Council

After working as an Economic Adviser to the President of Kazakhstan, Professor Yelena Kalyuzhnova founded and remains the Director of the Centre for Euro-Asian Studies at the University of Reading, UK. She is an authoritative expert in the areas of oil and gas and emerging economies. Professor Kalyuzhnova is the author of the first English-language book on the Kazakhstani economy, a number of research monographs, as well as a range of academic papers on economic issues. Within the UK government, Professor Kalyuzhnova served as an economic adviser on Caspian issues to the Rt. Hon. Lord Fraser of Carmyllie, Q.C., House of Lords as well as the All Party Parliamentary Group on Kazakhstan, House of Commons. She is now Vice Dean of Henley Business School. Yelena is also a member of the Council of the British Institute of Energy Economics.

Mike is a Director in EY’s Climate Change and Sustainability Services practice, where he primarily advises firms in financial services on their climate and sustainability strategies. Until January 2023, Mike was Chief Economist and Director of Analysis at the Climate Change Committee, the UK’s independent statutory climate adviser. Mike led the CCC analytical team in developing the CCC’s advice on Net Zero, the Sixth Carbon Budget, the actions and policies required to deliver it, and the framework for tracking and monitoring progress. He also oversaw the CCC’s adaptation analysis. Having spent his career telling stories with evidence, Mike is a firm believer in the power of analysis to make the world a better place.

Alec is Head of the Central Modelling Team in the Department for Business Energy and Industrial Strategy. His team are responsible for working out how much green-house gas the United Kingdom are projected to emit. He and his colleagues develop a range of models that make these projections, taking into account the effect of government policies and a host of other factors. The team also work on models that help to understand how we can meet our long term emissions targets and how government energy policies affect consumers. They have designed and built a bespoke policy simulation language for household energy modelling. He also leads for the department on quality assurance programme for analytical models. Alec started his working life as an engineer. After getting fed up of getting wet and dirty he moved into Operational Research. Since then he has worked in a wide variety of organisations ranging from the retail to public sector. He was made a Companion of the Operational Research Society in 2020.

Jorge is a senior advisor for the energy transition. He is involved in the production of the bp Energy Outlook and Statistical Review of the World Energy. Jorge joined bp in October 2018. Previously, he worked as research fellow at King Abdullah Petroleum Studies and Research Center in 2014-2018. The rest of his professional career developed in both, the private and the public sector. In the public sector, he worked as economic advisor at Spanish Prime Minister’s Economic Bureau, at the cabinet of the Minister of Energy, and at the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. He is also a research associate at Oxford Institute of Energy Studies.

William Blyth has 25 years’ experience in energy economics and policy, with a focus on transitions to a low-carbon economy and energy access in developed and developing countries. He is Director of Oxford Energy Associates, an independent energy research company. In this role he is working with Strathclyde University under UKERC Theme 4 on investment in infrastructure. He holds an Honorary Research position at Imperial College, and works part-time as Senior Research Fellow for the UK Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office, where he is currently helping to develop the COP26 Energy Transition Campaign.

Matthew works as a Professor of Sustainable Energy Business and Policy at the Hunter Centre for Entrepreneurship, Strathclyde Business School. His research examines the business models, policies and technologies necessary to accelerate the transition to a socially equitable, net-zero economy. He is a co-investigator on UKRI’s £10m EnergyREV consortium on smart, locally led energy systems, and the UK Energy Research Centre’s ‘Whole Person – Whole Place’ net-zero neighbourhood solutions project.

Matthew has published in ‘Financial Times 50’ ranked journals and co-authored two books on innovation to accelerate the energy revolution. He has written reports on behalf of the World Energy Council and been cited in government and parliamentary reports. His work has enjoyed extensive media coverage (e.g. BBC, Forbes) and he has also provided commentary for national media outlets like the i newspaper and The Conversation.

He sits on Scottish Power Energy Networks’ Customer Engagement Group to inform their five year business plan for Ofgem’s RIIO-ED2, as well as USwitch’s Green Tariff Accreditation Panel. He is a council member of the British Institute of Energy Economics, chair and trustee of the community energy charity South Seeds and an Honorary Member of the Green Angel Syndicate. Finally, he is co-founder and host of the Local Zero podcast, which champions local action to tackle climate change and profiled as the Times Pod of the Week.

Prior to joining Strathclyde he worked at Imperial College’s Centre for Environmental Policy (2012-2016) examining the effectiveness of energy innovation policies both in the UK and overseas (e.g. China, Finland). He completed his PhD at the Sustainability Research Institute (SRI) at the University of Leeds (2009-2012), examining the role that business model innovation plays in driving a low-carbon energy transition.

Mallika is Shell’s Chief Economist. She advises on economic, energy and climate policies to shape Shell’s long-term scenarios. She leads strategic engagements on energy transitions with national and city governments across the world, notably a multi-year collaboration with the Chinese government. Mallika also helps shape Shell’s policy and advocacy on the energy transition to support the company’s decarbonisation strategy. She sits on a range of external advisory boards.

Before joining Shell, she was Deputy Director at the UK Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, responsible for evidence and analysis across the environment, food and green economy portfolio. She has held senior positions in the UK government, including at the Cabinet Office as Head of Policy Analysis for the 2009 G20 London Summit. Before that, Mallika worked in senior economics and policy roles in the USA.

Mallika holds PhD and MS degrees in Economics from Carnegie Mellon University, USA, and a BA from St. Stephen’s College, Delhi University, India.

Peter has over thirty years of experience working on a wide range of energy and climate change policy issues. He currently holds a joint appointment at the University of Leeds as Professor of Sustainable Energy Systems in the Schools of Earth and Environment and Chemical and Process Engineering. Peter has acted as advisor to a number of United Nations organisations, the International Energy Agency and the European Commission. He is also a member of several large national research centres including the UK Energy Research Centre, the Industrial Decarbonisation Research and Innovation Centre, the Centre for Research into Energy Demand Solutions, the Supergen Energy Networks Hub and the Centre for Climate Change Economics and Policy. Peter’s research is strongly interdisciplinary, combining science, technology, economics and policy to enhance the understanding of, and policy responses to, the challenges of accelerating the transition to sustainable low-carbon energy systems. Prior to joining the University of Leeds, Peter was Head of the Energy Technology Policy Division at the International Energy Agency in Paris from 2007 to 2011, responsible for high profile publications such as Energy Technology Perspectives and the Energy Technology Roadmap series. In an earlier consultancy career, he was Technical Director of a major UK energy and environmental practice.