Tony O’Sullivan

Tony is the Founder and Executive Chair of Pollination, a global asset management and advisory firm focused on climate transition and a nature-positive future.

Tony was appointed Chair of the SMI’s Natural Capital Investment Alliance (NCIA) Task Force in October 2022. The NCIA was formed in recognition of the need to mobilise investment in nature-based investment opportunities. The NCIA has now merged with the Asset Manager and Asset Owner (AMAO) Task Force to collaborate on efforts, inter alia, around establishing Nature as an asset class.

Tony recently co-chaired the Demand Working Group of the International Advisory Panel on Biodiversity Credits (IAPB). This panel, a joint UK/French governmental initiative, was launched in Paris in September 2021 by His Majesty King Charles III and President Macron. The IAPB’s mission is to create a Biodiversity Credit framework enabling the global private sector to contribute meaningfully to financing high-quality ecosystem protection and restoration.

Martijn Wilder AM

Martijn is Founder and CEO of Pollination. He is currently Chair of the Australian Government’s National Reconstruction Fund Corporation (NRFC), and Chair of the Governing Board of the Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency Partnership (REEEP) based in Vienna. He is also an Adjunct Professor of International Climate Change Law at Australian National University, a Senior Advisor to Serendipity Capital, and a Member of the Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists. Martijn was previously Head of Baker & McKenzie’s global climate law and finance practice for twenty years and played a key role with Australia’s clean energy finance institutions. He was previously President of WWF-Australia, Chair of the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA), a former Founding Director of the Clean Energy Finance Corporation (CEFC), and he helped to establish and later Chair the Federal Government’s Low Carbon Australia finance body. He was also Chair of the Victorian Government’s independent expert panel on Victoria’s 2035 Climate Change target. Martijn was a Cambridge Commonwealth Trust Scholar and was awarded an Australian Honour (AM) for his contribution to climate change law and the environment.

Audrey Zibelman

Audrey Zibelman is an experienced energy industry executive who has driven decarbonisation efforts and innovation within organisations and across the sector. Audrey has been at the helm of multiple organisations, leading the transition of the power industry into a decarbonised world as a CEO, Board Member and government leader. Among other Board activities, Audrey currently serves on President Biden’s National Infrastructure Advisory Council, as a Board Trustee on the Rocky Mountain Institute and Senior Advisor to Meridiam. Audrey’s most recent executive appointment was at X, Alphabet’s moonshot factory where she led an effort on grid digitalisation and now serves as an independent advisor. Before joining X, Audrey was the Managing  Director and CEO of the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO), the national power system and gas system operator for Australia. Before AEMO, Audrey was the Chairwoman of the New York Public Service Commission where she was a member of the Governor’s cabinet and led comprehensive regulatory reform of the electric industry to support a decarbonised grid. Audrey also previously was the Executive Vice President and COO of PJM, and Vice President at Xcel Energy, one of the US’s largest electricity utilities.

Joanna Zhou

Joanna has over 12 years of experience acting for clients on a range of matters concerning climate change and energy law and policy. Prior to joining Pollination, Joanna was a trusted legal advisor in the energy and carbon sectors advising developers, offtakers, financiers and corporates on renewable energy and carbon projects. Joanna has also advised on matters concerning international law including the Paris Agreement. In the lead up to COP21, Joanna was an advisor to the Republic of the Marshall Islands. She was also the legal advisor to the We Mean Business Coalition at COP21, working to translate ambitious private sector asks for inclusion into the Paris Agreement. Joanna has a Masters of Law from Columbia University, specialising in climate change and energy law, and has been recognised as a James Kent Scholar. She was also a 2016 finalist for the Thomson Reuters Trustlaw Lawyer of the Year Award in recognition of her work on the Paris Agreement.

Katrina Zhang

Lin Yuan

Lin has diverse experience advising global clients across industries on developing sustainability strategy, managing climate risks, and deploying innovative capital solutions for a more climate-resilient future. Prior to joining Pollination, Lin was a consultant at EY, where she developed the firm’s sustainable finance and climate risk capabilities and offerings. Before EY, she worked at Albright Stonebridge Group, a global strategy and geopolitical risk consultancy, and did sustainability fieldwork in Southeast Asia. 

Estelle Yammine

Estelle is an Executive Assistant in Pollination’s Sydney office and supports Patrick Suckling and Nuvan Aranwela. Prior to joining Pollination, Estelle worked across the book publishing and travel and tourism sectors before joining administration as an Executive Assistant. Estelle has supported the operations of startups and global organisations alike across the financial services, marketing, HR, cybersecurity, and legal industries. Her experience encompasses a number of disciplines including project management and strategic planning, administrative support, HR, IT, and office management.

Zheng Feng Wu

Zheng Feng brings expertise in investments, deal structuring and negotiation across both renewable energy infrastructure and natural capital (particularly, natural climate solutions through carbon projects). Prior to joining Pollination, Zheng Feng was a pivotal member of Akaria Natural Capital, a private assets investment manager jointly staked by Schroders and Conservation International. He started his career as a capital markets banker in Singapore, and subsequently worked on mergers and acquisitions activities focusing on renewable energy and district energy projects for Singapore Power. He holds an MBA from the University of Cambridge and a Bachelor of Business from Nanyang Technological University.

Ashley Woods

Ashley has more than 20 years experience advising on and executing transactions across fintech, energy and oil & gas sectors.  He previously worked alongside the Founder and CEO of a large privately owned software company focussed on automation of business critical processes to implement the group’s strategic capital raisings, M&A and financing transactions along with other operational matters.  In addition, Ashley was responsible for the development and operations of a real estate project in the Caribbean working closely with several of the world’s top luxury hotel brands.  Ashley has also worked as a M&A lawyer at top tier international law firms in London, Tokyo and Melbourne.

Zoe Whitton

Zoe is an award-winning advisor in sustainable finance and climate risk, with significant experience developing strategy, governance and analytics for institutional investors wishing to manage climate change risk and SDG exposure. ​She previously led the award-winning APAC ESG Research team at Citi, advising institutional investors globally on climate change and sustainable development. Earlier in her career Zoe covered ESG and climate change at Credit Suisse and at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, and served as a youth delegate to the UNFCCC.

Zoe is the Chair of the Centre for Policy Development, serves on the board of the Investor Group on Climate Change, and is a member of both the Government’s National Hydrogen Strategy Advisory Council and the Expert Advisory Panel for the Federal Powering the Regions Fund.

She was previously a member of the ASFI TAG and a member of the Expert Working Group for ASFI’s formation. Zoe also sits on the Advisory Council of the Climate Governance Initiative and the Gold Standard Enabling Impact Working Group. Zoe has won numerous awards for her research and work on climate finance and risk, and regularly contributes to the wider conversation on sustainable finance by commentating in the Australian and international press along with various publications.

Laura Waterford

Laura’s work focusses on nature-positive corporate strategy and policy, and opportunities in the natural capital and nature-based solutions space. Laura advises clients on nature-related risks and opportunities in line with the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures guidance. Laura is a leading expert on voluntary biodiversity credit markets and has deep expertise on carbon markets. Prior to joining Pollination, Laura was a climate and environmental lawyer at leading national and international law firms and she was a finalist in the Lawyers Weekly 30 Under 30 Awards in the Planning & Environment category in 2020-2022.

Laura holds a Bachelor of Science (Geography) and a Bachelor of Laws from the University of Newcastle, and a Master of Laws from the University of New South Wales, specialising in environmental law and sustainable development.

Rachel Walker

Rachel is a design professional with in-depth experience in branding and digital design. Her focus is in transforming the clients behaviour into a holistic and well thought-out design with strong visual aesthetics to improve the user experience. Prior to joining Pollination, Rachel has experience in designing for a variety of clients, ranging from health-tech and higher education, to financial services and recruitment. 

Ratri Wakeling

Ratri is a corporate finance and investment professional with experience in the renewable energy, sustainable infrastructure and real estate sectors, having worked in Europe, Australia and Asia. She has worked for Greentech Capital Advisors (now Nomura Greentech), an investment bank solely focused on sustainable infrastructure sectors, providing M&A, capital raising and strategic advisory services. She previously served as a Director in Sahid Group, a publicly-listed Indonesian investment holding firm, responsible for capital structure optimisation and operations of its portfolio of companies across hospitality, education, commercial real estate and healthcare sectors. Ratri started her career as an engineer at Tenix Group (now Downer EDI) working across its aerospace and infrastructure divisions.

Silvia Vargas

Silvia is an Executive Assistant in the Sydney office and supports Managing Director’s, Zoe Whitton and Wendy Mackay. Silvia has a background in ecotourism, hospitality, and sustainability in Costa Rica. Her primary experience is in sustainable luxury boutique hotels and resorts, where she initially worked developing and implementing projects in a variety of areas to improve hotel services and operations, later moving to Human Resources, and Hotel Manager. More recently, she has been working as an Executive Assistant, providing support to senior executives across diverse industries. 

Camila Valencia

Camila joins Pollination with a diverse skill set in impact evaluation, econometrics, data analysis, and policy advisory. Camila was a research fellow at the Inter-American Development Bank where she specialized in trade-related research and analysis. During her time at the IDB, she worked on impactful projects that aimed to enhance trade policies, facilitate economic integration, and promote sustainable development within the region. Her experience in the field of international trade has equipped her with a comprehensive understanding of the complexities involved in fostering economic growth while balancing environmental concerns. In addition to her work at the IDB, Camila has also worked at the International Finance Corporation (IFC) and at the Development Bank of Latin-American (CAF). Camila graduated from Harvard University with a Master’s in Public Administration in International Development. With her thesis at HKS, she conducted an in-depth analysis of the drivers and impacts of deforestation in Colombia, proposing innovative strategies to combat this pressing environmental issue.

Silvia Tsui

Silvia is a highly experienced event and marketing specialist with a career spanning over 15 years in the legal and professional services industries in Asia. During her time at Linklaters, Silvia acted as a trusted advisor in executing high-quality client-focused events. She identified the growing importance of ESG and initiated the Asia Sustainable Business webinar series for the firm’s Asia clients. Previously, Silvia managed the communications and external affairs (international) at the Law Society of Hong Kong, and prior to that in marketing and events at a US insurance credit rating company in Asia. Since moving to Sydney in 2022, Silvia has been a part of the national events and networks team at Allens. She holds a Bachelor of Commerce (Marketing) from Monash University.

Alex Teicher

Alex has a range of experience working with governments, corporations and social enterprises on both strategy and transformation implementation. Prior to Pollination, he worked at a strategy and technology consultancy, and had the opportunity to implement strategies across a range of areas including government, agriculture and financial services. Prior to this, he worked as a project manager on one of Australia’s largest and most complex shipbuilding projects. Alex is a graduate of the University of Adelaide with First Class Honours in Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering. Alex has also spent time working with social enterprises in Timor-Leste and Fiji on sustainable fuel stoves and renewable energy.

Aaron Sun

Prior to Pollination, Aaron worked at Sentient Impact Group and Aware Super, focusing on originating, investing, and appraising renewable projects, core infrastructure, and agricultural assets.
Aaron also spent six years with KPMG Deal Advisory, providing strategic and financial advice that can enhance the client’s competitive advantage and shareholder values, in the context of strategic transactions – acquisitions, divestments, IPOs, privatisations, mergers and alliances, debt and equity deals. Before joining KPMG, Aaron worked at ANZ Institutional Banking. As an advisor and arranger of project financing, Aaron was committed to helping project sponsors of infrastructure and utility projects develop creditworthy limited-recourse structures to underpin project success. Aaron holds degrees in Actuarial Studies and Applied Finance. Aaron also holds the CFA and CAIA Charters.

Geoff Summerhayes

Geoff is renowned for his leadership in raising awareness of climate change financial risk in Australia and globally. He was formerly an Executive Board member of the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority (APRA), and one of his most influential roles was a chair of the Council of Financial Regulators Working Group on Climate Change, whose members include APRA, ASIC, RBA and Treasury. Internationally, Geoff was a member of the Executive Committee of the global standard setting body for insurance, the International Association of Insurance Supervisors (IAIS) and chaired its Audit and Risk Committee. He chaired the UN Environment Program’s Sustainable Insurance Forum (SIF), and represented IAIS and SIF at the Central Banks and Supervisors Network for Greening the Financial System (NGFS). Prior to his appointment at APRA, Geoff was CEO of Suncorp Life. He has held a number of senior executive roles at National Australia Bank, was CEO of Retail Investment at MLC and started his career in commercial property development at Lend Lease.

Patrick Suckling

Patrick plays a leading role on transition strategy, solutions and investments, including key markets in Asia such as India, Japan and Indonesia. He had a previous career in Australia’s Foreign Service, including as international adviser to two Prime Ministers, adviser to the Foreign Minister, High Commissioner to India, Ambassador for the Environment and Senior Official for APEC. Patrick’s work on climate change includes leading Paris Agreement negotiations, overseeing Australia’s $1.5 billion climate finance commitment, and strengthening climate cooperation with key countries such as the United States, China, India, Japan and Germany. He has worked extensively on the climate and nature transition with the G20, OECD, the Multilateral Development Banks and other global and regional institutions. He has also worked extensively with global corporates and financial institutions in these areas.

