Green Heat Finance Taskforce: report part 1 - November 2023

8. Annex 1 – Taskforce Membership

Scottish Council for Development and Industry (SCDI)

Sara Thiam, Chief Executive Prosper (Trading name of SCDI)

and Taskforce Co-chair

Prosper has a proud history of bringing government, business and civil society together to seize economic opportunities and make a difference to the challenges facing Scotland. With members from across Scottish society - from charities to local authorities and micro businesses to multi-nationals – The Council thinks bigger picture and longer-term. Prosper builds on and complements the activities of representative organisations (business, worker, trade, and professional) providing a unique space where they come together to unlock economic growth which works for Scotland’s people and our planet.

Sara is a former Director for the Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE) in Scotland and member of the Infrastructure Commission for Scotland. Her non-exec roles include Construction Scotland Innovation Centre (now BE-ST).

Sara’s career in economic development includes the Glasgow Edinburgh Collaboration Initiative and EU projects designed to stimulate Scottish innovation. Her early career involved the setting up of the Eurodesk youth information service subsequently replicated throughout the EU.

University of Edinburgh Business School (UEBS) Centre for Business, Climate Change and Sustainability (B-CASS)

Dr. Ian Cochran, Lecturer and Programme Director, Master of Science CCFI, Director for Impact, B-CCAS

For almost 15 years the University of Edinburgh Business School has had a faculty dedicated to researching and teaching issues related to climate change and sustainability. It is home to one of the oldest dedicated MSc programmes around issues at the intersection of climate change, investment, finance and policy. The Business School also has an extensive offer of bespoke and open Executive Education programmes working with a range of financial, commercial and third-sector clients.

The UEBS Centre for Business, Climate Change, and Sustainability draws on over a decade’s experience engaging with large and small businesses, policy makers, non-governmental institutions, and others, providing leading research, advice, consultancy, executive education, and more. Members of the Centre for Business, Climate Change, and Sustainability work in five main areas: Accounting for Climate Change and Sustainability, Doing Business Sustainably, Financing a Sustainable World, Transforming to a Sustainable Society, and Transitioning to a Low Carbon Economy.

Independent

Rufus Grantham, Founding Partner at Living Places

Rufus is a sustainable finance specialist with a focus on scaling responses to climate change while delivering better life outcomes for people. He has spent two decades working in investment research advising asset management clients on their investment strategies. He is a co-founder of Living Places, a social enterprise and advisory company focused on driving social, environmental and economic benefits through the transition of places.

He is also currently a Director at Blood and Sand Ltd. and a General Partner at Mettle Capital Partners, a corporate ESG integration data company.

Independent

Kirsty Hamilton OBE

Kirsty has over three decades experience in efforts to tackle climate change and accelerate the energy transition. In 2004 she set up an initiative at the nexus of renewables, finance and policy with leading finance practitioners and ran the Low Carbon Finance Group during UK electricity market reforms. Recent research work (UKERC) examines investment confidence and transparency.

She is an Associate Fellow at Chatham House and was a philanthropy-funded advisor to the COP26 Energy Transition team. She has been an IPCC expert reviewer and contributing author and was awarded an OBE in new year 2021 for services to green energy, finance and climate change.

Green Finance Institute (GFI)

Emma Harvey-Smith, Built Environment Programme Director

Uniquely positioned at the nexus of the public and private sectors, the GFI is the UK and Europe’s principal forum for innovation in green finance. GFI partners with financial institutions, corporates, policymakers, academics, philanthropists and civil society experts to develop solutions that will redeploy capital at the pace and scale that science demands. Backed by government, trusted by finance, and led by bankers, GFI uses its neutral platform to co-design financial instruments and mechanisms as well as develop the enabling frameworks, guidance and policy ideas needed to support greater green investment. Its credibility, capability and cross-sector engagement enable the GFI to respond to market barriers and develop solutions where others can’t. GFI collaborates with and for the market to strengthen green finance in the UK, Europe and globally.

EIT Climate-KIC

Andy Kerr, Chief Strategy Officer

Climate-KIC is a knowledge and innovation community focused on supporting whole systems innovation through coordinated interventions on different levers of change, ranging from early stage business support, to regulatory innovation, with the aim of helping city-regions to deliver resilient and zero carbon goals.

