Who We Are

More than 35 years’ experience in senior commercial, energy trading, business development, project management, strategy and technical management positions in the electricity and energy supply industry. Peter is a Founder Director and has led the development of the company including its interface to Government and industry. Peter is currently chair of the Carbon Capture and Storage Association.

An energy expert with a particular focus on taking innovative technologies from concept to deployment. Much of Chris’ recent work has been driving forward demonstration projects in the low carbon gas sector, notably the development and delivery of the HyDeploy project. He has a strong technical background, combined with skills in forming consortia and bringing stakeholders together to enable project delivery.

Andy joined Progressive at its inception, bringing 29 years of power station maintenance experience on coal, nuclear and Gas Turbine technology, and a wealth of practical engineering to the company. Progressive’s pioneering of IGCC opportunities allowed Andy to develop further expertise (for which he was awarded the I.Chem.E’s Hebden Medal) burning syngas and hydrogen in Gas Turbines, and CO₂ capture, transportation and storage.  He represented the UK in producing an ISO Standard for CO₂ transportation.  More recently extending this to hydrogen, he was responsible for the I.Chem.E’s series on hydrogen (in recognition for which he was awarded their Ambassador medal).

Senior business development, strategy and technology roles within CEGB. A Founding Director of Progressive Energy leading on project financial appraisals and complex process analyses. Instrumental in a number of EU Framework programmes, on executive boards, active in the formulation of EU policy for the Emissions Trading Scheme and UK Governmental bodies focused on carbon mitigation.

David is a recognised industry leader in the development of low carbon energy infrastructure and joined Progressive Energy as a director in 2019. As Network Strategy Director for National Grid Gas (subsequently Cadent), he led the formation of the Future of Gas programme which first set out a strategy for decarbonisation of heat and led to the development of numerous projects in the sector, including the HyDeploy and HyNet hydrogen projects. A chartered engineer, David spent the early part of his career at BAE Systems / Airbus, before moving to Atkins in 2008, where he became Director of Power and Renewables. David holds degrees from Cambridge, Warwick and MIT.

Catherine joined Progressive in 2021, with over 30 years’ investment, trading, and commercial business development experience in the energy industry. Catherine is an experienced energy transition investor and commercial Director, with a track record of originating and delivering high-value innovative projects, including developing the successful Lynemouth coal-to-biomass conversion and its sale to EPH. Catherine was previously Chief Operating Officer of RWE’s Energy Transition Investment fund, originating and managing private equity investments; and was RWE’s nominee Director on the Board of STEM Inc. She has a degree in Theoretical Physics from Durham University, an MBA, and the FT Non-Executive Director’s Diploma. Catherine currently Chairs the UK Government’s Energy Storage Health & Safety Governance Group.

Following 25 years’ experience in the chemical industry, John joined Progressive Energy in 2019 as North West Regional Lead based in Cheshire.  A Chartered Chemical Engineer with a degree from the University of Cambridge, until joining Progressive Energy he was Operations Director for the Specialty Carbons business of Cabot Corporation, a US blue chip, leading manufacturing operations in the US, China and the Netherlands.  Prior to that he was Global Energy Technical Director for Cabot.  John leads stakeholder engagement across all elements of HyNet and beyond in the North West. He also leads specific projects, bids and business growth opportunities.

Adam joined Progressive in 2016 following nearly 20 years of consulting experience for Government and the private sector. An accomplished project and programme manager, he has worked on the HyNet project since its inception in 2016 and is currently leading a major fuel switching demonstration programme, working in partnership with Pilkington, Essar and Unilever. In addition, Adam has significant commercial experience, leading due diligence exercises and bids on behalf of Orsted, RWE Npower, SSE, Lloyds, Foresight and Barclays. Falling back on his first career in marketing, Adam also supports most of Progressive’s external communications activities, including those related to the HyNet project.

