Speakers (Morning Sessions):
Leo Bedford
Patrick Allcorn
Head of Local Energy
Head of Local Energy at the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ), Patrick leads a team dedicated to fostering energy solutions at the local level. He played a pivotal role in designing and implementing the Domestic RHI and spearheaded community energy initiatives at DECC. Patrick's previous experience includes roles at Transport for London and the London Borough of Croydon. He initiated the LEAF project, facilitating the establishment of over 200 local energy schemes in 2012.
Dr Steven Fawkes
Managing Partner
Dr Steven Fawkes has over 30 years’ experience in the energy efficiency sector and is recognised as a leading advisor and expert in the development, application and communication of new techniques in energy efficiency and energy efficiency finance.
​Throughout his career Steven has been an energy efficiency pioneer. He has worked hard to improve practice and promote greater levels of energy efficiency and has initiated energy efficiency programmes in Europe Asia and North America.
​Through over 260 publications including books such as, “Outsourcing Energy Management” (2007), “Energy Efficiency” (2013) and “Best Practices and Case Studies for Improving Industrial Energy Efficiency” (2016), as well as his own influential blog – www.onlyeleventpercent.com, he has sought to share knowledge and insight for the good of the efficiency industry.
Heather Buchanan
Co-Founder & CEO
Heather Buchanan is the Chief Executive Officer of B4NZ and has extensive experience advising Government, trade bodies and civil society on the commercial relationship between banks and their customers. Since COP26, Heather has been tireless in her efforts to focus on the role of finance and banking in supporting the real economy in a just transition. She was thrilled to see this work culminate with B4NZ taking to a global stage as a core partner of the UK Pavilion at COP28. In 2024 Heather was recognised as one of the twenty Trailblazing Women in Climate (Reuters) and shortlisted as Sustainability Leader of the Year (Business Green).
Jo Wall
Senior Strategy Director
Jo has over 35 years' experience across the multiple disciplines required to respond to the climate emergency including policy development, leadership, finance and an understanding of technical solutions.​ She has led on the development of complex business cases, change management, public consultation, and project and programme management. She has a sound working knowledge of commercial project delivery and project finance.​ During Jo’s career as a UK property sector professional, Jo has worked across local government, private practice and the corporate sector. Jo has 12 years’ hands-on experience in the UK renewables sector including project initiation, development, financing, Power Purchase Agreements, project sales and construction.
Martin Reeves
Chief Executive
Martin is the Chief Executive at Oxfordshire County Council since March 2023. He spent 14 years as the Chief Executive of Coventry City Council and had previously been with Bedfordshire County Council for three and a half years as Assistant Chief Executive and Chief Executive. Martin was previously Head of Performance Improvement at Westminster City Council in the heart of London. He was also Programme Director for WorkSmart, the City Council’s flagship transformation programme.
Martin spent much of his early career as a lecturer and researcher, and has a PhD in applied economics. Martin is a Governor on the Board at Coventry University. He has recently completed his term as President of SOLACE (Society of Local Authority Chief Executives) and is the first Honorary President of LARIA (Local Authorities Research and Intelligence Association).
Alex Green
Head of Let's Go Zero
Alex is the Schools Lead for Ashden and leads on Let’s Go Zero 2030, a campaign that supports UK schools working together to be zero carbon by 2030. She managed Ashden’s sustainable school awards and peer to peer LESS CO2 programme for 7 years before launching the Let’s Go Zero campaign in 2020. Alex has a Masters in Environmental Management from the University of Cape Town and has previously worked running an environmental business awards scheme for a local authority, supporting small businesses to cut carbon and regulating industry at the Environment Agency.
Peter Gudde
Net Zero Programme Lead
Programme Lead for Net Zero for the Greater South East Net Zero Hub, has over 30 years of experience across sectors. He previously spearheaded sustainable energy initiatives at West Suffolk Council. Peter is also a doctoral researcher at the University of Suffolk, focusing on energy transition and governance in local government. He holds chartered qualifications in environmental and waste management.
Rufus Grantham
Partner / Co-Founder
Rufus had a 23 year career in mainstream finance until 2019, qualifying as a chartered accountant, working as an equity analyst, equity salesperson, being CFO of an AdTech startup and running a 100 person credit and equity research team for a large investment bank. Before co-founding Living Places in 2023, Rufus worked at Bankers without Boundaries (BwB), focused on built environment transition, conceiving of the Net Zero Neighbourhood (NZN) model and working with a range of collaboration partners and local and national public sector entities in the UK and across Europe to further develop it. Rufus is also co-founder of Mettle Capital, a data startup that uses machine reading to create ESG materiality and sentiment data on individual companies
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Rob Saunders
Director, Net Zero Systems Integration
Rob Saunders is Director of Net Zero Systems Integration at Innovate UK. A Cambridge engineering graduate, Rob started his career in innovation in the food and packaging industries when leading major R&D programmes for Crown Packaging and Pepsico. He retrained in 2010, graduating from the Imperial College Masters programme in Environmental Technology & Energy Policy and led analysis for UK Energy Research Centre bioenergy projects before joining Innovate UK in 2011 as lead for offshore renewable energy. Rob led the energy programme at Innovate UK for four years, helping UK businesses to grow as they develop new products that address solutions to affordable, clean and secure energy systems of the future.