Dale Straughen

Dale is an accomplished corporate lawyer with extensive experience advising clients on mergers and acquisitions and private equity transactions in the energy and infrastructure sector. Prior to joining Pollination, Dale worked as a M&A lawyer in top tier national and international law firms in Sydney, London and Melbourne, where he provided legal advice to investors, developers, financiers and corporates on cross-border and multinational transactions, with a focus on the energy transition. During COP23, Dale acted as an advisor to the Republic of Palau. Dale has a Bachelor of Commerce and Juris Doctor from the University of Melbourne.

Sophie St John

Sophie is a Certified Environmental Practitioner with over 12 years of industry experience. Prior to joining Pollination, Sophie was the Nature Service Leader for the Australasia region at Arup. In this role, she developed and delivered a comprehensive client-facing nature offering for the built environment. This included providing nature-related training, devising strategies, conducting net gain assessments, and designing nature-based solutions. Much of her career has been as a terrestrial ecologist, delivering environmental assessments approvals, and offsets primarily across infrastructure projects within Australia and PNG. After completing her MBA in 2018, Sophie have taken on various operation and business development related leadership roles. Her accolades include the Environment Institute of Australia & New Zealand’s Young Environmental Professional of the Year (2015) and the Inaugural UQ MBA Women’s Leadership Award (2018).

Jacqui Stapleton

Jacqui has diverse experience in human resources and organisational development in both the public and private sector. Prior to joining Pollination, she held a variety of positions at the NSW Government’s Agency for Clinical Innovation, including Strategic HR Lead and People & Culture Manager. Jacqui was responsible for leading the HR function and delivering key HR projects for the organisation. More recently she has focused on the employee value proposition, driving positive culture and change management.

Louis Slade

Louis’ work focuses on developing and implementing organisations’ nature transition roadmaps. Louis has supported clients to identify and set site-level biodiversity targets, understand and improve approaches to biodiversity offsetting, and developed tools to evaluate the risks and opportunities associated with investments in environmental markets. Louis has additionally worked on TNFD-aligned nature risk assessments. Prior to Pollination, Louis was Strategy Advisor at Climate 200 and a Consultant at Social Ventures Australia where he supported government, corporates, and not-for-profits in strategic planning and outcomes measurement. Louis holds an MPhil. in International Development from the University of Oxford, and a B.A. in Politics, Human Rights, and Development from New York University.

Victoria Skinner

Victoria has broad experience across organisational management, including strategic operations and change management. Before joining Pollination, Victoria was the Practice Manager at a specialist commercial and litigation law firm where she managed the operational functions of the firm, including finance, human resources, IT management and strategic projects. 

Kishen Singh

Prior to joining Pollination, Kishen was developing voluntary carbon market solutions for financial institutions and large corporations at start-up, SALT Climate Tech. He also worked with carbon project developers, aiding them in raising capital. Kishen’s research has examined socio-economic issues surrounding critical mineral extraction. He has also written articles for LSE Green Finance on climate-tech and venture capital. Previously, Kishen held leadership positions at the LSE, such as being the founding Head of LSE Future Impact’s Climate Division.

Mitch Shannon

Mitch has extensive experience providing legal and strategic advice to governments and businesses on energy markets and policy, regulatory compliance, commercial contracts, risk management and the delivery of large-scale infrastructure projects. He was formerly a Senior Adviser at the Australian Energy Market Commission, where he led the development and implementation of complex regulatory reforms to address economic, policy and technical issues arising in Australia’s energy market. Mitch has deep energy sector expertise and a strong understanding of the drivers of investment in renewable energy projects. He is also currently the Co-Chair of the Sydney Young Energy Professionals.

Larry Schwartz

Larry brings over 30 years of experience in greenfield infrastructure projects and industrial services businesses across the globe. Throughout his career, he has led a variety of global initiatives in corporate strategy, project development, and creative corporate financing, with extensive P&L responsibility. He has held leadership roles such as Chairman & CEO of Seaborn Networks and CEO of Global Marine, and most recently, he served as COO of Mangata Networks. Larry’s deep expertise in the telecommunications and renewable energy sectors is complemented by his board roles across several publicly traded and venture-backed companies.

Adriano Scardino

Adriano joins Pollination after several years of experience in the Construction Industry in Australia, during which he has successfully covered a number of roles during the bidding and delivery stages of some of the largest projects in the Public Transport and Energy sectors. He has developed strong and very diverse analytical and modelling skills thanks to his experience as an Engineer, a civil Estimator on the Tender for Snowy Hydro 2.0, and most recently in his Data Science role in the Pre-Contracts and Risk team at CIMIC Group’s CPB Contractors. His capabilities include Civil and Structural Design, Financial Modelling and Data Science algorithms such as Machine Learning models. Adriano holds a Bachelor and a Master’s Degree in Civil Engineering from Rome’s La Sapienza University and is currently completing his MBA at the University of New South Wales.

Diego de Sartiges

Diego has deep experience in the financial services and management consulting industries, having worked with large corporates, investors and high growth start-ups at the intersection of business strategy, sustainability and technology innovation. Diego joins Pollination from the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, where he led the design and implementation of climate-related initiatives in areas such as data & analytics, carbon markets and sustainable investment. Prior to this he was a Partner at Boston Consulting Group in Singapore, where he spent nearly a decade advising financial institutions in South-East Asia on their strategic, operational and M&A issues, as well as building together with his clients several successful Fintech businesses. He holds an MBA from INSEAD in Singapore and a Master degree from ESSEC Business School and Paris Dauphine University in France.

Marissa Santikarn

Marissa has a decade of experience working on carbon pricing policies as part of broader decarbonisation strategies, including five years at the World Bank climate change group. Previously, she has also held consulting and international development roles on climate change issues in Germany, Australia and Thailand.

Lucy Sanderson

Lucy is an experienced lawyer who has a particular interest in nature and biodiversity-related risks and opportunities and the way in which such issues intersect with and create synergies with climate. Prior to joining Pollination, Lucy worked in MinterEllison’s Climate and Sustainability Risk Governance team. Lucy has assisted key clients in identifying and managing climate- and sustainability-related commercial and legal risks (and opportunities) across their value chains, including in the built environment, financial services and mining sectors. Lucy is experienced in conducting misleading disclosure reviews and verification of corporate disclosures and publications – assisting clients to navigate the increasing risk posed by corporate ‘greenwashing’. 

Beatriz Sampaio

Beatriz Sampaio joins the Advisory team as an Associate and will be based in the Chicago office. Prior to joining Pollination, Beatriz worked at LanzaJet, a leading sustainable aviation fuels company where she was responsible for assessing relevant criteria such as the policy and regulatory environment, feedstock influence on credit values, trade and voluntary markets for SAFs, and carbon intensity score to create a go-to-market strategy for the company. Also, as a Climate Programs Specialist at the City of Evanston’s Office of Sustainability, she was working on the implementation of the City’s Energy and Water Benchmarking Ordinance and a multi-year analysis of performance metrics such as natural gas use, Energy Use Intensity, and greenhouse gas emissions. Beatriz earned a Master’s in Energy and Sustainability from Northwestern University.

Richard Saines ONM

Rick is globally recognized as a climate change leader, and for over two decades has advised governments, multinational companies, financial institutions, funds and project sponsors on the economic transition to a low carbon economy, including being a thought leader on carbon and environmental market transactions. He is officially ranked by Chambers USA and Chambers Global as a leading climate change lawyer, an accolade he has held for over 10 years.

Rick serves on the Board of The Climate Registry, the Governing Council of International Emissions Trading Association (IETA), and the Board of Advisors to the USC Schwarzenegger Institute.

He was Awarded Chevalier of the National Order of Merit by the President of the Republic of France for his significant contribution to the preparation of the Paris Climate Summit, and the implementation of the Paris Agreement.

Stephanie Russo

Stephanie has spent her career working at the interface of financial markets, public policy and conservation.  She brings deep and broad expertise in natural capital, public policy, and regulatory environmental markets and a focus on developing financially robust policies and strategies that advance solutions for nature and climate. Passionate about leveraging the power of markets to accelerate climate action and to protect and restore nature, Stephanie has played leading roles in the development, design and reform of markets for water, energy, carbon and natural capital in Australia and the Asia-Pacific and advised government, business leaders and investors on the most intractable environmental challenges in Australia. Prior to joining Pollination, Steph was a co-founder and Chief Strategy Officer of Carbon Growth Partners, a world leading carbon markets investment manager, led government relations for the Nature Conservancy in the Asia-Pacific region, led the National Australia Bank’s natural capital strategy and established the Australian Government’s first dedicated natural capital financing unit.  Steph holds a Bachelor of Environmental Management and Law with first class honours, a Graduate Diploma in Economic Design and is a qualified project manager.

Kyle Rudzinski

For more than 15 years Kyle has accelerated scalable change at the intersection of climate and capitalism – through the financial sector, at the corporate level, and with the U.S. government. Previously, he led strategy and operations at rePlant Capital, a B Corp focused on climate finance transforming supply chains to regenerative agriculture. He was a sustainability leader at Levi Strauss & Co. and has advised companies like Tesla on sustainable manufacturing. At the U.S. Department of Energy, he led investments in a multimillion dollar solar startup portfolio. Kyle has spoken on the circular economy and regeneration at SXSW, Green Biz, and Sustainable Brands along with giving lectures at Stanford, Harvard, and Berkeley. For his work in climate finance, he was named a Fellow with the Just Economy Institute. He earned an MBA from BerkeleyHaas along with an MEd and a BA from the University of Virginia.

Laura Rogers

Laura brings diverse financial experience across the private, public and not-for-profit sectors. Her drive to transition into sustainability stems from a year spent in Uganda, where she witnessed the inequitable impacts of climate change and the range of innovative market solutions driving sustainable development. Laura has previously worked at Deloitte and New Zealand Police and holds a Bachelor of Commerce/Law from the University of Otago.

Phoebe Roberts

Phoebe Roberts is an Executive Director in the Climate & Sustainability Risk Governance team. Phoebe joins Pollination from APAC’s largest commercial law firm, MinterEllison. She brings over 10 years’ experience as a corporate lawyer to her practice in climate and nature risk governance, strategy and disclosure. Phoebe specialises in embedding net zero commitments and addressing climate change risks (and opportunities) across commercial contracts and transactions. She is the former Director of Implementation and Co-Lead of APAC with The Chancery Lane Project (‘TCLP’) – a first of its kind global initiative of corporate lawyers to re-wire contracts to deliver net zero. In 2022/23, Phoebe lead TCLP’s European Built Environment workstream. In 2023, Phoebe was awarded the Law Council of Australia’s Young Environmental Lawyer of the Year Award (Mahla Pearlman Award) in recognition of her leading expertise in this space.

Will Richards

Will is a Director in the Climate & Sustainability Risk Governance team. Will joins Pollination from the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission where he was a senior member of the Sustainability Taskforce. Will specialises in ‘greenwashing’ in the context of consumer-facing claims and has a particular interest in claims relating to emissions and offsets. He is also experienced in the intersection between competition law and agreements between businesses to collaborate on sustainability, and in incorporating a competition and consumer lens when designing markets to drive sustainability outcomes. He has spoken on these issues in various international and domestic forums.

Hamish Reid

Hamish has 30 years experience in consumer brand building having worked for Fonterra in New Zealand, Danone in Paris and Saatchi & Saatchi in London. In 2005 Hamish’s focus moved to sustainability and climate change, in particular, where he ran consulting projects with the International Olympic Committee, Les Mills and New Zealand Rugby. In 2017 Hamish joined milk nutrition company Synlait’s Executive Leadership Team where over five years he led the company’s repurposing, sustainability strategy and commercialisation. Hamish joins Pollination to support the firm’s advisory clients in the food, fibre, agribusiness and consumer brands sectors. 

Caroline Reed

Caroline is an Executive Assistant in Pollination’s London office and supports Co-Founder & Chair, Tony O’Sullivan. Caroline has worked in executive administration in leading firms for more than two decades. Her experience spans roles in London and Sydney, predominantly in the financial sector. Prior to joining Pollination, Caroline has held roles at firms including O’Sullivan Partners & JPMorgan. She holds a BA (Hons) in Sociology from Southampton University.

Kate Rayson

Kate has applied her deep commercial and marketing expertise to tackle diverse sustainability challenges, in Australia and overseas. At Qantas, she led Qantas Future Planet – the world’s largest airline offset program – developing new carbon neutral products that unlocked new opportunity and revenue. As Engagement Manager at WWF, she led public engagement on the organisation’s largest advocacy campaign – Fight for the Reef – developing strategy that successfully drove policy change at a domestic and international level. She is a graduate of Social Leadership Australia’s Sydney Leadership program; and has been a speaker and programmer at industry events including the Carbon Market Institute Summit.

Felix Qin

Felix is an investment professional with expertise across the energy, climate and nature transition sectors. Felix has strong end-to-end transaction management, commercial due-diligence and financial valuation skills, and has leveraged this in his work across Pollination’s venture capital and project investment strategies.

Before joining Pollination, Felix was at a leading Australian renewable energy investment bank, advising on over 1.5GW of utility-scale solar, wind, hydropower and battery storage. Felix has a Bachelor of Commerce (with Distinction) from the University of New South Wales.

Charl Potgieter

Charl has over 20 years of experience in financial control, management reporting and taxation combined with financial modelling, reporting and data management skills. Most recently Charl was responsible for leading the Finance Team at Blackrock Australia including responsibility for financial control, treasury, cross-border transfer pricing and taxation. He originally qualified as a Chartered Accountant in South Africa and commenced his career in audit at Deloitte, before relocating to Sydney and joining the Deloitte Financial Services audit team. Charl holds Bachelors and Honours degrees from the University of Stellenbosch in South Africa as well as a Diploma in Datametrics from the University of South Africa.

