FogQuest: sustainable water solutions, also referred to as FogQuest on this website, is a not-for-profit limited liability corporation that is incorporated in the Province of Ontario, Canada.
It is also a Registered Charity with the Government of Canada.
Charitable registration number: 87420 1312 RR0001
Mailing address: 448 Monarch Place,
Kamloops BC, V2E 2B2
Canada
Tel: 250-374-1745 • Fax: 250-374-1746
Introducing the FogQuest Team
Executive Director
Robert Schemenauer was a co-founder of FogQuest in 2000 and is in charge of the day-to-day operation of FogQuest. He has been working on water projects using fog collectors for more than 30 years, was the founder of the International Conference series on Fog, Fog Collection and Dew, and Chair of the conferences in 1998 and 2001. He was also Chair or member of the Scientific Committees for the conferences in 2004, 2007 and 2010. He has a Ph.D. in cloud physics and a broad background in the atmospheric sciences.
Among the awards he has received is the University Medal and Distinguished Scientist Award from the University of Hawaii, Hilo in 2004 in recognition of distinguished and sustained research contributions in fog science.
He currently lives in Kamloops, British Columbia. He was a research scientist with Environment Canada for 25 years and then an emeritus research scientist for another 10 years. He was an adjunct professor with Thompson Rivers University from 2008 to 2010 and remains active in the scientific community both in Canada and internationally. Gardening, genealogy and traveling fill his spare time.
Board of Directors
Tony Makepeace is a Toronto based photographer, teacher, and educational media developer. He has contributed articles and portfolios to numerous magazines and maintains a sessional faculty position at George Brown College in Toronto.
He has also served as a director of the Canadian NGO The Nepal Community Development Foundation since 1995.
Peter Schuepp had a very distinguished career in micrometeorology at McGill University in Montreal followed by a period as an emeritus professor. He has been a dedicated member of the board of directors of FogQuest since the charity’s formation in 2000.
He has a background in cloud physics, agricultural meteorology and aircraft measurements of fluxes of heat and gases. He is an award winning scientist for his career in research, teaching and science editing. He presently lives in Orillia, Ontario, Canada where he pursues his retirement occupation in art, with both gallery showings of his work and a large mural in a local church, as well as being actively involved in volunteer work.
Byron Bignell is a sociologist, researcher and technology/IoT developer based in Kamloops whose research interests focus on sustainable development and the impact of project failure on the health status of the affected communities.
Byron has been deeply involved in the design, development and testing of low-cost solar-powered data logging and remote sensing systems for fog collection.
For the past 10 years, he has also served on the board of directors of the Toronto-based Nepal Community Development Foundation.
Advisors to the Board of Directors
Sherry Bennett was one of the co-founders of FogQuest when it was first incorporated in 2000.
She has been supporting and assisting FogQuest since that time and has worked for Environment Canada in King City, just north of Toronto, for many years. She has a great love for life, for family and for friends. This has served her well in her other endeavors such as event planning. FogQuest’s social media presence and fundraising are areas of particular interest for her in our charity.
Pilar Cereceda is a retired professor who still works part time in the Geography Institute of the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile in Santiago.
She is one of the founders of the fog collection technology and has been working on fog collection projects for over thirty years. She is an expert in the physical geography of deserts and in arid lands bio-geography. She was also the founder and original director of the Atacama Desert Center in Chile. She assists with technical correspondence and has been tremendously helpful in finding and training students to work with FogQuest on projects in Chile and in other parts of the world.
David Phillips is perhaps Canada’s most famous weather personality. He is a senior climatologist with Environment Canada and regularly appears on television and in the print media speaking on weather and climate issues. He lives in Aurora, Ontario with his family and Winston the weather dog. David is a proud recipient of the Order of Canada.
Program Managers
Field Projects Coordinator
Virginia Carter is a Geographer and has a Master’s degree in Environmental Studies. She has been living in Ghent, Belgium since October 2017 where she has started her Ph.D. studies in Geography at Ghent University.
She has extensive experience in coordinating fog collection projects, namely in Chile (Falda Verde, Patache, and Talinay), Guatemala (Tojquia and La Ventosa) and Eritrea (Nefasit and Arborobú). Since 2004, she has worked as a volunteer at FogQuest in the position of Field Projects Coordinator.
Before leaving Chile, she had established a career as a public servant. She has experience with environmental and territorial topics in public institutions, such as at the Logistical Command of the Air Force, the Ministry of Public Works and the Ministry of the Environment, among others.
Virginia brings dedication, hard work and enthusiasm to both the large and small projects she assists with in FogQuest. Currently, she is helping to guide the next phase of the large fog collection project in Tojquia, Guatemala.
Village Project Implementer
Nicolás (Nico) Zanetta-Colombo is a Geographer with a Masters in Geography from the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile and is a Research Assistant at the Center for Climate Science and Resilience (CR)2. Nico is developing scientific and environmental education initiatives in rural and indigenous communities in the Atacama Desert.
In FogQuest, Nico specializes in field Site implementation. He is presently working on the expansion of the existing FogQuest village project in the Western Highlands of Guatemala and on the evaluation of new locations for fog collectors. He has been actively involved with FogQuest since 2015 and has visited and worked at other potential field sites in Central America.
He is a very personable young man, with excellent Spanish and English, and a great amount of hands-on experience with fog collectors. We are very fortunate to have him assisting us.
Resource Coordinator for Colombia and Northern South America
Jose Manuel Molina completed a Master’s degree in hydrologic sciences and engineering at Colorado State University in the USA before moving with his young family to Brussels, Belgium. After a period there he returned to Maryland, USA where he is now working at John Hopkins University in Baltimore.
He is a native of Colombia, South America, and has guided the development of a fog collection project for a village there in cooperation with colleagues in a number of institutions. He is a member of the scientific committee for the 2013 International Conference on Fog, Fog Collection and Dew, and, as well as assisting with the fog project work in Colombia, helps answer questions and provide advice when queries are received from northern South America.
Our Gratitude to Those Who Have Helped
We also express our gratitude to the following people who have served in various supervisory or advisory capacities with FogQuest over the years: Mark Couture; Tara Cracknell; Fernanda Rojas Marchini; and Pablo Osses McIntyre.
In addition, our sincere thanks go out to all those who have volunteered in field projects or in our office since we began in the year 2000.