Profile
Nick Humphries
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About Me:
I’m from Liverpool, now living in Leeds. I am interested in strength and fitness, but I now have a young daughter so these days I spend most of my spare time with her and my partner doing family activities.
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I grew up in Liverpool but my grandparents had a small farm just outside. I spent most of my half terms and summer holidays working on it and developing my interest in agriculture. My first career choice was actually computing, but I lost interest in that path after college. I actually joined the army as an officer after that, but health problems meant I had to leave after a few months. I eventually went back to agriculture and went to university to study it, then worked in the industry and eventually studied my PhD in soil science.
My fitness training and rehab from the army meant i developed a keen interest in health and fitness. I qualified as a personal trainer, powerlifting coach and CrossFit coach. I used to compete at CrossFit and powerlifting, including competing at the British Powerlifting championships in 2018. I now do less as I have a young family and more intensive job, but still try to keep active and strong.
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My pronouns are:
he/him
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My Work:
I now work in the mining sector on carbon mitigation projects, as a specialist in agriculture and soil science. I mainly focus on sustainable land use, looking at projects which can utilise solutions such as sustainable cropping, alternative food production, bioenergy etc.
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Though I have a background in agriculture and soil science I now work in the mining sector. There are large areas of land under management in mining, as well as considerations around water, jobs, pollution and carbon. My projects work to try to use degraded mine land to create the most benefits possible, driven by reducing our carbon footprint.
In my main project we are looking to grow cactus on low-quality land in South Africa to use as a sustainable crop to feed an alternative protein process, which will replace chicken eggs with much lower land, water and carbon use. We grow the cactus sustainably, turn it to sugar, feed it to a modified fungus in a fermentation process, and the fungus produces egg white. The project requires me to work in crop and soil science, biochemistry, process engineering, business development, and carbon accounting. There is a lot to think about and learn!
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My Typical Day:
Typically I will be office based, and my day is usually split between meetings with other stakeholders (scientists, business people, and internal company experts), researching topics on my project, and ‘Technoeconomic Modelling’ (spreadsheets). I do also get to travel around the world for technical meetings and quite often get to spend some time in cactus fields in South Africa!
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I have lots of technical meetings with internal people about land use, water use, permitting, business development, strategy and other topics. Then I also have lots of external partners to meet with to discuss things like farming, cactus, microbiology, process engineering, civil engineering. There is a lot to understand and manage when implementing such large projects. All the information gathered then feeds into our technoeconomic modelling.
The technoeconomic modelling means taking all the technical information I have gathered and building an economic model based on it so we can make the best business, technical and environmental decisions. Its a very big spreadsheet which requires constant updating, but is important to understand risk. It has already led to the investment of millions of dollars in research and technology, and could lead to the investment of hundreds of millions more if everything goes to plan.
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Education:
I grew up in Liverpool and went to a comprehensive primary school and then an all-boys catholic secondary school. I did well in school but didn’t enjoy it because of bullying, so went to Liverpool Community College for my A-levels instead of staying on at sixth form, despite being a top student. I picked the wrong subjects and basically failed my first year! I did 3 years in total to make up for it and got good enough A levels to study Computer Engineering at uni, but after 3 months decided it wasn’t for me and dropped out.
I then decided to try the army, but that didnt really go very well so I left after a few months and didnt really know what to do. I decided to give farming a chance, since I’d grown up farming on my grandparents farm and knew I enjoyed the work, but hadnt considered it as a career.
I got a place studying agriculture and soil science at the Royal Agricultural University and went on to get a first class honours degree. I then worked for a few years in the industry rather than study more, but I eventually found and got accepted onto a PhD I was interested in to study soil science at the University of Leeds, School of Civil Engineering. I received my PhD in 2019 and have been working in agricultural science since.
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Qualifications:
12 GCSEs A*-C: English, English Literature, Maths, Physics, Chemistry, Biology, History, RE, DT, Business Studies, French and Latin.
AS levels: English C, Maths E, Chemistry E
A levels: Computer Studies B, ICT C, Physics C
BSc (Hons) First Class: Agriculture (Sustainable Soil Management)
PhD Civil Engineering
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Work History:
Farm worker (home farm and other farms for work experience): 8 years part time/full time.
Precision Farming Account Manager: 3.5 years. Managing crop fertiliser inputs and mapping soils using satellite imagery and GPS.
PhD Researcher: 4 years. Studying soil and water chemistry and microbiology.
Chief Agronomist: 3 years. Leading the agronomy research for a Norwegian sustainable fertiliser technology start-up.
Carbon Mitigation Principal: 2 years (current). Managing sustainable land use projects for carbon mitigation in the mining sector.
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Current Job:
Carbon Mitigation Principal: Technical and scientific lead on sustainable land management and alternative agriculture projects trying to deliver carbon, environmental, water, social and economic benefits.
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Employer:
Anglo American: A global mining company specialising in copper, iron ore and crop nutrients. Anglo American aim to ‘reimagine mining to improve people’s lives’ and we see ourselves as a crucial part of the sustainability and renewable energy transition, by providing the raw materials required with the least environmental and social impact possible.
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My Interview
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What did you want to be after you left school?
Computer Engineer
Were you ever in trouble at school?
Not really
If you weren't doing this job, what would you choose instead?
Farming
Who is your favourite singer or band?
Mumford and Sons
What's your favourite food?
Roast dinner
Tell us a joke.
Why did the soil scientist get promoted? He was out standing in his field.
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