Valerie Pinkerton

Valerie is an interdisciplinary environmental professional with broad experience in philanthropy, policy analysis, and stakeholder engagement to support climate change mitigation and coastal adaptation. She was previously an associate program officer at the Robertson Foundation, making strategic grants to address climate change, protect ocean health, implement invasive predator controls in New Zealand, and support tiger conservation. Prior to this role, Valerie provided research and analysis for policymakers on a range of environmental issues through roles with the Yale Center for Environmental Law and Policy, Natural Resources Defense Council, and the Environmental Law Institute. She received her MEM from Yale University and a BA from Columbia University.

Lara Phillips

Lara has over 15 years of experience in sustainability across the agriculture, FMCG, insurance, and advisory sectors. At Fonterra, she led sustainability solutions for customer and consumer brands across North America, Europe, Asia and Oceania. In this role, Lara led the development of sustainable products, as well as customer emission reduction solutions. She has deep technical knowledge in environmental markets, emissions mitigation and sustainability strategy in agricultural supply chains, alongside broad strategy and governance experience – developing climate strategy at Insurance Australia Group, advising clients on emissions trading and reporting at PwC, and as an external advisor to Bain & Company. At Pollination, Lara has led the development of climate and nature strategies and solutions across a range of sectors including food and fibre, industrial, and aviation. Lara has a Postgraduate Diploma in Environmental Management from the University of Auckland, and an MSc from the University of Canterbury​.

Harrison Pharamond

Harrison has diverse experience across the impact investment and social entrepreneurship space with a focus on emerging markets. Prior to joining Pollination, Harrison spent five years at MCE Social Capital, an impact investment firm where he managed impact measurement and evaluation across a portfolio spanning over thirty-five developing countries and multiple sectors, including sustainable agriculture, clean water, renewable energy, and financial inclusion. Harrison has also consulted for leading impact companies including Sonen Capital, Agora Partnerships, pfc Social Impact Advisors, and Alterna. He has lived and worked in countries across Latin America, sub-Saharan Africa, Southeast Asia, and Europe.

Thea Philip

Thea has broad experience providing strategic and legal advice to private sector, government, and non-profit clients on matters relating to climate and nature strategy, energy, environment, and transition finance. This includes advising on nature-based solutions projects, carbon markets and public-private partnerships for mobilising climate finance to emerging markets and developing economies.​ Prior to joining Pollination, Thea was a commercial lawyer at Ashurst, where she advised on regulatory compliance, carbon markets, carbon neutral certification processes, environmental upgrade finance, native title, and due diligence. She also worked on high profile environmental approvals processes and major infrastructure projects. Previously, Thea worked at the International Energy Agency, where she was engaged in energy policy research and analysis. ​Thea holds a Master of Philosophy in Environmental Policy from the University of Cambridge. While at Cambridge, she undertook additional training in sustainability business skills through the University of Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership.​

Sudish Perera

With a background in regenerative agriculture and financial modelling, Sudish’s experience in sustainability spans across the food, retail, and finance industries. Sudish has worked extensively with clients to drive the transition to regenerative agricultural systems, having delivered regenerative transition cost modelling for a leading UK retailer, transaction support for an Australian carbon project developer, and regenerative solutions design for a major dairy company. Prior to joining Pollination, Sudish worked as a consultant for Deloitte Climate & Sustainability. In this role, Sudish supported the delivery of an agricultural decarbonisation pathways study for a multinational conglomerate, a sustainable agriculture strategy for a major Australian retailer, and a holistic decision support tool – DR.SAT – built to empower Australian farmers to build resilience, particularly in the context of a changing climate. Sudish has on-farm experience from his time supporting Tumpinyeri Growers, an indigenous-led agroecological farm in Central Victoria. He is currently completing a postgraduate diploma in Regenerative Agriculture at Southern Cross University, and holds a BCivEng(Hons)/BCom from Monash University.

Dipti Patel

Dipti has experience helping clients understand the risks, opportunities and impacts resulting from sustainability issues and how to integrate sustainability into corporate-level strategic planning. Prior to joining Pollination, she was a Manager at EY’s Climate Change and Sustainability Services practice where she advised clients across a variety of sectors in designing and implementing sustainability strategies, goals and impact measurement frameworks. Dipti also worked in EY’s Financial Services Consulting practice supporting operational readiness planning and risk management processes. Dipti holds degrees in Environmental Science and Economics from North Carolina State University and a Masters of Accounting from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Candice Pasion

Candice joins Pollination with diverse experience in financial reporting, management accounting, taxation and business services. In her previous roles, she has led end-to-end finance operations in Not-for-Profit and multinational tech organisations. Candice is a Chartered Accountant and holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of Technology, Sydney.

Juan Sebastian Parra

Juan Sebastian has experience advising clients on carbon markets transactions, including conducting due diligence of carbon projects and advising clients on the purchase and sale of carbon credits under emissions reduction purchase agreements (ERPAs) and offtake agreements. Juan Sebastian also has experience in transactions mobilizing blended finance. Prior to joining Pollination, Juan Sebastian worked as an associate in the Bogota, Colombia, office of an international law firm on corporate matters and cross-border M&A transactions. He received his Master of Laws (with Honors) from Northwestern University’s Pritzker School of Law and is admitted to practice law in Colombia and the State of New York. Juan Sebastian speaks English and Spanish (native).

Charlie Parer

Charlie brings a wealth of experience in finance and economics, now dedicated to climate and nature strategy design and implementation. He partners with corporate clients across the food, fashion, pharmaceuticals, and infrastructure sectors to model transition costs, identify financial levers, and structure solutions that ensure both capital efficiency and sustainability goals are met.

Charlie’s background includes experience at a Big 4 firm in supply chain and stakeholder consulting. He then transitioned to an Australian investment bank in equities research, focusing on quantitative analysis and research in the tech and telecom sectors.

Charlie holds a Bachelor of Advanced Finance and Economics with First Class Honors from the University of Queensland and completed an exchange at University College London, where he focused his studies on sustainable energy.

Kimberley Osborn

Kimberley is a driven organisational professional with a focus on building strong relationships and enhancing experiences. She brings a strong knowledge of diverse cultures and organisations gained through extensive international experience, a passion and strong understanding of systems and software engineering. Prior to joining Pollination, Kimberley was a Candidate Experience Coordinator at Atlassian, Project Manager at Bendelta and Executive Assistant at Attestor Limited. Kimberley holds a Bachelor of Commerce degree from the University of Stellenbosch and a Software Engineering Immersive certification from General Assembly.

Hannah Ornatowski

Hannah’s experience centers around driving climate change related strategy in the financial sector, including supporting clients on decarbonization opportunities and assessment of key climate and ESG related risks for their businesses. Prior to joining Pollination, Hannah spent seven years at Goldman Sachs, a leading global financial institution, where she engaged with clients, investors, policymakers and NGOs on climate change, led the firm’s net zero financing commitment, and drove partnership on an innovative blended finance facility that aims to catalyze low carbon project development in South and Southeast Asia. She holds a BA in Political Science with minors in Economics and Chinese from Vassar College.

Sara Oishi

Sara has diverse experience across the technical, legal, and policy aspects of climate change. Prior to joining Pollination she was an Associate at Lathrop GPM, LLP working in the environmental and tort litigation practice group. Sara’s experience includes advising Fortune 500 corporations on complex environmental risk and regulatory issues. Sara also has experience in structuring financial mechanisms to support the energy transition, having spent several years with non-profit and start-up companies helping develop innovative means of financing large scale energy efficiency projects. Her experience also includes analysis of renewable fuel and energy storage technologies. Sara holds environmental engineering degrees from Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Stanford University and a law degree from Vermont Law School.

Jessica Nutt

Jessica brings diverse experience in supply chain and procurement, project management, process improvement and operating model design and implementation. Prior to joining Pollination, Jessica was a management consultant at EY, where she worked on a variety of strategy and operations projects for federal and state government, and private sector clients. She has a particular interest in the role of global supply chains in addressing sustainability and biodiversity challenges.

Devon Northrop

Devon Northrop is a dynamic HR Business Partner with extensive experience in fostering employee engagement and driving organizational success. At Boston Consulting Group, she led the career development team, ensuring seamless execution of priorities and robust support to organizational committees. Previously, at West Monroe Partners, Devon developed performance management programs and coached managers on career progression, significantly enhancing employee satisfaction and diversity metrics. Devon excels in leveraging data-driven insights to optimize HR processes and has a proven track record in conflict resolution, employee relations, and compliance. Her exceptional communication skills facilitate effective collaboration across all organizational levels.

Ricardo (Rick) Nogueira

Rick is an expert on climate finance policy, blended finance and sustainable investing.  He advises major philanthropies, governments, and multilateral development banks on designing and implementing climate finance solutions. Rick is also a Board Member of Washington, DC’s Green Finance Authority, the first municipal Green Bank. Rick previously served in the Obama administration as a Senior Advisor to the Special Envoy for Climate Change where he led on climate finance matters in the lead up to the Paris Agreement and served as a Board Member on the Green Climate Fund. Prior to public service, Rick spent 10+ years in private equity fund management with a focus on emerging markets. He was the Co-founder and Managing Director of the Leaf Clean Energy Company, a $400 million publicly-listed fund targeting clean energy investments across the Americas. Earlier in his career, Rick practiced law with a focus on energy transactions and climate policy.

Kelly Ng

Kelly joins Pollination with experience in deep-tech venture capital in Singapore. At SEEDS Capital, a Singapore government investor, she led end-to-end deal efforts into startups (including sustainability-focused companies in sectors such as renewable energy and the green built environment). She has a diverse set of skills in early-stage investing, strategy development, and multi-stakeholder engagement with public and private organisations. Kelly holds a bachelor’s degree in arts in Literature with first class honours from Yale-NUS College, a joint institution founded by Yale University and the National University of Singapore.

Georgina Murray

Georgina has diverse experience across ESG issues and how finance can create social and environmental change. Prior to joining Pollination, she was the ESG Portfolio Analyst for almost 3 years at Ethical Partners Funds Management supporting the ESG company analysis and engagements as well as developing a carbon emissions portfolio analysis tool. She also has 7 years of experience in the NGO sector with UNICEF Australia as the Marketing Manager and currently is a Mentor at Altiorem. Georgina holds a Bachelor of International and Global Studies with First Class Honours from the University of Sydney.

John Morton

John E. Morton brings more than twenty-five years of experience in emerging markets, climate finance, and economic and environmental policy. Throughout his career, John has been at the forefront of designing and structuring some of the most innovative platforms and investment vehicles to mobilize private capital flows into climate-related sectors in fast-growing global markets. In the Biden Administration, he served as the U.S. Treasury Department’s and Secretary Yellen’s inaugural Climate Counselor, managing and coordinating an historically ambitious set of policies and priorities. During the Obama Administration, John served as the President’s White House Senior Director for Energy and Climate Change, and previously as the Chief of Staff and Chief Operating Officer at the Overseas Private Investment Corporation (now the US DFC). Outside Government, John was Managing Director of Economic Policy at The Pew Charitable Trusts and a private equity investor with the Global Environment Fund. He began his career as a strategy consultant with Mercer and with the World Bank managing environmental infrastructure projects in the former Soviet Union. John lives in Washington DC with his wife and two children.

Travers Morony

Travers has extensive experience providing legal and strategic advice on the financing aspects of key infrastructure and renewable energy projects. Prior to joining Pollination, Travers gained experience at various law firms including Gilbert + Tobin in Sydney and Baker McKenzie in Singapore where he specialised in advising sponsors, arrangers, lenders and borrowers on a broad range of domestic and cross-border debt financing transactions, including a number of sustainability linked and green loan transactions in the nascent Australian sustainable finance market. Travers holds Bachelor of International Studies from the University of Sydney and a Bachelor of Laws from the University of New South Wales.

Georgia Monaghan

Prior to joining Pollination, Georgia was a lawyer at Ashurst for two and a half years, working in tax, corporate transactions and strategic litigation. Georgia has worked on high profile arbitrations, NSW Supreme Court proceedings, public and private M&A and the Royal Commission into Banking. Georgia has experience in due diligence, compliance reporting and corporate governance and has policy and law reform experience from her time as a secondee to the Justice Reform Initiative. Interested in the start-up space, Georgia is a Startmate Fellow and has co-founded an ethical and sustainable fashion blog.

Chelsea Minage

Chelsea is an experienced Payroll Specialist with over 8 years experience processing payroll for both permanent employees and contractors. Prior to joining Pollination, Chelsea worked at a healthcare recruitment company doing end to end payroll for their contractors and managed to streamline the payroll process. Prior to that she worked at a global IT consulting company processing payroll for their permanent employees. Chelsea has a Bachelor of Commerce (Professional Accounting) and has experience across payroll and finance. Outside work, you will find Chelsea playing soccer and taking each day as it comes.

William Marshall

Will has significant experience advising both the public and private sector on strategy and policy. Prior to joining Pollination, Will developed strategic water policy across NSW that focused on enhancing biodiversity and enabling regenerative agriculture. He also recently developed several strategies that establish a sustainable pathway for the different water resources and their dependent industries across NSW for the next 25 years. Will has expertise in ecological management, soil carbon initiatives and climate modelling, and has a MSc in Environmental Science. As a consultant at Deloitte, Will developed commercial strategy in the telecommunications, infrastructure and banking industries and helped develop the business case for the future Western Sydney Parkland City.

