a Professor of Economic Geology in early 2014, Paul worked for Umbono Capital as Senior Geologist since 2007, evaluating natural resources projects including oil and gas, coal, diamonds, PGE’s, magmatic Ni-Cu sulphides, gold, rare earth elements, uranium, dimension stone, and industrial minerals. He is a Fellow of the SEG, Geological Society of London and the Geological Society of South Africa. He has recently retired from Wits University and now divides his time between teaching and postgraduate supervision at Wits, consultancy on various projects related to Critical Metals especially Li, U and PGE and bird watching.