Planning for Net Zero

Tim has been a practising planner for over 40 years. During that time he has worked for an number of local authorities, his last position being Head of Planning and Building Control Services at Derwentside District.

Since leaving local government in 2008, he has worked in private practice with Ward Hadaway and more recently with Arcus.  He has also had a spell as a Planning Inspector.

He is specialist in consenting renewable energy developments, working for EDF Renewables from 2010 to 2018 and is now in his second spell, focussing mainly on solar and battery projects.

Tim has given presentations previously to RTPI North East events and is delighted to be Chair for this event.

Steve leads the External Affairs team managing communications, stakeholder engagement and community relations activities across National Grid Electricity Transmission’s strategic infrastructure projects in England. This includes the onshore and offshore Accelerated Strategic Transmission Investment projects that are needed to deliver on the UK Government 2030 target for 50 GW of offshore wind. Steve’s background is in consenting major electricity transmission infrastructure proposals for National Grid in the UK and Australia. He is a Chartered Town Planner.

Musa is a Principal Development Manager at EDF Renewables and has been a Chartered Member of the RTPI for over 17 years. Musa is responsible for developing EDF Renewables utility scale solar as well as the battery portfolio. Prior to working at EDF Renewables, Musa has worked in both consultancy, in the North East, Yorkshire as well as the Middle East, as well as local authority where he started his career.

Claire Bradley joined Durham County Council as Principal Policy Officer in August 2022. Her role has a focus on policy areas responding to the climate and ecological emergency. She has recently led on the County Durham Solar Energy Supplementary Planning Document.  Claire is a chartered town planner with nearly 20 years of experience focussed in the public sector. This includes as Principal Policy Officer at the London Borough of Brent, where she worked on the Wembley Area Action Plan and the Brent Local Plan, which was recently awarded 'Best Plan' at the RTPI London Awards for Planning Excellence. She started her career working in regeneration at Sunderland City Council and studied at Newcastle University.

As Managing Director and Head of Ecology, Caroline is responsible for the business growth and daily operations whilst overseeing the technical side of the business. Caroline’s has over 15 years in the conservation and ecology field. Caroline brings practical experience to find cost effective solutions to mitigation requirements from her work with Wildlife Trusts, Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust, National Trust and the Scottish Wildlife Trust. Coupled with her decade providing ecological advice for large and small scale residential and industrial development this allows Caroline to provide a strong client focus in a pragmatic and effective manner.

Caroline has specialised in renewable energy for the last 8 years, working on onshore wind, large and small scale solar, battery energy storage schemes and cable routes for the SOFIA offshore Wind Farm. Caroline works closely with stakeholders and multi-disciplinary schemes and has a proven track record in successful planning applications for built environment and renewable energy.

Caroline holds survey licences for great crested newts and bats and has gained recognition for her abilities with bats through the Natural England Bat Earned Recognition Scheme.

John is a Chartered Landscape Architect with over 20 years experience in private practice focussing principally on landscape and environmental planning and strategic level design for major development. His specialism and core area of expertise is in landscape planning especially Landscape and Visual Impact Assessment (LVIA) but he is also an experienced multi-disciplinary project manager and EIA coordinator. He is the landscape planning director at Stephenson Halliday (an RSK company) and has worked on projects in all regions of the UK ranging in scale from schemes determined under the Town and Country Planning Acts up to Nationally Significant Infrastructure Projects (NSIPs). He is an experienced landscape expert witness and has presented landscape and visual evidence at several public inquiries and hearings. John has extensive experience in relation to the renewable energy industry; especially wind (onshore and offshore), solar PV, storage and carbon capture. He is currently the lead landscape architect overseeing LVIA work on several major solar NSIPs including EDF’s Springwell and Rosefield Solar Farms as well as a number of major carbon capture projects.’

Peter is highly ranked in Chambers and Partners and described as "an absolute superstar in the planning space." His team in Leeds is noted as being "very knowledgeable and commercially orientated, providing excellent service." His particular areas of experience are strategic advice on energy and natural resources, transport and commercial development projects including major planning applications, appeals and judicial challenges.

Peter also writes a regular column for the national publication "Minerals Planning Magazine," which contributes to the activities of Renewable UK and has spoken at events for bodies such as the Royal Town Planning Institute and the Nuclear Industry Association.