Michaela McNeil

Michaela is an experienced senior risk and compliance professional with more than 15 years’ experience. Most recently Michaela was the Head of Compliance for AMP Capital where she was responsible for implementing and managing the compliance and regulatory framework. Michaela acted as the primary risk and compliance advisor across key regulatory reform including Product Design and Distribution obligations (DDO), GDPR; implementing associated risk and compliance frameworks and has extensive experience in regulator and government engagement. Prior to AMP Capital, Michaela worked in various risk and compliance roles including at BT Funds Management, AMP Services, and spent a number of years working both in the private and government sector supporting energy market development.

Giverny McMillan

Giverny is an Executive Assistant & Office Manager in Pollination’s Sydney office, supporting Founder & CEO, Martijn Wilder AM, and Managing Director, Megan Flynn. She was formerly a Legal Secretary at Baker McKenzie and supported various senior lawyers in the Intellectual Property, Technology, Media & Telecommunications Group and The Head of Asia-Pacific Employment Group, before working with Martijn Wilder AM, who was The Global Head of Climate Change Group. She coordinated the operations and logistics of Baker McKenzie’s Asia-Pacific Annual Meetings. Giverny was awarded the Baker McKenzie Professional Development Award in 2018.

James McKinney

James is an investment professional with broad experience across public and private capital markets and strong quantitative and financial modelling skills. Prior to joining Pollination, James worked as an investment consultant in the UK, where he helped large institutional investors solve a range of investment-related challenges such as setting investment strategy, structuring derivative-based hedging strategies, fund selection and implementation. He also supported a number of his clients in integrating climate and other ESG risks into their investment decision making process. James holds a Masters degree in Physics from the University of Warwick and is a Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) charterholder.

Brydy McDonnell

Brydy is the Executive Officer of the Pollination Foundation based in the Melbourne office. Prior to joining Pollination, she acted in a range of advisory roles within the Queensland Department of Environment and Science. Delivering operational management of marine and terrestrial protected areas, she supported strategic programs including the Great Barrier Reef Field Management Program and the Minjerribah Protected Area Expansion Strategy.  Previously, Brydy worked as an Executive Assistant to various senior executives within the Queensland Government developing foundational skills in executive administration, recruitment, and office management.

Andrew McConnell

Andrew is an expert in quantitative and qualitative climate and biodiversity risk modelling, with a strong background in climate finance, sustainable monetary policy, and macroeconomics. Before starting at Pollination he supported the WWF as a lead author in the development of their biodiversity risk methodology report and by making their biodiversity risk tool useable for portfolio risk analysis. Prior to this he consulted in Europe for financial institutions in building transitional and physical climate risk models. His quantitative background was acquired while working as researcher at Germany’s Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research. There he worked doing IAM modelling with the REMIND model team before moving to the research group on climate finance and public economics. While working in this group he made several seminal contributions to the conceptualisation of sustainable monetary and macroprudential policy for central banks and won Oxford’s Sensitive Intervention Point Prize for his development of climate adjusted collateral “haircuts”. The latter of which has become a key component of the ECB and other central bank’s climate strategies.

Luke McClean

Luke is a seasoned public policy advisor with over 13 years experience working across all levels of Government in Australia, Canada, and New Zealand. He has a strong track record of successful policy development and advocacy and is committed to deploying those skills in addressing climate change and advancing nature positivity. Prior to his role at Pollination, Luke played a key role in advising the Independent Member for Warringah, Zali Steggall OAM MP, on all policy areas including crafting a Climate Change Bill for the Australian Government. He consulted with a broad range of stakeholders, including corporate, industry and community, garnering over 6,000 supportive submissions and driving greater ambition from the Government. Luke has advised governments and corporations worldwide on large-scale transformation programs and devised strategies to enhance their ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) performance. Earlier in his career, he worked on diverse areas including social services, human rights and defence. He is committed to working with others to create a more sustainable and equitable future.

Kim McCarthy

Kim has extensive experience leading the design, implementation and governance of carbon offset products, in domestic and international markets. Kim was previously a member of the sustainability team at the Qantas Group, providing strategic leadership on carbon-offset project due diligence, compliance reporting and governance. Kim has experience providing services relating to sustainability assurance, sustainability strategy, climate change advisory and environmental market procurement in multidisciplinary businesses and ASX50 contexts. Kim has a Masters of Conservation Biology and Bachelor of Business Administration from Macquarie University.

Marisa Martin

Marisa has deep experience advising global clients on climate change law and policy, and has been internationally recognised for her work. As a former attorney with Baker McKenzie’sClimate Change Practice, Marisa specialised in advice on carbon transactions, domestic and international climate law and policy, with a focus on the implementation of the Paris Agreement and nature-based climate solutions (e.g., REDD+). Marisa has also provided expert legal analysis on corporate sustainability and renewable energy, water infrastructure and biofuel projects. She was appointed Co-Chair of the American Bar Association’s Climate Change, Climate Change, Sustainable Development and Ecosystem Committee. She has been recognised as an ‘Emerging Lawyer’ in Environmental Law by Leading Lawyers; and an ‘Associate to Watch’ in Climate Change by Chambers. She is licensed to practice law in California and Illinois.

Jacqueline Macalister

Jacqui brings two decades of leadership in sustainability transitions across business, banking, and non-profit sectors, with expertise in food and agriculture strategy, sustainable finance, decarbonisation, and regenerative agriculture.

She held senior roles with IKEA and McDonald’s, where she drove global sustainability and supply chain transformations. Jacqui developed and executed strategies and high-impact programmes that reshaped supply chains at scale, contributing to meeting ambitious sustainability targets across agriculture, animal welfare, and climate. At IKEA Food, she led the integration of nutrition and sustainability functions, pioneering a holistic approach that linked human health with environmental sustainability, driving innovation and impact across global operations.

More recently, Jacqui played a central role in advancing sustainable finance at the Bank of New Zealand (BNZ), managing strategic relationships within the food and agriculture sector. She structured sustainability-linked loans, leading the development of Climate Transition Planning for corporate clients, and advising the NZ Treasury on its inaugural Green Bond. As a board member and advisor to several New Zealand-based companies, Jacqui combines her strategic and commercial expertise with a commitment to sustainability, helping businesses navigate complex challenges and align long-term success with transformative sustainability practices.

Jacqui holds degrees in law and commerce from Otago University and a Master of Studies from the University of Cambridge, with a focus on scalable food system solutions.

Mellisa Ma

Mellisa is a strategy specialist with experience in advising Australia’s largest companies in firm-wide strategic transformations and operating model redesigns. Prior to joining Pollination, Mellisa was a Senior Associate at Strategy&, where she with senior stakeholders across a diverse range of sectors to identify organisations’ capability gaps and strategic ways forward. Mellisa is also a social entrepreneur, co-founder of financial literacy organisation, MoneyGirl. Through MoneyGirl, Mellisa continues to bring together public sector agencies, not-for-profits and corporates to contribute to Australia’s solution to financial education for young women.

Christina Lincir

Christina joins the Washington DC office as an Executive Assistant. Prior to joining Pollination, Christina has worked as an Executive Assistant to the President & CEO of the Trust for the National Mall, as well as supporting other Executive leaders at the organization for nearly three years. Before commencing her career in an Executive Assistant field, Christina spent five years as an HR Coordinator and Recruiter for several companies in Los Angeles where she gained experience in contract negotiations, client and candidate relations, CRM software for people management, payroll and benefits, and employment laws and policies. While earning her degree in History, with a minor in Art History, from the University of California, Los Angeles, she interned at several museums in Los Angeles including the Getty, and she was selected for an internship at the National Archives in Washington DC.

Alicia Liono

Alicia Liono is a sustainability professional with a MSc in Sustainability Management from Columbia University and a BSc in Biology from Imperial College London. She started her career working in the sustainable finance teams of NGOs before transitioning to sustainability consulting in early 2021. Her work exposure spans multiple geographies, including the UK, Asia, and the US, and she has been in the authoring teams of two publications.

Sophie Leitch

Sophie has strong experience advising companies, governments and industry bodies on sustainability, climate and nature. With a particular focus and expertise in environmental markets, Sophie provides legal, policy and strategy advice regarding the implementation of these markets for high-integrity outcomes and the operationalisation Article 6 of the Paris Agreement. With an interest in nature risk and financing, Sophie has also conducted TNFD-aligned nature risk and opportunity assessments for large corporates and supported the development of a toolkit to support investors to understand nature-related risks and opportunities in their portfolios and investment strategies.Prior to joining Pollination, Sophie was a lawyer at Allens, working in the funds, superannuation and banking sectors, with experience advising on complex regulatory and compliance matters, such as greenwashing reviews, for a range of financial services providers, including banks, superannuation funds, insurers and reinsurers and fund managers.

Nikkita Lee

Nikki is a proud member of the Yawuru and Karrajarri people of the West-Kimberley region in Western Australia. Nikki joins the Perth office as Project Coordinator working with Rob Grant, Managing Director – Head of Projects and Erica Lampropoulos, Director – Projects. Prior to joining Pollination, Nikki worked at Fortescue Future Industries and Fortescue Metals Group for over 9 years including working as the Executive Assistant to the Global CEO and as part of the Decarbonisation team. Nikki has had the opportunity to travel across multiple countries as part of Fortescue’s Green Energy Strategy.

Tasha Lea

Tasha brings experience providing legal and strategic advice to governments and corporates on carbon markets, climate law and policy, and electricity industry regulation. She was formerly a lawyer at a top-tier New Zealand law firm advising clients across the transactional and advisory space on carbon sequestration projects, the New Zealand Emissions Trading Scheme, sustainable development and various regulatory projects in the electricity and renewable energy sectors. Tasha also holds a LLM in environmental law from the University of New South Wales, where she took particular interest in ecological economics and using policy mechanisms to direct additional investment toward natural capital assets. She is also a Board member of an NGO providing small scale microfinance to communities in Myanmar.

Heng Dean Law

Heng Dean started his career with the Singapore Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA). He spent 9 years with MFA and was a First Secretary at the Singapore Embassy in Jakarta from 2005-2009. Heng Dean was with investment firm Temasek from 2011 till 2022 where he managed strategic relationships in South East Asia and supported Temasek’s investments in the region. Heng Dean also worked on sustainability and climate issues, including the setting up of GenZero, a S$5 billion investment platform wholly-owned by Temasek that focuses on carbon markets and decarbonization, where Heng Dean worked on strategy and organizational matters. From 2022 to 2023, Heng Dean was a Senior Advisor on Carbon Markets and Sustainability with an Indonesian listed palm oil company PT Triputra Agro Persada.  Heng Dean has a B.Sc. in Accounting and Finance from the London School of Economics and an MBA from INSEAD.

Steven Lang

Steven is an experienced systems change leader with an extensive track record advising global corporates, particularly in the food and consumer goods sectors, and enabling multi-stakeholder coalitions.  Prior to joining Pollination, Steven was a Partner with Systemiq where he led some of the firm’s most significant work in the Food and Agriculture system, and in the area of regenerative business models, including the design and mobilisation of a significant multi-stakeholder action platform to scale regenerative food systems.  He has also served as an advisor to various international organisations and philanthropic foundations on financing regenerative food systems, and was a Partner with EY where he qualified as a Chartered Accountant, and developed extensive experience in the areas of strategy, corporate finance, supply chain transformation, and sustainability.  Steven led much of the firm’s work in the area of Natural and Social Capital measurement and valuation, being one of the leading contributors to the Natural Capital Protocol and serving as a member of ICAEW’s Global Sustainability Committee.

Erica Lampropoulos

Erica has worked in leadership roles across renewable energy and decarbonisation projects and strategy. Erica joins Pollination from Fortescue Future Industries, where she led the development of green hydrogen projects in her role as Regional Manager Hydrogen. Her career also includes roles at Electricity Generation and Retail Corporation trading as Synergy, Herbert Smith Freehills and Knowledge Society. Erica is currently a board member of Palmerston Association and Primary Focus.​

Rebecca Lake

Rebecca has over a decade of experience advising governments and corporate clients on sustainability and communication strategy. Prior to joining Pollination, Rebecca consulted for the United Nations on a portfolio of agriculture, land-use, clean energy and industrial development projects throughout Africa, Asia, Eastern Europe and Latin America. Rebecca started her career in Indonesia, where she managed stakeholder engagement for the National Action Plan for Sustainable Palm Oil, the first industry wide commitment of its kind. Inspired by her upbringing in rural Australia, and experience working at the coalface of the global environmental crisis, Rebecca is passionate about enabling an inclusive and just climate transition. She holds a Master of Business Administration, with a specialisation in finance, from UNSW’s Australian Graduate School of Management where she is recognised as a Women in Leadership Scholar. 