Amy has more than 12 years of PR and communications experience in areas including energy, environmental and the built environment across the private and public sectors. She has managed statutory consultations for three Nationally Significant Infrastructure Project applications, including Triton Knoll Offshore Wind Farm, as well as pre-planning consultation and stakeholder engagement on many smaller developments.  As a people person, Amy is an expert in strategically working with stakeholders on development projects to build awareness, educate and engage.

Rachel is a chartered chemical engineer with nearly 10 years of experience in the chemicals manufacturing industry with ExxonMobil, during which time she held a wide range of technical and leadership roles. She has extensive experience in operations support and reliability engineering in refinery and chemicals units, as well as process safety and risk management. In 2016, she led the commissioning and start-up of a new hydrogenation plant, providing technical support and comprehensive project co-ordination. In addition to engineering expertise, Rachel has led complex organisational cultural changes, with a focus on innovation, sustainability, organisational effectiveness and inclusion & diversity. She joined Progressive Energy in 2020 as the Project Manager for HyNet FEED following the Industrial Decarbonisation Challenge bid.

David joined Progressive Energy in early 2022 and draws on his experience to assist in the delivery of the HyNet. Prior to joining Progressive, David was the Head of Scale-up and Engineering for Econic Technologies – a start-up company focusing on the utilisation of CO2 with in polymeric products.

David has an extensive background in the licensing of catalyst technology, process design, product delivery and management of multi-disciplinary teams, after his time at Johnson Matthey (formerly Davy Process Technology)

Experienced project manager, developer and highly respected technical expert. 40 years’ experience in the energy industries including oil and gas, followed by over ten years in waste and sustainable energy. With Progressive Energy Philip has participated in technology developments in carbon capture from industrial processes, the validation of novel power generation technologies, due diligence for investors and the evolution of a novel technology for production of bio-substitute natural gas (BioSNG).

Victoria joined Progressive Energy in 2015 and is the main Finance Contact. With a degree in Food Science Victoria spent 10 years working in the Food Industry at companies including Unilever, Greencore and Kerry Foods before moving to work for Nationwide Building Society specialising in SAS data analysis. After having children retrained in as a bookkeeper and is now a Member of the ICB.

Kimberley studied Mathematics at the University of Birmingham, and graduated with a Bsc in 2018. After taking a gap year, she studied bookkeeping and is currently qualified with an ICB Level 2 Certificate. She joined Progressive Energy’s back office in 2021 as Finance Assistant

Nav is a Senior Project Engineer at Progressive Energy working on the development and roll-out of hydrogen technologies. His current focus is on blending hydrogen into the UK gas distribution networks via our HyDeploy projects, work which got Nav recognised as the 2017 Power Graduate of the Year.  Nav is our technical lead on materials and gas industry procedures due to his doctorate in materials science and experience having served as operational performance manager at Cadent (formerly National Grid Gas). Prior to this, Nav worked in the power generation and aerospace industries; assessing post-combustion CCUS technologies at E.ON’s Ratcliffe power station, and developing friction welding technologies at Rolls-Royce.

Joe is a chartered chemical engineer with project development and technical operations experience in the oil & gas, food manufacturing and clean energy sectors, having previously worked at both ExxonMobil and Cargill. Joe is currently seconded to Vertex Hydrogen, where he is focused on technical development of the HyNet Hydrogen Production Plant, as the project prepares for Final Investment Decision.

Robert has over 35 years’ experience in the management of engineering projects in the power and process industry sectors.  During 20 years with BOC, amongst other roles, he was the Projects’ Director and then Operations Director with responsibility for the UK’s largest hydrogen production plant.  During this time he also had senior global roles in health and safety and business improvement.  For the last eight years he has worked on carbon capture & storage and hydrogen production projects including three years as Head of Operations for Capture Power Ltd responsible for delivering the FEED for the White Rose CCS project.

