Simon Holmes à Court has stood at the intersection of community, climate action and politics since May 2007, when he attended the meeting of a community group setting out to build Australia’s first community-owned wind farm. Fifteen years later to the month, at the May 2022 federal election, one of this former Silicon Valley dotcom engineer’s startups, Climate 200, harnessed community, climate action and politics to play a major role in shaking up Australia’s tired old political order.

Simon is an energy analyst, clean-tech investor, climate philanthropist, and director of the Smart Energy Council and the Australian Environmental Grantmakers Network. He was co-founder of the Australian Wind Alliance and inaugural chair of the Melbourne Energy Institute’s Advisory Board. He is a respected commentator on the economic, political and engineering aspects of Australia’s energy transition.

Image credit: Kristoffer Paulsen.