He studied Cultural Engineering and Water Management at the University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences in Vienna and received his doctorate from the Faculty of Civil Engineering at the Vienna University of Technology (TU) in the field of evaluation and optimization of landfill aftercare.

He then remained as Project Leader at the Research Department for Waste and Resource Management at the Vienna University of Technology, where he led national and international research projects related to the analysis, evaluation and design of waste and resource systems. The methodological focus of his work lies in the areas of material flow analysis and life cycle assessment, which he uses to establish clean and resource-efficient material cycles.