Supported by the European Institute of Innovation and Technology, Climate-KIC identifies and supports innovation that helps society mitigate and adapt to climate change. It believes that a decarbonised, sustainable economy is not only necessary to prevent catastrophic climate change, but presents a wealth of opportunities for business and society.

Andy was previously the Executive Director of the Edinburgh Climate Change Institute and led the development of ECCI into the leading low carbon hub in Scotland.

Scottish National Investment Bank (SNIB)

Eddie McAvinchey, Executive Director Sustainable Investment

The Scottish National Investment Bank is a public development bank, established to provide patient, long-term investment capital to businesses and projects in Scotland. The Bank seeks to address opportunities which the private sector is not able to fully finance. It is complementary to private investment and has a particular focus on proving out commercial models and ‘crowding-in’ private investors.

The Bank acts as a commercial investor and is guided by its three strategic missions: to support a Just Transition to Net Zero, to build communities and promote equality of opportunity, and to foster innovation.

While publicly owned, the Bank operates independently and on a commercial basis, and can work collaboratively with partners in both the private and public sectors to develop and prove out new investment models.

Scottish Financial Enterprise (SFE)

Sandy MacDonald*, Director of Public Policy and Communications

Scottish Financial Enterprise is the representative body for Scotland’s financial and related professional services industry, with over 110 member companies, ranging in size from global organisations headquartered in Scotland, such as abrdn, Baillie Gifford, Bank of Scotland, and the Royal Bank of Scotland; to UK and international companies with substantial operations in Scotland, such as Barclays, BlackRock, JP Morgan, Morgan Stanley, Phoenix Group and Royal London; as well as Scottish-based fintechs, credit unions and support companies drawn from all areas of financial services, like FNZ and Origo.

*Sandy MacDonald represented SFE on the Taskforce until September 2023. For phase 2 of the Taskforce, SFE’s representative will be Ben Rose.

UK Green Building Council (UKGBC)

Simon McWhirter, Deputy Chief Executive and lead for UKGBC Scotland

Powered by over 700 member organisations from across the value chain, UKGBC is at the forefront of positively influencing policy, identifying the pathways required to propel the sector forward sustainably and driving the solutions to transform our buildings, communities, cities and infrastructure so that people and nature thrive.

Simon leads UKGBC’s policy and political work, as well as overseeing its corporate communications with members, media and the wider industry. He also has oversight of UKGBC’s portfolio of place-based projects and devolved activity.

Launched at COP26, when the world’s eyes were turned to Glasgow, UKGBC Scotland works collectively across the sector to convene industry leaders and engage with devolved authorities to sustain momentum and drive through major initiatives to support the Scottish built environment’s path to Net Zero.

Scottish Renewables

Helen Melone, Senior Policy Manager - Heat, Hydrogen & Solar

Scottish Renewables is the voice of Scotland's renewable energy industry. Its vision is for a Scotland leading the world in renewable energy, working to grow Scotland’s renewable energy sector to keep it at the forefront of the global clean energy industry. Its members work across all renewable energy technologies, in Scotland, the UK, Europe and around the world. These members deliver investment, jobs, social benefits and reduce the carbon emissions which cause climate change.

Scottish Renewables, in representing its members, aims to lead and inform the debate on how the growth of renewable energy can help sustainably heat and power Scotland’s homes and businesses.

As the trade association for all renewable energy technologies in Scotland, it has a strong focus on renewable heat and heat decarbonisation, as well as the opportunities these offer for the increased use of renewably-generated electricity. This can mean working towards city-scale heat networks in Scotland's cities and investigating and communicating the benefits of heat pumps, as well as exploring how heat decarbonisation can be financed.

Helen's work as the Senior Policy Manager for Heat, Hydrogen and Solar involves managing and supporting the development of Scottish Renewables’ policy positions, which aim to create the conditions for the sustainable growth of Scotland’s renewable energy industry, and communicating these effectively to key policy and regulatory decision makers.

Energy Consumer Committee

Lewis Shand Smith, Energy Consumer Committee Chair

The ECC is tasked with bringing the voice of the consumer to the development of energy policy and a just transition. Its membership consists of those who are working with and on behalf of energy consumers in Scotland. It provides of forum for the exchange of hard data, the outcome of research and the feedback of qualitative data – what people are thinking and feeling.

The network is supported by Consumer Scotland and is a strategic leadership group reporting to the Scottish Energy Advisory Board.