Meet The Team

Cooler co-founder. Having graduated in biochemistry, Dave began his career with Deloittes and then spent twelve years working in IT becoming a director of one of the North West’s top IT companies. He then founded a small consultancy and spent ten years working as a management trainer and coach in the commercial sector.

Having spent six years on the board of Friends of the Earth, he chaired the “Energy” writing group of “Manchester A Certain Future”, and now sits on its steering group, chairing the Low Carbon Culture aim.

Dave is an experienced public speaker and advocate and has appeared widely on BBC TV and Radio, ITV, C4 and Sky and in the regional and national press, and recent work has included management consultancy advising a corporate on product sustainability, developing a feasibility study for a sustainable business network, work creating, developing and leading The Carbon Literacy Project, and general advocacy, advisory and chairing work.

Cooler co-founder. Phil is a long-standing social entrepreneur, broadcaster and community activist based in Manchester. He wants to leave his children ‘a future, not an apology’.

Phil has been a long-time activist for sustainable development, moving from local work with Friends of the Earth in the 1980s to riding a tandem back from Sydney raising awareness of rainforest conservation in 1990. Having studied law at Manchester Polytechnic, Phil enjoyed a successful career in radio working as a presenter and producer of features and documentaries for BBC Network Radio and working for programmes as diverse as You and Yours and Mark Radcliffe. One of his proudest moments remains giving the first-ever radio airplay to The Inspiral Carpets. Between making programmes Phil delivered media training to a wide range of national and local clients, from the RSPB to Manchester Museum of Science and Industry.

In 1999 he was the moving force behind setting up the leading community media charity Radio Regen (www.radioregen.org) working in community engagement and creating community solutions from the ground up. This work led to a place on the Board of the Manchester Local Strategic Partnership where he sits as an independent member, ensuring a high profile for sustainable development in the City’s overarching strategies. Phil was also a lead lobbyist in the successful campaign establishing legislation for community radio – working with ministers and civil servants to that end. He is still Director of Radio Regen, working part-time there as Cooler grows.

In 2007 Phil was one of the founders of the high-level climate change advocacy network The 100 Months Club, which in turn led to involvement in the drafting of the city’s climate change action plan: Manchester: A Certain Future, (www.manchesterclimate.com) as part of which he led the ‘Buildings’ writing group. He still contributes to the MACF Steering Group and is also a member of the Board of Manchester’s Local Strategic Partnership.

Emma is our Project Leader, overseeing various internal projects, managing our website and invoicing, advocating for Carbon Literacy at external events and within partner organisations, and managing and providing support to our ever-growing team.

Emma has worked with Carbon Literacy since 2015. Firstly as one of the first certified Carbon Literacy Trainers, trained at Manchester Met University, through which she went on to deliver CL training within six organisations across England, France and Germany. Emma also undertook an internship with The Carbon Literacy Project alongside the final year of her BSc Geography. Upon completion of her degree in 2017, and shortly before graduating with First Class Honours, Emma was invited to join the team as Project Coordinator. Both a keen environmentalist and outdoor enthusiast, recently Emma has represented The Carbon Literacy Project at events such as the launch of the Patagonia Action Works platform at Kendal Mountain Festival.

Emma’s experience within the wider environmental and sustainability sector includes with Manchester Met Environment Team where she undertook a year-placement as Sustainable Travel Plan Intern and also worked as a Sustainability Ambassador; with Manchester Climate Change Agency; and, with Manchester Museum as part of Climate Exchange.

Helen is our Project Coordinator; she oversees the recruitment and management of our volunteer team, as well as supporting and delegating responsibilities to our wider team. She also coordinates our external communications, maintains our customer relationship management system and supports invoicing and outreach.

Helen began volunteering with The Carbon Literacy Project in March 2018, before joining the team as Project Administrator, later in the year, after graduating from a BA Human Geography. Prior to this Helen had undertaken Carbon Literacy training, and then become certified as a Carbon Literacy Trainer in 2017, at Manchester Metropolitan University. Helen has delivered multiple days of training to students at Manchester Met, as well as the world’s first Carbon Literacy for Labs session at The University of Manchester.

