Kris McGowan is Team Leader of Carbon Forum. He has been with MEA for over four years and in that time has worked in most aspects of climate change - technical audits, community engagement and co-ordination, presentations and training and alternative media. With a B.Sc. in City and Regional Planning and a Masters in Sustainable Development he is well placed to give an overview of the bigger picture. Before coming to MEA, Kris managed the UK's only 100% Organic Supermarket for four years. Kris particularly enjoys creating innovative ways to communicate climate change messages and believes that the answers are relatively simple, inspiration to change is the key. In his portfolio of projects he has managed community based energy efficiency schemes, a series of climate change events, won a national award for Eco-Vehicles Top Trumps, and worked with a wide variety of stakeholders from small parish councils to international utility companies.

Professional Interests: Carbon, Light Bulbs, Communication

Qualifications: NVQ III Business, B.Sc. (Hons) City and Regional Planning, MA (Professional Practice) Sustainable Development

Skills: Lateral and blue sky thinking, presentations, communication, solutions, information digestion and dissemination

Where I've come from: Lancaster, Leeds, Shropshire, Cardiff, Sussex, London, Hereford

I like: Cycling, getting lost (not at the same time), doing things differently, running/jumping/climbing/sliding. Chocolate.

A moral I live my life by: 'Be the change you want to see in the world' Ghandi

How I'm trying to live more sustainably: Getting people cycling more, wearing organic/ charity shop clothes and driving a fresh looking but low CO₂ vehicle

I believe the greatest threat to our current society and environment is... apathy and disempowerment 

My 'dirty secret': I hate most root vegetables.

It may surprise you to know but... I was once in the SAS

If things had turned out differently I might have been...a car designer, architect, town planner, fashion designer, eco entrepreneur, chef, teacher and still stuck hanging upside down off a road bridge over a river in south wales.