Silvia Bentancur received her bachelor’s degree in Industrial Engineering from the Catholic University of Uruguay (UCU) in 2011. She then gained engineering experience in Uruguay before receiving a full scholarship from the Uruguayan Research and Innovation Agency (ANII) in 2012 to pursue a Master’s in Municipal Water and Infrastructure at UNESCO-IHE Institute for Water Education in the Netherlands, which she completed in 2014. Since then, Silvia has been an Adjunct Professor at UCU, balancing teaching, management, and research responsibilities. In 2016, she received another full scholarship from ANII, in collaboration with UPM pulp mill and UCU, to carry out doctoral studies at IHE DELFT and Delft University of Technology (TU Delft). Her PhD research, conducted between Uruguay and the Netherlands, focused on modelling UPM pulp mill wastewater treatment plants in Uruguay. Silvia's extensive experience led her to establish a new undergraduate program in Environmental Engineering at UCU, where she is now the director. In 2024, Silvia obtained her PhD in Sanitary Engineering.

I work in the research line of wastewater treatment and modelling of wastewater treatment plants in the Department of Engineering. The main focus is to evaluate the treatment of industrial wastewater. I have special experience in the pulp and paper industry as I had the opportunity to carry out my master's and doctoral thesis in this industry. I am also very interested in resource recovery, such as phosphorus, nitrogen, and energy from wastewater with a circular economy approach.