Helen is passionate about communicating to, and enlightening individuals about their potential to mitigate climate change within the various aspects of their lives, whether that be in a personal, social, professional or political capacity. Helen has also engaged the public in carbon reduction at Blue Dot Festival, and undertook a year of study at California State University San Marcos.

Fiona started volunteering with The Carbon Literacy Project in November 2017 and joined the team as our Certification and IT Coordinator in May 2019. Fiona works to maintain our IT and email systems and also oversees the training of new volunteers in our evidence and certification process.

Natalia began volunteering with The Carbon Literacy Project in June 2018 and joined the team as our Public Sector Coordinator in May 2019. Natalia’s work focuses on coordinating the development of the BEIS (Government Department for Business, Energy, and Industrial Strategy) funded suite of Carbon Literacy Public Sector Toolkits, then the piloting and wider roll-out of the materials.

In June 2019, Louise started volunteering for us one day a week. After almost a year, in May 2020, Louise joined the team as our part-time Project Officer. Her work focusses on general project assistance, with key responsibilities in criteria checking, certification, customer relations and project queries.

Louise studied Environmental Management and Sustainability at Manchester Metropolitan University. She undertook the University’s Train the Trainer programme to become a qualified CLT and became immediately interested in the work being done by both The Project, other organisations, and especially partnering universities. Her final year studies focussed on environmental education and education for sustainability, whilst completing her final year research project on the impact of the ‘Carbon Literacy for Students’ scheme at MMU.

William started volunteering with The Carbon Literacy Project in August 2019, completing a summer internship before continuing to volunteer remotely alongside his studies. Whilst volunteering, he assisted with reviewing and updating the Carbon Literacy Knowledge: E-Learning framework, developed Carbon Literacy resources, and supported the creation of the BEIS-funded Carbon Literacy Public Sector Toolkits. He holds a BSc in Human and Physical Geography from the University of Reading. His thesis for his MSc in Climate Change and Development involved investigating how UK businesses are responding to the climate emergency. After completing his MSc at the University of Reading in October 2020, he joined the Public Sector Team.

Chloe is our Higher Education Coordinator, advocating for and supporting universities to roll out Carbon Literacy training. Chloe has been working in the Higher education sector since 2015, through many roles across Manchester Metropolitan University involving student recruitment, peer mentoring, sustainability engagement, and research. More recently she worked as Project Manager within the educational charity Students Organising for Sustainability UK (SOS-UK), where she oversaw programmes such as Green Impact at universities, hospitals and community organisations. Chloe is a keen activist who supports many campaigns within Manchester and previously volunteered as Regional Organiser for student campaigning charity, People and Planet. Chloe is a certified Carbon Literacy Trainer and IEMA Registered Trainer with expertise in developing and delivering bespoke training packages within educational and charitable sectors. She volunteered for The Carbon Literacy Project in 2017 alongside studying for her BSc in Ecology and Conservation at Manchester Met and Chairing their Environment Society.

Chloe is passionate about education reform, youth empowerment, and weird and wonderful ways of communicating sustainability issues to others. She has lots of experience in engaging a wide range of audiences on issues relating to sustainable development and youth empowerment at universities; colleges; schools; conferences (EAUC; Triple Helix); charitable organisations (Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust; People and Planet); festivals (Blue Dot; Manchester Festival of Nature); The BBC (Breakfast Show). Her extensive public engagement work was recognised by Manchester Met where she won their Science Communication Champion Award in 2019.

Since Ned’s introduction to Carbon Literacy in 2015 on a student-focused course, he became one of the first certified Carbon Literacy Trainers. He also volunteered with The Carbon Literacy Project, in 2016, alongside his studies towards BSc Environmental Management & Sustainability at Manchester Metropolitan University. Having since assisted on Carbon Literacy delivery for a number of Manchester-based courses, and then earned his MSc Sustainability, Culture & Development from Durham University, Ned’s passion for environmental outreach and sustainability education has only grown. With The Carbon Literacy Project team and scope of work continuing to grow, Ned joined the team in July 2020.