Ed Gillespie (sustainability professional)

Ed Gillespie is a British environmental entrepreneur, speaker, futurist, and author. His focus is on sustainability and innovation.

Edward Roger Martin Gillespie
Born28 June 1972
Norfolk, England, UK
OccupationInspirational keynote speaker and futurist
Known forCo-Founded wearefuterra.com, Director of Greenpeace UK
Notable work
wearefuterra.com

Early life and education

He grew up in Norfolk, attending Norwich School. Afterwards he was a volunteer for Project Trust as a teacher in Above Rocks, Jamaica. He completed an BSc in marine biology at the University of Wales and continued in this discipline by undertaking a MSc in Marine Resource Development and Protection at Heriot-Watt University.

After this his focus shifted to business as he enrolled in a Professional Masters in Leadership for Sustainable Development at Middlesex University, a course run by sustainable development charity Forum for the Future.[1] While there he met Townsend, with whom he co-founded Futerra, although the two are no longer in contact.[2]

Career

Gillespie started his professional career as an Environmental Development Manager at London Transport. Before this he had worked for the Survival Natural History Film Unit and as a marine biologist in Australia, New Caledonia and Orkney.

In 2001, he co-founded Futerra Sustainability Communications with Solitaire Townsend. He left the business in January 2019[3] to pursue other opportunities in public speaking through the London Speaker Bureau,[4] with the Forward Institute - where he works as a facilitator on responsible leadership development[5] and with start-up businesses.[6]

In 2007/8, he traveled around the world without flying, during which he wrote a regular popular column for the Guardian/Observer called "The Slow Traveller".[7] His passion for slow travel led him to invest in, and become chairman of European Rail Business Loco2.[8] This business was sold to SNCF in 2017.[9]

Gillespie has held a number of senior advisory positions and directorships. These include as a non-executive Director for Zero Carbon Food,[10] he was a London Sustainable Development Commissioner for several years,[11] was a director of carbon emissions campaigning organisation Sandbag [12] and an investor in Foodtrade.[13]

He is currently a Director at Greenpeace UK,[14] a Trustee at Energy Revolution[15] and an investor in a wide range of entrepreneurial businesses including Panda Packaging,[16] Piclo,[17] Raw Bottles,[18] Bennaman,[19] Engaged Tracking,[20] Common Objective[21] and Small Robot Company.[22]

Along with fellow futurist Mark Stevenson he is half of the Futurenauts at the Atlas of the Future, and has both spoken at and co-hosted their annual Fixing the Future event in Barcelona.

Publications and public speaking

Gillespie co-presents The Great Humbling podcast with Dark Mountain co-founder Dougald Hine.

Gillespie also co-presents Jon Richardson and the Futurenauts - How to survive the Apocalypse with his fellow futurist Mark Stevenson and ‘Britain’s 3rd most loved comedian’ Jon Richardson.

Gillespie is a regular contributor to The Guardian, which began back in 2007 with his Slow Traveller blog.[23] This developed into commentary on topics around sustainable business, climate change and environmental communications.[24] He still writes on sustainable travel for Conde Nast Traveller.

In June 2014, Wild Things Publishing published Ed's first book, Only Planet.[25][26] The book is based on his 2007/8 trip and the Independent described it as allowing "the world's flaws and beauty to seep into your soul".[27]

Gillespie is regularly invited to lecture around the world to audiences, including the UN, national governments, multinational corporations and citizen organizations. He has given two TEDx talks, the first in 2010 about the importance of embedding sustainability into business strategy in a talk titled 'Sustainability, the reinvention of progress'[28] and the second in Hackney in 2015 on the future of food in 'We literally are what we eat'.[29]

Gillespie is interested in the power of creative writing to inspire change, writes poetry and publishes other articles on his Medium page.

gollark: You could make some sort of crater park.
gollark: Wait, you dropped almost 2000 tonnes of metal and stuff on a planet at 50km/s?
gollark: Can we just fence off affected areas?
gollark: Also, the colony is doing fine and they can be decelerated.
gollark: ...

References
  1. "Leadership for Sustainable Development". Forum for the Future. Archived from the original on 19 December 2014. Retrieved 2 March 2015.
  2. Lock, Helen (20 September 2017). "Businesses on the couch: the co-founders in couples' therapy". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 25 October 2017.
  3. Lock, Helen (20 September 2017). "Businesses on the couch: the co-founders in couples' therapy". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 22 December 2019.
  4. londonspeakerbureau.com https://londonspeakerbureau.com/speaker-profile/ed-gillespie/. Retrieved 22 December 2019. Missing or empty |title= (help)
  5. "Team & Board". Forward Institute. Retrieved 22 December 2019.
  6. "Global Goals Accelerator ⋆ Futerra". Futerra. 25 June 2018. Retrieved 22 December 2019.
  7. Gillespie, Ed (18 March 2007). "The slow traveller: A bumpy start". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 22 December 2019.
  8. "team". Loco2. Retrieved 2 March 2015.
  9. "Loco2", Wikipedia, 6 November 2019, retrieved 22 December 2019
  10. "The Team | Zero Carbon FoodZero Carbon Food". Zerocarbonfood.co.uk. 24 January 2014. Retrieved 2 March 2015.
  11. "Ed Gillespie". Londonsdc.org. Retrieved 2 March 2015.
  12. "Who we are". Sandbag. Archived from the original on 26 March 2015. Retrieved 2 March 2015.
  13. "ed gillespie". FoodTrade. Retrieved 2 March 2015.
  14. "Board of directors". Greenpeace UK. Retrieved 22 December 2019.
  15. "Ed Gillespie". Energy Revolution. Retrieved 22 December 2019.
  16. www.pandapackaging.co.uk https://www.pandapackaging.co.uk/. Retrieved 22 December 2019. Missing or empty |title= (help)
  17. "piclo.energy". piclo.energy. Retrieved 22 December 2019.
  18. "RAW Bottles". Realising Another World. Retrieved 22 December 2019.
  19. "Bennamann Ltd – Bennamann creates solutions that transform the biomethane value chain". Retrieved 22 December 2019.
  20. "Engaged Tracking | Climate Portfolio Optimisation". EngagedTracking. Retrieved 22 December 2019.
  21. "Sustainable Fashion | Do Fashion Better | Common Objective". www.commonobjective.co. Retrieved 22 December 2019.
  22. "Small Robot Company". Small Robot Company. Retrieved 22 December 2019.
  23. "Slow Traveller | From the Observer". The Guardian. Retrieved 2 March 2015.
  24. "Ed Gillespie". The Guardian. 4 January 2009. Retrieved 2 March 2015.
  25. "Only Planet". Only Planet. Retrieved 2 March 2015.
  26. Webb, Flemmich (12 June 2014). "Only Planet by Ed Gillespie, book review: Allow world's flaws and". The Independent. Retrieved 25 October 2017.
  27. "Only Planet by Ed Gillespie, book review: Allow world's flaws and". The Independent. 12 June 2014. Retrieved 22 December 2019.
  28. "Responsible Marketing". VLearn.org. Archived from the original on 19 December 2014. Retrieved 2 March 2015.
  29. We literally are what we eat | Ed Gillespie | TEDxHackney, retrieved 22 December 2019
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