Holly Kramer

Holly is a prominent Australia and New Zealand board director, with a broad range of roles on listed, unlisted and not for profit organisations.  She also speaks publicly about her many passions including sustainability, gender equity and leading businesses through purpose and culture and is currently focused on driving sustainability in the Food and Agriculture sectors.  In her current portfolio, Holly sits on the board of Australia’s leading food retailer, Woolworths Group, and is chair of the board’s Sustainability Committee.  She is a director on the board of Fonterra Group, New Zealand’s largest business and a listed dairy cooperative with sector leading sustainability credentials.  Holly is also a director of NBryo, an unlisted agri-tech start up business, a Pro Chancellor of Western Sydney University and sits on the board of indigenous scholarship group, the GO (Goodes-O’Loughlin) Foundation. Holly is also a member of Bain & Company Advisory Council. In her executive career, Holly was the CEO of apparel retailer Best & Less.  Prior to that role, she had more than 20 years’ experience in general management and marketing at Pacific Brands, Telstra and Ford Motor Company (in Australia and the US.)  Holly is also the recipient of the Sir Charles McGrath Award for a distinguished career in Marketing.

Juliette Kennedy

Juliette has largely worked in the not-for-profit law sector, spending the last five years working for the National Justice Project, a firm utilising strategic litigation and public interest lawyering to advance the interests of marginalised communities in Australia, particularly First Nations Australians, asylum seekers and refugees. Her work has included supporting clients through the NSW and WA coronial inquest jurisdictions and advocating for the prevention of deaths in custody. Juliette holds a B.A in International Development from the University of New South Wales and is currently completing a Juris Doctorate at Macquarie University.

Jayden Kennedy

Jayden is a multifaceted professional with expertise in finance, engineering, and corporate strategy. Prior to joining Pollination, Jayden was a product strategy analyst at Ford Motor company, where he developed models that fed the electrification strategy of Ranger and Everest vehicles. Additionally, he has experience in equity research with a global small-mid cap fund manager and in mining equipment maintenance engineering with Rio Tinto. Jayden graduated from the University of Western Australia with a Master of Professional Engineering majoring in mechanical engineering, and a Bachelor of Science majoring in mechanical engineering and French language.

Olivia Kelly

With a background in law, Olivia brings deep analytical capability – helping identify and navigate climate risk and opportunity and build business and supply chain resilience. Prior to Pollination, Olivia was a lawyer at Herbert Smith Freehills, advising public and private companies on contentious aspects of major corporate and financial transactions, corporate governance, regulatory compliance and risk management. Olivia advised clients in high profile contested litigation matters, including financial services regulatory matters, shareholder class actions, competition and anti-bribery and corruption proceedings. She has consulted on business and human rights issues including private sector accountability for environmental and human rights impacts in the Asia-Pacific, and identification and remedy of supply chain risks. She brings experience in policy and law reform from her experience in community legal and pro bono matters and is a current member of the Australian Lawyers for Human Rights – Business & Human Rights Sub-Committee.

Jonathan Kelly

Jonathan has more than 22 years’ fund management and direct investment experience, working with high growth businesses, founders and management teams to maximise long-term value creation. His experience spans growth private equity, venture capital and technology operations. In 2017, Jonathan co-founded Odyssey Private Equity, an Australian-based mid-market firm, raising A$275m from institutional investors. Prior to Odyssey, Jonathan was an executive with CHAMP Ventures, where he successfully invested across five funds totalling more an A$1 billion in committed capital. He has also served as a director of the Australian Investment Council, the peak body for private capital in Australia.​ Jonathan has worked in operational roles as an electrical engineer during his early career, including four years with Cochlear Limited where he led the development of clinical software and manufacturing test systems.

Beth Keddie

Beth is an experienced strategist and innovation leader having developed and implemented transformational strategies across multiple sectors in response to disruptive change. She formerly led strategy, product and commercial venturing at Jemena and Energy Queensland’s subsidiary Yurika in response to sectoral transformation driven by renewables and digitalisation. This included the creation of new businesses, development of award-winning products and customer engagement initiatives that were progressed from pilot trials to core business. She also has entrepreneurial experience working directly in and with start ups and early-stage ventures and has successfully established partnerships to accelerate corporate innovation and product development.

Ami Kadota

Ami is an Office Assistant in the Sydney office. With several years of experience in customer service and office management, she has honed her skills in providing exceptional support and ensuring client satisfaction. Prior to joining Pollination, Ami served as the Student Services and Experience Manager at Navitas English for both Perth and Sydney campuses. She has experience reviewing systems and procedures to ensure compliance with the National standards for ELICOS providers.

Catalina Jugravescu

Catalina has broad experience as an investment strategist supporting institutional clients achieve their financial and sustainability goals. Prior to joining Pollination, she was a Strategist within the Private Markets team at the Universities Superannuation Scheme (USS) where she established the climate risk framework for private equity, private credit, real estate and infrastructure, designed new fund structures for transition-focused investments and contributed to the overall USS Net Zero trajectory. Catalina also worked at BlackRock providing Outsourced Chief Investment Officer (CIO) services for pension funds and insurance clients across Europe. At Pollination, Catalina is focused on supporting financial institutions transition their investments to net-zero, nature positive outcomes and identify innovative financing mechanisms to mobilize capital towards transition across corporates, financial institutions and philanthropic capital. Catalina holds a degree in Economics from University College London (UCL) and an MSc in Economics and Policy of Energy and the Environment at UCL and is a CFA® charterholder.

Kalika Jayasekera

Kalika Jayasekera joins Pollination following a 20-year career in global asset management based in London. She most recently played a key role in transforming Softbank’s Vision Fund Investment Management business, where she was a Board Director and Global Chief Compliance Officer. Prior to that, she was responsible for driving and implementing significant operational change at Blackstone in her role as EMEA Head of Regulatory Affairs and Compliance. She has also held positions as General Counsel and Head of Compliance for over 10 years in the European hedge fund industry. Kalika serves as an Emeritus Governor of the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) and is an external member of the LSE’s Governance Committee

Tatum Joseph

Tatum is an experienced lawyer advising on climate and sustainability related risk using a corporate law lens. Prior to joining Pollination, Tatum worked in MinterEllison’s Climate and Sustainability Risk Governance team. While at MinterEllison, she was seconded to the Business and Human Rights team at the Human Rights Law Centre. Tatum has assisted clients to address critical climate, sustainability and human rights related risks (and opportunities) across their operations and value chains, including in financial services, the retail sector and the mining and energy sectors. Tatum is experienced in conducting misleading disclosure reviews and responding to the associated litigation risks – assisting clients to navigate corporate ‘greenwashing’ and ‘blue-washing’ risk.

Claire Johnston

Claire joins Pollination with a strong background in engineering and sustainability. During her time in Air New Zealand’s engineering graduate program she gained hands-on experience across sustainability, business strategy, and aircraft maintenance, contributing to projects involving financial modelling of climate risks, climate-related disclosures, and circular economy strategies. Prior to Air New Zealand, Claire worked in Beca’s Sustainable Buildings team and its start-up, BTune, uncovering strategies to reduce the climate impact of the building sector. Claire holds a Bachelor of Mechanical Engineering (Hons) from the University of Canterbury.

Rob Jesudason

Rob is the Chief Executive Officer and Founding Partner of Serendipity Capital, which he established in 2020. Serendipity is a permanent capital vehicle that invests in B2B technologies aligned with transformational trends in financial services, including quantum computing, artificial intelligence and sustainability.

The firm’s portfolio includes investments Quantinuum, QuantrolOx, Deep Labs, EFM, Encompass, Mirato and Pollination. Serendipity is majority-owned by its principals, all of whom have deep experience in the financial services and technology sectors. At the end of the first quarter of 2023, its assets were valued at c.US$420 million and it had recorded an IRR on capital invested of 32.3% since inception.

Before founding Serendipity, Rob spent over 27 years operating and investing in the financial services and technology industries. He was a senior investment banker covering financial institutions before joining Commonwealth Bank of Australia and becoming its Chief Financial Officer and a member of its Executive Committee. He has previously worked for Credit Suisse, JPM, Barclays and McKinsey & co.

Rob holds a Bachelor of Science degree from Aston University, from which he also received an honorary doctorate in 2022.

Dr. Jane (Carter) Ingram

Carter has over 15 years of experience at the forefront of integrating nature into sustainable development across Africa, Asia, Latin America and the United States. Prior to joining Pollination, Carter was a Senior Manager in EY’s Climate Change and Sustainability Services practice where she advised food/agriculture, real estate, infrastructure and tourism businesses in designing and implementing ESG goals and strategies, programs and impact measurement, with a focus on natural capital. Carter’s previous experiences include launching and leading the Ecosystem Services program and the Science for Nature and People Partnership (SNAPP) for the Wildlife Conservation Society, where she worked with governments, multi-lateral institutions, NGOs and businesses to conduct scientific analyses, develop new collaborations and implement initiatives to advance conservation and sustainable development globally. Carter completed a Post-doctoral fellowship at the Earth Institute of Columbia University and has a M.Sc. and D.Phil. from the School of Geography and the Environment of Oxford University. She has co-edited two books and written over 60 articles, reports and publications on biodiversity and ecosystem services, climate change, poverty reduction and economic development. Carter is currently an Adjunct Associated Professor in the School for Foreign Service at Georgetown University and serves on the SNAPP Science Advisory Council, the Technical Advisory Council for the UNDP Equator Initiative, the International Working Group for the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures and has been co-leading a USG working group on Natural Capital Accounting in the United States.

Jane Hutchinson

Jane is a leader in nature conservation with over 20 years experience as an Executive and Non-Executive Director of multiple and varied conservation organisations including Accounting for Nature, The Nature Conservancy Australia Program, Australian Land Conservation Alliance, Midlands Conservation Fund and Tasmanian Land Conservancy. Jane is a fellow of the Barbara Thomas Fellowship, the Harvard Club of Australia and is a former Tasmanian Australian of the Year for her contribution to nature conservation.

Samim Hoshmand

With a background of nature conservation and climate change, Samim has over 12 years of experience in various capacities with the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP), United Nations Industrial Development Programme (UNIDO), International Federation of Red Cross Society (IFRC) and Heinrich Böll Stiftung (hbs). He was also the National Ozone Officer implementing Montreal Protocol and Vienna Convention for over 5 years. In May 2019 he has appointed a senior role as Director of Climate Change for Afghanistan, supervising over 40 staff and experts. In this role, he helped with securing over $22 million from the Green Climate Fund for Afghanistan. He also instructed climate change and environment laws at Kabul Education University. Samim was the founder and chairman of the Board for Environment Watch Afghanistan Society (EWA). He published several papers on nature conservation and climate change and authored a book in Farsi called “Towards Green Future” which he dedicated to Afghanistan’s natural beauty. Samim represented Afghanistan at various COPs and global meetings and actively negotiated and participated in media advocacy campaigns encouraging green development.

Deia Housen

Deia has deep experience in advising global financial institutions, corporates and governments on natural capital investments, sustainable and blended finance structures, and transition corporate finance solutions. She is currently a member of the Pollination investment team, supporting the scaling of private capital investments into nature. She joined Pollination in February 2022 as a member of the London Advisory team, where she advised corporates and governments on sustainable and blended finance products and funding structures. She supported Tony O’Sullivan, Founder & Chair of Pollination, in his role as Chair of the Natural Capital Investment Alliance (NCIA), part of the Sustainable Markets Initiative (SMI), bringing together leading asset managers to demonstrate the opportunity for private capital investments into natural capital. Deia was seconded to Climate Asset Management, member of SMI NCIA, to support with the fundraising and marketing of the Natural Capital Strategy. ​Prior to joining Pollination, Deia worked at BlackRock for over two years in the strategy and solutions teams, where she led the strategic engagement with senior executives of the largest wealth and institutional clients in the Netherlands, Nordics and FraBeLux region. She managed the engagement with these clients to co-develop BlackRock’s sustainability offering across different business areas, including Alladin, financial market advisory, and active, passive and real asset funds.  She earned a dual Master of Science degree at Bocconi University (CEMS) in International Management. She speaks Dutch, English, Italian and French. ​Deia leads the volunteering activities with the London office, while undertaking various personal volunteering activities.

Kate Hilder

Kate is skilled in content development, knowledge management and corporate governance.  Her commitment to leveraging knowledge as a strategic asset empowers teams, builds capability and supports business success. With seven years as a Corporate Governance and Knowledge Management Consultant for MinterEllison, together with her previous experience in legal education, legal publishing and product development, Kate brings a wealth of expertise to her role at Pollination.

Inês Henriques

Ines is an alternative investment fund operations professional passionate about nature-based solutions as part of the global effort to accelerate biodiversity conservation and sustainable development.  With a diverse background and over nine years of experience in impact finance, Ines brings multilingual capabilities and expertise in fund administration, portfolio accounting, regulatory compliance, performance analysis, investor relations, and cross-functional collaboration with key stakeholders. Prior to joining Pollination, Ines was a Fund Controller of the Private Assets Operations at a recognised impact-driven asset manager. In this role, she led the day-to-day operations of Luxembourg impact investing funds, focusing on emerging markets and innovative solutions to environmental challenges, where she gained practical experience in voluntary carbon market trading.

Matthew Herington

Matt is a technical specialist in carbon and biodiversity markets, energy transitions and international development. His professional career of over 15 years has been shaped by formal training and experience at the nexus of science, policy and practice, enabling a focus on delivering high impact, high integrity climate solutions both in Australia and across emerging economies. Prior to joining Pollination, Matt was Principal Consultant for Ndevr Environmental and the technical lead for its nature-based solutions work stream – delivering corporate advisory solutions including land-based carbon offset project due diligence, origination, audit and assurance. His career also includes advisory roles with Queensland and Western Australian energy policy divisions, science-based roles with UQ’s Centre for Policy Futures and CSIRO, and has completed several international assignments across the Asia-Pacific region, including projects in Papua New Guinea, India and Nepal. Matt is an accredited expert and auditor under the Accounting for Nature Framework.

