Rivers have been my passion since childhood. So, nothing was more logical than to turn my passion into a professional activity. For decades, I have initiated and coordinated long-term river basin-related campaigns to save the Danube, Ebro, Guadalquivir, Loire, Elbe, and Rhine in partnership with international NGOs, in particular, the WWF international.

I mainly use my experience and expertise as a river expert and communicator to create an efficient interface between politics, science and civil society.

As a result of a 10-year campaign, "Living Loire" for the preservation of the wild River Loire, I was able to play a key role in the realization of the first Europe-wide removals of large dams.

To promote international cooperation among NGOs, I founded the European Rivers Network (ERN), which today is linked to many stakeholders in the 50 most important river basins on the European continent.

I am Wetland International Europe’s focal point seeking to accelerate the implementation of EU freshwater-related laws, restore and protect free-flowing rivers and upscale nature-based solutions for inland waters, in collaboration with our members, networks and partnerships in Europe.

I have spent the past two decades at the intersection of conservation science, policy and communications in the US, EU and globally. Rivers run through my experiences – including the Hudson, Niger and Rhine. Before working at the global and European levels for Wetlands International, I spent more than a decade in Washington, DC as the Legislative Director for environmental champion and member of the US House of Representatives Maurice Hinchey and the Research Director at the League of Conservation Voters. I also have significant field experiences researching wetland-dependent species, from the Everglades in the US to the Bolivian Amazon, and for more than 15 years as a volunteer for the Delaware Bay Shorebird Monitoring Program in the US.

Irene Duque is the Freshwater Policy Officer at Wetlands International Europe. A Spanish lawyer with three LLM degrees, she specializes in European environmental law and has a deep passion for the conservation of habitats and species. Irene began her career as a strategic litigator, focusing on the protection of large carnivores and their natural habitats. Over the years, she has worked and volunteered with various environmental law organizations, using her expertise in EU law to advocate for the protection and restoration of nature.
Recognizing that much of her legal work addressed environmental damage long after it had occurred, Irene moved to Brussels — the heart of EU policymaking — to help shape better environmental laws that prevent harm before it happens.
She is particularly committed to protecting free-flowing rivers, which are vital for maintaining healthy ecosystems. These dynamic waterways support life above and below the surface, facilitate the transport of nutrients and sediments, and play a key role in regulating water quality. Despite their ecological importance — long acknowledged by human communities who settled alongside them — rivers have been increasingly polluted, fragmented, and depleted over the past century.
At Dam Removal Europe, Irene supports the survival of these vital habitat networks through policy advocacy and restoration efforts, working to ensure they have the space and time they need to recover and thrive for future generations.

Julia Boverhoff is Freshwater Policy Associate at The Nature Conservancy Europe. In her role, she supports TNC’s Freshwater work as well as the policy actions that are intersecting with TNC’s work on the ground. She focusses on aspects of the EU Biodiversity Strategy, the Nature Restoration Law, but also on topics related to the broader topics around Freshwater, such as the EU Green Deal at large, energy, climate adaptation and resilience both in the European as well as in the global context. She promotes the establishment of policy measures that help enable dam removal on the ground.

Passionate about working on the development and implementation of Freshwater related policies in Europe and beyond. Excited to see how the newly adopted Nature Restoration Law can lead to 25.000 km of Free-Flowing Rivers in Europe.

Prior to joining the Nature Conservancy in 2022, she was a Blue Book Trainee at the European Commission, in the Cabinet of Executive Vice-President Frans Timmermans.
Julia holds a double masters in Environmental Law (Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam) and Civil Law (Leiden University).

My name is Barry Bendall and my professional background is as a fisheries scientist studying the migratory behaviour of fish with a particular focus on the impacts of barriers. For me, it has always been very apparent that physical barriers are one of the major factors impacting fish populations but also the functioning and resilience of wider river ecosystems.

Understanding the problems is one thing, but it is vital that we use this knowledge to deliver action. I joined The Rivers Trust more than a decade ago to support the work of grass roots organisations restoring river catchments throughout the UK & Ireland. Since then, local Rivers Trusts and partners have delivered hundreds of dam removal projects, opening up thousands of kilometres of habitat, restoring natural processes and improving biodiversity.

However, despite all this work and the benefits provided, mainstreaming dam removal projects is still a major challenge with many legislative, financial, institutional, and social barriers preventing the scaling up of action. There are many thousands of barriers across the UK and Ireland and the problem is the same across most of Europe and the world.

Scaling up dam removal activity to the levels required to reverse decades of decline requires collaboration and coordination at local, national, and international scales. It is this that motivates me and my involvement with the Dam Removal Europe coalition.

Removing dams is one of the most effective ways to restore rivers to their natural functioning for the benefit of nature and people. Following the announcement of the EU biodiversity Strategy and impending Nature Restoration Law to connect 25,000km of rivers, there is a growing need to coordinate, advise and drive dam removal projects across Europe. Under the Living European Rivers initiative, I coordinate and engage with WWF offices and partners across Europe on dam removal topics.
Currently my focus is on scaling up of dam removal in South Eastern Europe: a biodiversity hotspot with massive dam removal potential. Under the 1.27 million Euro DRE project, funded by Open Rivers Programme and lead by World Fish Migration Foundation, we are able to implement activities that will create suitable enbling conditions for dam removal. With these enabling conditions we aim to build the DR movement in the region, initiate policy change and develop a pipeline of 100 dams to be removed.