Dave Haynes

Dave brings over 20 years of helping start-up and growth stage companies achieve their objectives. His extensive skillset lies in executive leadership, vision adaptation and operations in such areas as impact venture capital, climate finance, and the benefit corporation movement. Prior to joining Pollination, Dave established rePlant to create economically enticing models to enact systemic change as well as provide vision, fundraising, investor relations, and thought leadership in the burgeoning field of regenerative agriculture.

Anna Hancock

Anna is an energy system, climate transition and ESG professional with 25 years of power and resources sector experience. As Executive Director at Pollination, Anna works in industrial decarbonisation and power strategy.

Most recently, Anna established and led the Sustainability and Climate Change function at EnergyAustralia, and negotiated the Climate Transition Action Plan. She readily integrates climate drivers into strategy, policy, risk, and capital allocation agendas, having previously headed corporate finance, investor relations, supply, and retail operations. Prior to joining EnergyAustralia, Anna held senior roles in mining, including establishing BHP’s first office in China to source engineering equipment for sites across the globe.

Anna was recently appointed to the Board of the Clean Energy Regulator and Chairs the Board of the Renewable Energy Alliance. She has an MBA from INSEAD, France, (Honours List), and bachelor’s degrees from the University of Melbourne / Universiteit van Amsterdam.

Rob Grant

For 25 years, Rob has been personally and professionally passionate about advocating for and delivering climate change abatement and clean energy policy, regulation, projects investments, businesses and industries. His professional career includes roles as Director Energy at Fortescue Metals Group responsible for the company’s energy and green hydrogen businesses, Chair of the Clean Energy Investor Group, Senior Vice President Clean Power and Vice President Capital for SNC-Lavalin in Asia Pacific and for 18 years until July 2014 helped position Pacific Hydro as Australia’s most successful and dynamic international clean energy utility. Rob holds a Bachelor of Civil Engineering and has completed an MBA and Master of Applied Finance at Melbourne and Macquarie Universities.

Ariadne Gorring

Ariadne is passionate about Indigenous-led cultural conservation, working with the Kimberley Land Council (KLC) for over 20 years on native title and cultural and natural resource management. Ariadne worked with 14 Native Title groups to register the West Kimberley on the National Heritage List. She led the registration of the North Kimberley Savanna Carbon Projects – the first in Australia to be registered on native title lands. She has engaged with national and international networks to promote best practice models of Indigenous led conservation. She was a Committee Member, World Indigenous Network Conference in Darwin; and Presenter at World Parks Congress, Sydney, and United Nations Climate Change Conference, Paris. She’s an Atlantic Fellow for Social Equity Melbourne University; and recipient of The Nature Conservancy’s Barbara Thomas Fellowship in Conservation Financing.

Susie Gleeson-Byrne

Susie is a People and Culture leader who is passionate about delivering great people practices and developing innovative, team-oriented cultures that foster individual success and career growth. She has a strong track record of partnering with business leaders and bringing clear strategic vision to help drive success.

Susie has a global outlook and her broad experience spans three continents and several different industries, from technology and music to investment banking. She is passionate about equality of access to opportunities and contributing to a just and sustainable society.

Erin Gianferrara

Erin is an Environmental Economist with over ten years’ experience. Her work focuses on natural capital valuation, nature risk analysis, and biodiversity impact assessments to inform investment decisions. Erin’s recent projects include supporting the Kenyan Government to develop an environmental markets-based funding mechanism to support biodiversity, forest conservation and sustainable livelihoods, and supporting a leading global asset manager to integrate nature impacts and dependencies into investment screening criteria with an aim to increase the biodiversity value of their forest portfolio. Erin’s current projects include developing corporate biodiversity strategies as well as supporting private equity firms to develop climate and nature investment strategies including tech-based and nature-based carbon credit generation and procurement.

Nihal George

Nihal brings 18 years of global experience at the intersection of financial services, technology and sustainability. He has led strategy, commercial, product and operations teams in venture backed startups and as an advisor to corporates and investors in Australia, South East Asia and India. Previously, Nihal ran corporate development and business operations at Brighte, a renewable energy fintech where he led board strategy, launched new market propositions and setup a partnerships team. Prior to that, Nihal helped setup and grow the digital acceleration and ventures platform at Oliver Wyman, where he served financial institutions, corporates, investors and development agencies across APAC. Beyond climate transition, Nihal is passionate about championing diversity. Having lived across three continents, including a decade in Singapore, he brings a multi cultural and entrepreneurial approach to teams. Nihal is an advisor to early stage startups solving financial inclusion and climate challenges and was previously an impact fellow with Acumen fund’s Singapore volunteer chapter. Nihal holds an MBA from INSEAD in addition to a Masters in Physics and Bachelors in Mechanical Engineering.

Natalia Gaviria

Natalia is an Assistant Accountant based in the Sydney office. Prior to joining Pollination, Natalia was the Finance Manager of a group of 15 businesses around Sydney across industries including retail, recruitment and farming. Natalia is experienced in accounts management, accounts payable and receivable, budgeting and forecasting as well as payroll and taxation. Earlier in her career, Natalia has also performed roles in marketing, tax accountancy and business consultancy.

Jennifer Gan

Jenny is a multidisciplinary designer with a background in business development and marketing. Her main goal is to communicate powerful ideas with visual impact and clarity. Prior to joining Pollination, Jenny worked at HZ, an award-winning creative agency, where she managed the business development graphic design process and implementation. She was also across designing eye-catching strategic presentations and proposals, helping bring in clients of all industries – including real estate, technology, hospitality, healthcare, automotive, and more. Jenny holds Bachelor’s degrees in both Graphic Design and Marketing from the University of Maryland.

Kirsty Galloway-McLean

Kirsty is a leader in global environmental governance and knowledge management, including 15 years with the UN working on sustainable development and information sharing. She is passionate about making policies practical, information accessible, and the power of people-led nature conservation. Kirsty previously led the climate change and communications department of the Traditional Knowledge Initiative at Japan’s United Nations University, and she set up the first globally distributed information exchange system under international law for the Convention on Biological Diversity in Montreal. She ran the cross-disciplinary research Centre for the Mind at the Australian National University, was an advisor on risk assessment and intellectual property for the Australian government, and established BioChimera, a Melbourne-based consulting firm that specialises in assisting international environmental agencies and philanthropic foundations working with Indigenous peoples. Kirsty has authored four books on climate change and Indigenous peoples, edited several scientific and technical journals, and written numerous articles on climate change adaptation, mitigation, REDD+, safeguards, access and benefit-sharing, Indigenous livelihoods, and traditional knowledge.

Philip Furlong

Phil is an experienced design and brand specialist and joins the team as a Design Manager, based in Sydney. He has spent the last ten years leading design, brand & content teams within a leading financial services B Corp & WME certified brand house across education, health & emergency services. As the Design Manager, he was instrumental in building the organisation’s design capabilities across brand, social, lifecycle, acquisition & operational areas supporting business asset growth from $1 billion to $9 billion. He played key roles in the development of 5 new brand propositions & launches, including a new digital bank, as well as creation of the corporate master brand. As part of the Marketing leadership team, he worked closely with Digital Services, Corporate Affairs, CSR, Sponsorship & Sales to deliver to the organisation’s strategic plan. He also has significant experience in financial services risk & compliance requirements. Across his career, he has held senior design & creative management positions with multiple advertising agencies, including DDB & STW group as design & studio lead for Audi, Foxtel, Vodafone, NRMA and Fidelity International.

Steven Frost

Steven is a program management professional who will be supporting Pollination’s U.S. Government grant implementation portfolio. Prior to joining Pollination, Steven worked at IREX implementing U.S. State Department and USAID grant programs in Ukraine and Moldova. Steven’s work helped boost the resilience of Ukraine’s people, government, and civil society during Russia’s invasion and supported local governments in Moldova to become more transparent, effective, and responsive to their citizens. Steven has a B.S. in International Politics from Georgetown University, and also has prior experience with marketing, communications, and government relations.

Isabelle Franklin

Prior to joining Pollination, Isabelle worked as a policy adviser at the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet for four years, advising the Prime Minister across a variety of policy areas including climate policy, innovation and science policy and infrastructure policy. Isabelle is the Vice-Chair and Board Director of the Australian Youth Affairs Coalition, the Chair of the Young Women’s Council of Australia, a Global Shaper with the World Economic Forum and on the Institute of Public Administration Australia’s Future Leaders Committee. Isabelle is also a coordinator with Foundations for Tomorrow, and works with CARE Australia to analyse the impacts of climate change on gender and with Jasiri Australia to encourage young women to engage with the policy development process. Isabelle holds a Bachelor of Science (Neuroscience) and a Bachelor of Laws (Hons) from the Australian National University and has been admitted to practice as a lawyer to the New South Wales Supreme Court. Isabelle is currently completing a Master of Public Policy, specialising in climate policy, at the Crawford School.

Megan Flynn

Megan has been at the forefront of corporate sustainability strategy, climate law, carbon markets, and sustainability consumer trends for over 15 years. She formerly led sustainability at the Qantas Group, growing its commercial carbon offset program to be the largest of any airline in the world and negotiating on behalf of the aviation industry under its United Nations governing body. Prior to this she was an Associate in the Global Environmental Markets team at Baker McKenzie. She is a Non-executive Director of Carbon Markets Institute and Melbourne University’s Sustainable Society Institute. She is a Research Partner of Harvard University’s Sustainability Transparency Accountability Research (STAR) Lab and a graduate of the Harvard Social Leadership Program.

Luke Fletcher

With a background in both the energy industry and climate-change research, Luke has extensive experience advising companies and large institutional investors on ESG integration and climate-related risks and opportunities. Having worked as a senior ESG analyst in the investor research team at CDP, Luke developed methodology frameworks under TCFD and was lead author on a number of CDP’s award winning sector research reports. Prior to this, Luke worked in the oil & gas industry as a Petroleum Engineer at BP across assets in Angola and an offshore rotation in the North Sea. Luke holds an MSci from Cambridge in Natural Sciences, specialising in Materials Science & Metallurgy. He was named among the top 10 SRI analysts in Extel IRRI 2019.

Veda FitzSimons

Veda has strong environmental markets expertise and advises a range of corporates and governments across climate and nature matters.  With a particular focus on nature risk and natural capital, Veda has advised a range of APAC government entities on early policy positioning regarding voluntary biodiversity credit markets. Veda contributed to the development of Pollination’s proprietary nature risk assessment methodology and has conducted pilot TNFD-aligned nature risk assessments for ASX-listed entities and nature strategy work. With strong carbon markets expertise, Veda provides legal and policy advice regarding the operationalisation of Article 6 of the Paris Agreement and has a particular focus on opportunities across blue carbon methodologies and mechanisms to support their economic viability. Prior to joining Pollination Veda was a lawyer at Ashurst, with experience in the Environment & Planning team.

Ella Edwards

Ella’s expertise spans the agriculture and textile industries with experience in environmental policy, land management, conservation and restoration, global supply chains and corporate ESG. Ella has a Master’s of Environmental Science and Law and has worked across research, development and marketing within the agricultural sector in Australia and the global textile supply chain in China, India and Europe. Within the textile industry, Ella has provided policy and compliance advice under the European Green Deal Agenda and Circular Economy Action Plan and designed and implemented company-wide sustainability strategies. Prior to joining Pollination, Ella led the development of the feasibility study for a large soil carbon sequestration project in Zimbabwe.

Vicky Drake

With a background in marketing and advertising, as well as a law degree, Vicky ran her own recruitment agency for five years before heading in-house as our Talent Acquisition Partner. Some of Vicky’s previous clients include UNICEF Australia, Circular Economy Systems, TBWA, Lion, McDonald’s, Virgin Money and RSPCA.

Lauren Drake

Lauren has global experience in environmental markets and has deep experience in climate law, policy and finance, with a particular focus on carbon markets and nature-based solutions. As an Executive Director at Pollination and previously, a climate change lawyer at Baker McKenzie’s Global Climate Change practice, Lauren provides expert advice to clients in strategy, risk and governance, as well as law and policy, thereby unlocking new value and helping companies and governments to build organisational resilience to the climate change challenge.

Anna Draganova

Anna has 12 years experience providing strategic advice to financial services institutions in the risk and compliance space. Prior to joining Pollination, Anna was a Director at EY’s Financial Services Risk Management practice where she led the delivery of large-scale climate and credit risk transformation projects for banking clients in the UK and EMEIA. Anna was also part of EY’s Sustainable Finance leadership team tasked with the design and roll-out of strategic advisory services to financial institutions in the ESG space. Prior to joining EY’s London based Credit Risk team, she worked in the M&A teams in Belgium and Bulgaria where she focused on corporate finance, business valuations and financial due diligence for financial institutions and corporate clients.

Sarah Denman

Sarah has extensive experience advising companies and governments on sustainability, climate and nature.

Sarah guides clients on nature-positive corporate strategy, including nature and biodiversity risks and opportunities, nature-positive supply chain engagement, alignment with the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures and target-setting. Sarah also works with governments and non-government stakeholders to understand and develop climate change laws and policies, including engagement with voluntary carbon markets.

Prior to joining Pollination, Sarah advised governments and companies on environmental and climate change law and policy at environmental law NGO ClientEarth. She has sat on the Law Society of England and Wales Climate Change Working Group, which advises the legal profession on climate change. She was invited to provide evidence on sustainability to both to the Welsh Climate Change Committee and the EU Commission, and has spoken on the nexus of climate change and gender at COP26. She previously spent several years at Allen & Overy in London as a regulatory lawyer in the international capital markets department (including secondments to Hong Kong and Goldman Sachs).

Sarah holds a Law with French Law LLB from University College London and a Diploma in French law from the Université Panthéon-Assas (Paris II).

Tara Davids

Tara brings end-to-end strategy to execution experience, with a focus on scaling food and technology-led ventures. Prior to Pollination, she worked in operations and finance at rePlant Capital, a climate finance B Corp transforming the supply chains of food companies to regenerative agriculture and manager of a climate debt fund investing in projects to improve on-farm soil health, carbon storage, and biodiversity. Tara previously worked at technology platform start-ups in Silicon Valley, bringing together product innovation with operational detail and P&L management. A former strategy consultant with Monitor Deloitte / The Monitor Group, she has advised Fortune 500 companies on corporate strategy, sales and marketing strategy, and M&A. Tara holds a BA from Stanford University and MBA from Dartmouth College.

James Daniel

James is an experienced advisor to private, public and non-profit clients on high-stakes investments, acquisitions and other transactions. He previously worked as a lawyer at Allens with a personal focus on the role of technology in addressing climate change. This included advising early stage climate tech companies on capital raisings, use of data and commercial contracting. During this time James also worked extensively in the health sector including on the negotiation of AstraZeneca’s supply of its COVID-19 vaccine to the Australian and New Zealand Governments. James was the Pro Bono Coordinator for the Allens Sydney office for two years and responsible for building and maintaining strategic partnerships with pro bono clients. James holds degrees in Laws and Arts (majoring in Psychology and Philosophy) from the University of Sydney. 

Max Dalton

Max has 10 years’ professional experience spanning structured finance, project finance, funds management, and transactions, underpinned by a foundation in commercial law. Starting his career at Australian law firm, Holding Redlich, Max transitioned from private practice to hybrid legal and commercial roles, leveraging his expertise to deliver value across diverse industries.​

Before Pollination, Max was Head of Legal and Business Management at an impact investment manager, working closely with CEO Oliver Yates on energy transition and project finance transactions and collaborating with teams across operations and fund development and distribution. Prior to this, he was Commercial & Legal Director at Australia and New Zealand’s leading project financier for screen productions, where he led a team across transactions, business management, policy development, and client and investor relations.​

Max’s commitment to impactful work has seen him engage with various community and civil society organisations, including the International Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, the Australian Law Reform Commission, and the Marrickville Legal Centre.​

He holds an MBA from AGSM UNSW (Excellence) and a combined Bachelor of Laws (Honours) and International Studies (Distinction) from UNSW.

Gemma Cranston

Gemma has deep experience working on nature with business, government, financiers, and researchers. She has a strong track record of leading the development and deployment of company engagements to identify strategic and commercially relevant approaches to protect and restore nature. She is accustomed to working in an international environment and collaborating cross-functionally with key senior stakeholders in a wide-range of business sectors including fashion, food and beverage, retail, and water sectors. Gemma joins Pollination from the University of Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership (CISL) where she was Director, Business and Nature, spearheading their thought-leadership on what business leadership looks like in the face of the nature crisis.

Matthew Cranford

Matthew is an Executive Director in our Washington D.C. office. Prior to joining Pollination, Matthew held various roles at the U.S. Department of the Treasury over the past 9 years, including, most recently, Senior Policy Advisor for Climate and Sustainable Finance, where he lead strategy for Treasury’s international engagement on sustainable finance and climate-related financial risks, including at the FSB, G20, G7, OECD, and Coalition of Finance Ministers for Climate Action. He holds a PhD in Environmental Policy & Development from LSE, a MSc in Environmental Technology, Environmental Economics & Policy Specialization from Imperial College London and a BSc in Biology with a minor in Chemistry from the University of Virginia​.

Dr. Helen Crowley

Dr. Crowley has a 30+ year career underpinning her global expertise in biodiversity across public and private sectors designing and implementing nature based and natural climate solutions, nature/biodiversity business strategy, investment and financing opportunities for impact. Her professional work spanned over a decade on conservation strategy and field programs with Wildlife Conservation Society in Africa and Madagascar, a decade building corporate sustainability leadership with the luxury group, Kering, and most recently leading the nature focus across all sectors as Managing Director at the advisory and investment firm, Pollination. She now focuses as a global advisor to companies and investors guiding the development and implementation of their strategies and initiatives to align with the transition to Nature Positive and Net Zero and to contribute to building an economy thriving within the safe operating space for humanity. Dr. Crowley also dedicates time to teaching, writing and presenting to build awareness on ways of integrating nature into design and business. To this end she contributes to global fora, podcasts and online courses, has co-produced a short documentary film and was noted as one of the top 52 ‘newsmakers’ in Australia in 2022. She contributes to the Advisory Boards of the non-profits Wildlife Friendly Enterprise Network, Textile Exchange, Capitals Coalition and Savory Foundation, mentors start-ups and innovators through Superorganism and Sustainabelle Advisory and is a Non-executive Director on company Boards. She has a PhD on Ecology from the Australian National University, has led research expeditions with the Australian Antarctic Expeditions to the Sub-Antarctic and the National Geographic Society in Madagascar. She was awarded Chevalier de l’Ordre National from the President of Madagascar for services to the country.

Jordan Cook

Jordan has significant experience in infrastructure and agricultural funds management spanning transactions, capital management, investor relations, and governance. Prior to joining Pollination, Jordan was an analyst in Macquarie Asset Management’s Infrastructure and Real Assets division, working primarily within an agricultural fund that raised and deployed equity at scale on behalf of institutional investors. With a background in natural asset investments, Jordan has a particular interest in the role that nature can play in responding to the climate crisis.

Maggie Comstock

Maggie is an Executive Director in our Washington D.C. office. Prior to joining Pollination, Maggie served as the Senior Director of Climate Policy and Carbon Markets at Conservation International, where she led the institution’s work to support nature-based solutions for climate mitigation and adaptation within national and global policy frameworks. During her time at Conservation International, she also worked on Climate and Biodiversity Finance Policy.  Prior to joining Conservation International, Maggie worked as a Policy Analyst at the U.S. Green Building Council focusing on international green building policy, sustainable cities and global market development. Maggie holds a master’s degree in Environment, Society and Development from the University of Cambridge, where she researched international carbon markets and their implications for developing countries.

Phil Cohn

Phil has 19 years’ experience in carbon markets, renewable energy, electricity markets and innovation. He combines technical knowledge with strong commercial, transactions and strategy skills to deliver complex projects in environmental and energy markets. Phil leads Pollination’s Carbon and Nature project development and investment group, overseeing a global team building a pipeline of large-scale nature based solutions projects. Prior to joining Pollination, Phil was COO at a clean energy start-up where he led corporate development and partnerships with ASX200 clients, energy buyers and retailers. Phil was formerly an Investment Director at the Australian Renewable Energy Agency where he led the Agency’s distributed energy, demand response and grid integration investment priorities. Prior to this Phil founded RAMP Carbon which provided project development, trading and advisory services to blue chip clients in the Australian and European carbon markets.

Christie Clarke

For nearly a decade Christie Clarke has advised major global organisations on climate change and sustainability. In her former role at CDP – the global leader in environmental disclosure for investors, companies, cities, states and regions – Christie worked as an ESG analyst in the investor team. In this role she advised large institutional investors including State Street and NBIM on ESG integration, specifically focusing on climate risks and opportunities. She has also worked at Forum for the Future, where she supported leading corporates such as Unilever and 3M in the development of cutting-edge sustainability strategies. Prior, she was a sustainability consultant at KPMG, advising a range of large global companies from Mirvac to Macquarie Bank on sustainability reporting, strategy and leadership.

Penelope Choussat

Penelope has diverse experience accelerating the transition in strategy consulting and communication. Prior to joining Pollination, Penelope was a sustainability and energy consultant working on behaviour change projects. Before that she was the communication officer at The Shift Project, a post-carbon think tank, where she participated in translating technical reports into tangible low carbon pathways and solutions. Her role was then to share those and engage with the relevant political and economic decision makers to help them in the decarbonisation of their sector. Penelope also worked for Loop, a global reuse platform and helped them to scale their circular economy solution.

Marisa Chiarella

Marisa is an experienced business development and marketing professional. Prior to joining Pollination, Marisa spent 16 years managing Baker McKenzie’s global climate law and finance practice. During this time she assisted 60+ lawyers across globe to secure market-leading work across international climate law and carbon markets; manage a diverse group of key clients across multiple industries and jurisdictions; as well as to build and maintain a profile as the world’s leading climate law practice. Marisa’s previous roles include digital marketing for the then Shop Direct Group in the United Kingdom and prior to that in marketing and communications at Deloitte Australia. Marisa has a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Technology, Sydney.

Jinxi Chen

Jinxi has diverse experience across environmental sustainability, research techniques, quantitative analysis and financial metrics. Prior to joining Pollination, Jinxi worked at CDP as an investor research analyst, where she conducted in-depth analysis of companies’ climate risks and opportunities and co-authored sector research reports on capital goods, steel, and shipping. Jinxi completed a Master in Environmental Science and Policy at the University of Chicago, where she worked at the Argonne National Laboratory as a part-time research aide in the Energy System Division. She also interned with the Climate Institute in Washington D.C., UNEP World Conservation Monitoring Centre and Cargill Investments. Jinxi holds a BA in Geography from the University of Cambridge.

Mila Cerecina

Mila brings almost 20 years’ global experience delivering executive strategic advice on climate, human rights and social impact, international development, and impact measurement. She supports financial institutions and corporates to to design and implement climate and nature strategies and position for competitive advantage in the net zero and nature-positive transition. She recently co-authored a practical guidance for corporates on the nature-positive agenda. She is a leader in Pollination’s financial markets focus area and supports Pollination’s key strategic partnerships.

Prior to Pollination, Mila had an impact-driven career in the United States and globally, culminating at the Open Society Foundations, where she served as chief staffer to the global management committee, and co-led the development of the philanthropy’s new climate justice strategy.

Oscar Castellas-Cartwright

Oscar Castellas-Cartwright is an Associate Director in the Washington DC office. Prior to joining Pollination, Oscar was a Senior Analyst in Deloitte Melbourne’s Sustainability and Change advisory practice, supporting their clients with decarbonisation solutions, climate risk advice, and ESG strategic development. He also has experience in carbon market research and analysis through the completion of an internship with the Carbon Market Institute. Oscar holds a Bachelor of Business, specialising in Economics and Finance at Monash University.

Carl Carcione

Carl is an experienced operations and technical Leader with over 20 years across the mining, engineering, manufacturing and green energy industries. Carl has significant experience delivering large scale infrastructure projects in the mining industry, working with Fortescue from the execution phase of its flagship Cloudbreak Mine through to becoming the 4th largest and lowest cost iron ore producer in the world. During this time Carl worked across all phases of project lifecycle from concept to delivery, commissioning and operations. More recently Carl has been working in the renewable energy & climate technology space developing project concepts for renewable energy and renewable fuels, developing industry decarbonisation strategies and identifying, evaluating and developing technologies to enable growth of the green hydrogen and green minerals supply chain. Carl holds a Bachelor of Chemical Engineering from Curtin University of Technology.

James Cameron

James is a recognised leader of the global climate change movement. He has extensive expertise and connections in mobilising change in civil society, government and business. He was the Co-founder of the Climate Change Capital, the world’s first green investment bank, and Co-founder of the Climate Change Practice at Baker McKenzie. James has worked extensively across a multitude of sectors. He is a Senior Advisor at Systemiq and Tulchan; on the Advisory Board for Neste (Finland), Green Finance Institute, AVAIO; and was a former Chairman of the Overseas Development Institute (ODI). ​He is also an Executive Fellow at Yale and a newly appointed Senior Research Fellow, Grantham Institute.  James is a former member of the UK Prime Minister’s Business Advisory Group; former negotiator, UNFCCC and Kyoto Protocol; and former Senior Advisor to the Morocco and Fiji COP Presidencies. ​James was officially appointed as a ‘friend of COP26’ providing strategic advice to the UK Government on the COP ambition, with a particular focus on the nature strategy.

Charlotte Bunker

Charlotte is a Chartered Accountant with over 15 years’ experience across financial control, commercial accounting, and external audit. After qualifying as a Chartered Accountant in the UK, Charlotte relocated to Sydney where she spent 7 years working for BDO in their Audit & Assurance division. More recently, Charlotte’s work has been focused on the SaaS and fintech scale-up space, leading finance teams through phases of rapid growth, supporting system and process improvements and lifting the quality of financial reporting and controls.

Joanna Butcher

Joanna is an experienced business development and marketing professional, having spent nine years working in legal services in Sydney and Dublin. Prior to joining Pollination, Joanna was a Client Relationship Manager at King & Wood Mallesons. In this role, Joanna was a member of the business development team for the projects, infrastructure, energy and resources practice group and led the business development for the firm’s energy sector. Joanna’s previous roles include leading the business development for KPMG Law Australia; Clients & Markets Manager for the major projects and construction practice at Clayton Utz, and prior to that in marketing at the Maples Group in Dublin.

Sage Bucher-Melcer

Sage’s professional expertise lies in defining materiality for nature and biodiversity across global socio-economic systems. With experience developing public and private sector solutions, she has worked to create scalable products that support the conventional engagement of financial markets in natural assets. Previously, she worked with organisations like Swiss Re and WTW to develop nature-based parametric insurance covers that build climate resiliency while accounting for natural asset value through risk mitigation. She also worked with the Insurance Bureau of Canada to understand how the Canadian government could internalise physical climate risk and invest in green infrastructure. Before that, Sage also conducted advisory work for clients such as ERM and Vanguard.

Jock Buchanan

Jock has spent his career leading deals across energy and carbon investment opportunities. He is experienced in leading complex deals and is passionate about investments in nature at scale as a pathway for tackling the challenges of climate change and natural capital. Prior to joining Pollination, Jock led Business Development for Shell Nature Based Solutions in Australia and the Asia Pacific region. In this role he was responsible for the origination, negotiation and execution of carbon investments. He brings to Pollination the strategic, commercial and operational know-how to deliver a broad range of opportunities across the carbon value chain. Jock holds a Bachelor of Engineering (UNSW) and an MBA from London Business School.

Daniel Buchanan

Daniel has supported the governance and growth of leading public, private and government organisations for more than two decades. Daniel’s experience includes senior administration roles including Executive Manager at Covata Limited and Executive Assistant to the CEO and CFO at Hills Limited. He also has extensive experience in HR, board management, shareholder liaison and event management.

Sam Bruce

Sam brings considerable experience in clean energy, working across technology strategy and investment, as well as project finance for utility scale assets.  Prior to joining Pollination, Sam worked at Fortescue Future Industries, focusing on identifying and investing in solutions for a range of renewable energy technologies and their underlying supply chains. Sam also spent 5 years with CSIRO Futures, the strategic advisory arm of Australia’s national science agency, where he led a number of national strategies including Australia’s National Hydrogen Roadmap and Critical Energy Minerals Roadmap.  Before joining CSIRO, Sam worked at Ernst & Young where he provided commercial and financial advice relating to the deployment of large-scale infrastructure assets. ​

Melanie Brock AM

Melanie is one of Japan’s most respected APAC specialists having lived and worked in Japan for the last 25 years. She uniquely combines practical commercial business leadership and language skills to consistently deliver on business, regulatory and partnership outcomes for Japanese and foreign corporations both on global and domestic levels. With a depth of experience working with government, Melanie boasts excellent networks in Japan’s corporate, political and government sectors. She has previously led nationwide marketing campaigns, successful bilateral free trade agreement and regional Japan corporate social responsibility activities.

Clare Bradshaw

Clare brings over 20 years of experience advising companies and executive teams on a wide range of financial matters. Her career began at Ernst & Young in London, where she worked in Audit. In 2008, she transferred to the EY Sydney office, joining the Corporate Finance division where she worked on various M&A transactions performing buy-side and sell-side financial due diligence.

Continuing her growth within EY, Clare transitioned to the internal finance team, becoming Operations and Finance Director for the Strategy and Transactions division where she was the key financial advisor to the Managing Partner, Executive Team and Consultants. Most recently, she served as COO of Fiftyfive5, a fast-growing consumer insights and market research consultancy, where she oversaw strategy, finance, people, and operations functions.

Clare is passionate about making numbers accessible to everyone and partnering with businesses to make evidence-based, human-centered decisions.

Suzanne Blake

Suzanne has over 20 years’ cross sector experience across marketing, communications and business development. At Pollination she leads global engagement at UNGA, Climate Weeks and COPs, where the worlds most influential stakeholders gather and she is responsible for building our influence at these. 

Formerly the CMO at FutureBrand, Suzanne has also led corporate communications, PR and Marketing at Macmillan Publishing Group and Phaidon; and directed marketing and business development at SalterBaxter, a leading US and UK sustainability consultancy. She has a proven track record of building strong brands to drive growth and producing impactful integrated campaigns. She’s a graduate of The University of Edinburgh and holds a MA in History.

Rachel Barrales

Rachel is passionate about accelerating equitable climate action. Prior to joining Pollination, Rachel reviewed carbon market projects as a Program Officer at Verra. She also served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Mexico supporting community level environmental initiatives and as a Climate Change Fellow at the Santa Clara Valley Water District in California designing a Climate Change Action Plan. Rachel earned a Master’s in Environmental Management from Duke University where she specialized in climate change and international development policy.

David Barley

David is an investment professional with a passion for sustainable growth investment. For the past fifteen years he been involved in capital raising, deal origination, transaction structuring and portfolio management across growth stage opportunities globally. David’s focus is natural capital investment. Since 2014 he has worked for Althelia (acquired by Mirova) initially on their Climate Fund and more recently on setting up and managing the Sustainable Ocean Fund. Most recently David spent a year with Gravis Capital supporting the launch of their Net Zero investment fund. Before moving into Investing David was a Senior Advisor to HRH the Prince of Wales’ International Sustainability Unit and a strategy consultant at Accenture.

Sarah Barker

Sarah Barker is a Managing Director at Pollination Law and leads the climate and sustainability risk governance team. She was previously a Partner at the Asia-Pacific’s largest commercial law firm, MinterEllison. Sarah has more than twenty-five years’ experience as a corporate lawyer, and is regarded as one of the world’s foremost experts on climate change governance, finance and liability risks. Sarah brings the practical perspective as an experienced non-executive director, having recently completed two terms on the board of one of Australia’s largest pension funds.

She is the Co-Chair of the World Economic Forum’s Global Future Council on Climate and Nature Governance, and immediate past Co-Chair of the Forum’s Climate Governance Community of Experts, starting from March 2025. She also teaches the Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership’s non-executive directors’ programme and AICD’s Climate Governance programme, and sits on the ASFI Taxonomy Technical Expert Group.

Sarah is ranked in Band 1 by Chambers (Asia Pacific) and is recognised in the Best Lawyers Guide in both the Corporate Law and Climate Change Law areas of practice.

Brendan Baker

Brendan has a diverse background, spanning research and development and strategy within the mining industry, to ESG and climate consulting in the financial industry. Prior to Pollination Brendan held both Senior Associate and Vice President roles in ESG research and climate consulting for MSCI’s ESG business, supporting Asia Pacific institutional investors with their climate and ESG ambitions and challenges. Before MSCI Brendan spent several years at CDP in London, managing a suite of technical and strategic projects within the Investment team. As a research scientist, Brendan worked with Alcoa World Alumina’s global R&D team for several years, across a range of process efficiency projects implemented throughout Alcoa’s global refinery network. Brendan holds a Bachelor of Science, majoring in Nanotechnology from Curtin University in Western Australia, and a Master’s in Environment and Resource Management from Vrije University in Amsterdam, majoring in climate policy.

Olivia Back

Olivia has worked with a range of Australian and Global clients, focusing on nature risk and opportunity profiling, and nature strategy development. This entails applying the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures framework to identify their key impacts and dependencies on nature and associated commercial implications for the business, as well as opportunities for risk mitigation and value creation. Olivia has environmental markets expertise, particularly working with clients to understand existing and emerging biodiversity credit schemes and products. In addition, working closely with clients to develop authentic First Nations partnership commitments and roadmaps, as part of their broader sustainability strategies. Olivia is also involved in work on directors’ duties and nature risk and monitors climate and nature litigation developments. Prior to joining Pollination, Olivia was an environment and planning lawyer at a leading national law firm, advising public and private sector clients on environmental and planning litigation, major infrastructure projects, and regulatory compliance and incident management. In 2019, Olivia was the tipstaff to the Honourable Justice Julie Ward, President of the NSW Court of Appeal (and formerly the Chief Judge of the Equity Division of the NSW Supreme Court).

Juan Pablo Avila

Juan Pablo has legal experience in energy, project finance, asset finance and general corporate matters. Prior to joining Pollination, Juan Pablo worked as an associate in major international law firms in Mexico City and Washington DC where he also advised clients in connection with banking and finance, restructuring, and mergers and acquisitions. He has worked on some of the most innovative projects in the Latin American market, including the US$135 million refinancing of two photovoltaic solar generation portfolio of projects in Chile with an aggregate capacity of 177MW. He is also admitted to practice law in Mexico and received his Master of Law with Honours from Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law.

Cassandra Austen

Cassandra Austen specialises in sustainable finance and nature based solutions. Prior to joining Pollination, she held the role of Senior Economist at Vivid Economics in London, managing international projects including net zero strategy for financials, blended finance policy, regenerative agriculture and natural capital investments. She also has experience in carbon markets and climate risk disclosures. Prior to her work in the sustainability sector, Cassandra gained six years of experience in financial markets in London and Sydney. Cassandra holds a Bachelor of Commerce from the University of Sydney.

Tristan Ashford

Tristan has broad energy experience working across all renewable generation technologies with a particular focus on green hydrogen and electrolysers. Tristan has a deep understanding of renewable supply chains and the manufacturing processes that underpin them. Prior to joining Pollination, Tristan worked at Fortescue Future Industries as a Principal Analyst, focusing on identifying and investing in solutions for a range of renewable energy technologies. Tristan also spent five years with Santos Ltd., in numerous on-site operational and leadership roles across QLD and SA. Tristan has a passion for continued learning and is currently undertaking a Masters of Energy Systems from the University of Melbourne and holds degrees in Chemical Engineering (Hons) and Economics from the University of Western Australia.

Nuvan Aranwela

For over 20 years, Nuvan’s career has spanned technology-led start-ups and ventures across a variety of industries, including data, loyalty and marketing, sourcing, financial services and insurance, e-commerce and sustainability. Consequently, he has developed ideas, secured investment, built capability and run early stage to mature operations. Having worked across strategy, commercial, marketing, operations and technology, he enjoys bringing together ideas with operational detail in a commercial context. He was co-CEO of fintech Six Park, which aims to build a path to financial well-being for all Australians. He is also Strategy Adviser to Landmarks ID, a start-up in the geolocation data and insights space; and a Board Member of Earthwatch Australia. Prior to that, he was Head of Innovation for Qantas Loyalty, a role he was appointed to following the acquisition by Qantas Group of Wishlist Holdings, a loyalty services business for which he was Chief Strategy and Technology Officer. Nuvan holds a PhD in Plant Biomechanics.

Nick Anstett

Nick has deep experience advising financial institutions, corporates, and non-profits on upstream investment policy, global co-investment partnerships, and downstream de-risking measures to mobilize private climate finance. He has advised on climate finance initiatives across clean energy, distributed renewables, sustainable transportation, water, waste, adaptation, resilience, and nature-based solutions. Prior to Pollination, Nick managed the sustainability practice at Albright Stonebridge Group, a global strategy and geopolitical risk consultancy, where he advised on major sustainability initiatives, critical ESG issues, and catalytic public-private partnerships in emerging and frontier markets.

John Ambler

John brings expertise in carbon markets, nature-based solutions, and net zero transitions. Prior to Pollination he worked for Clean Air Action Corporation, a carbon project developer. In this role he was responsible for the full lifecycle of carbon removal projects from operations and strategy to leading multiple validations and verifications. John started his career working at a community-based nonprofit, managing conservation efforts along the Andros Barrier Reef.​

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Anne Alonzo

Anne is a recognized global food and agriculture leader and has forged a highly successful and diverse career in the public, not-for-profit and corporate sectors. She was formerly Senior Vice President, External Affairs and Chief Sustainability Officer for Corteva Agriscience where she had responsibility for setting strategy and leading the External Affairs function. Anne previously served as President and CEO of the American Egg Board (AEB), the marketing arm of the U.S. egg industry. Prior to joining the AEB, Anne was appointed by the White House to serve as Administrator of the Agricultural Marketing Service, the federal marketing agency for the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Anne has also served as Vice President, Global Public Policy, Corporate Affairs at Kraft Foods, Senior Vice President at the National Foreign Trade Council, a diplomat at the U.S. Embassy, Mexico as well as senior regional counsel at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Chicago, IL. Anne has been recognized for her leadership supporting and mentoring Latinos across the U.S. and was honoured with the Chicago United’s People of Color Award, Latino Leader’s “Maestro” Award and LATINO Brava (courage award). Anne holds an MBA from the University of Chicago and a Juris Doctorate from the Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago Kent College of Law.

Brer Adams

Brer has deep experience in investments and advisory in infrastructure, renewable energy, carbon and clean technology sectors. Prior to joining Pollination, he co-founded a developer of renewable energy and energy storage projects, worked for G20 Global Infrastructure Hub and spent 8 years with Macquarie Group in advisory and principal investments in environmental services and clean technology sectors.

William Acworth

William combines deep technical knowledge of climate economics with strong stakeholder engagement to advance climate solutions across the globe. Prior to joining Pollination, William led adelphi consult’s Carbon Markets and Pricing team where he oversaw projects in climate policy design, implementation and evaluation for clients including the World Bank, European Commission, national governments, development banks and multi-national companies. As Head of the Secretariat of the International Carbon Action Partnership (ICAP), William led ICAP’s technical work program, global capacity building efforts and moderated exchange of experience on carbon markets between senior policymakers from across 40 governments.  While with the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and the German Institute for Economic Research he advised government and industry on market-based instruments for climate mitigation particularly for the power and emission intensive industrial sectors.