John Aldersey-Williams graduated in 1984 with a BA in geology from Cambridge. He spent 7 years as an oil industry geologist, during which time he also completed his MBA. He then joined Schroders’ UK-leading energy banking team. After 4 years, he returned to the oil industry in a succession of commercial, financial and leadership roles, latterly as Finance Director for Texaco’s North Sea business. After 17 years in the oil industry, John moved to the zero-carbon energy sector, providing strategic, commercial and economic support to a range of clients, including technology and project developers, supply chain, investment banks, The Carbon Trust and Scottish Government. He has worked in Carbon Capture and Storage, offshore wind, tidal stream and wave, as well as in related policy areas. He is now focused on strategic aspects of decarbonisation and carbon capture and storage, and has recently completed a PhD investigating the energy transition.

Briony has a background in marine biology and completed an MSc in Marine resource Development and Protection in 2006. Subsequent postgraduate studies in Law have provided her with a diverse skill set. Briony joined the back office team in 2019, with a broad base in the Oil and Gas industry and experience in tendering, health and safety and freight and logistics.

A chartered mechanical engineer with 20 years of experience in Energy, Oil & Gas & Manufacturing Industries.  A subject matter expert on Combined Cycle Gas Turbine power plant having spent 10 years working on this field within E.ON.  Through his career he also worked for Wood, Halliburton and Invista.  Andrew has extensive experience in project engineering & management, plant modifications, managing plant risk and integrity, process safety and is a Hazard Study leader.  He also has experience in supplier due diligence, long term service agreement scoping and negotiation, owners engineer and FEED studies.  He is currently focused on Industrial Fuel Switching programs and power generation from Hydrogen.

James is an Engineering Project Manager with extensive, mid-stream, pipeline and fuels infrastructure experience. James’ career has included onshore gas transmission design consultancy services and main works contractor management roles. His background in military leadership has included positions with NATO and the UN as well as advisory services to the UK Defence Infrastructure Organisation at home and overseas. As a Civil Engineer James has delivered cradle-to-grave project management for multi-million pound campaigns in the UK, as well as diverse civil engineering and fuels infrastructure portfolios across South Sudan, Singapore, UAE, Iraq and Afghanistan. At Progressive, James is currently the Engineering Project Manager for FEED on the Hydrogen Supply Project for HyNet.

A chartered mechanical engineer and project manager with a strong scientific background. Mike has extensive experience of CCS technology development, performing due diligence on novel power cycles and working closely with heavy industry on industrial capture.  Mike has also led research into hydrogen-from-waste technology, authoring a public report, and alongside this has worked on all stages of waste-to-methane technology, from running experimental programmes to managing development of the first commercial-sale BioSNG facility, and presenting results at academic conferences.  Mike is Progressive’s Technical Lead for the Industrial Fuel Switching programme, enabling industry to reduce emissions by use of hydrogen in existing processes.

Charles is a chartered chemical engineer, and achieved his Master’s degree from the University of Cambridge, before gaining half a decade of experience in Oil Refining and Waste-to-Fuels through working at ExxonMobil and Velocys. Charles has a breadth of industrial experience across Project Development, Operations, Troubleshooting and is a specialist in Process Control & Optimisation.

Charles joined Progressive in 2021 to put his industrial experience and skills towards the energy transition, with a particular aim to minimise the cost of decarbonising UK energy networks by enabling the re-use of existing capital assets. Through the HyDeploy programme, Charles is working to build the safety evidence base for blending 20% Hydrogen into the UK gas distribution network and the specific impacts on the industrial and commercial sectors. This has included acting as a Process Control Specialist for Industrial Fuel Switching demonstration projects at Pilkington Glass, St Helens and Unilever, Port Sunlight to enable a glass furnace and steam boiler to run on 20% blend and 100% hydrogen.

Charles is the Project Lead on Hydrogen Supply & Resilience for Cadent’s Hydrogen Village project, which aims to convert 2000 domestic homes and commercial premises from Natural Gas to 100% hydrogen for heating in 2025, and is a key step on the journey to a fully decarbonised UK gas network.

First joining Progressive in 2020 for a summer placement, Adele focussed on process model development of carbon capture systems in the cement industry. Following this, Adele completed her integrated masters in Chemical Engineering at the University of Bath, in which she specialised in plant-derived bioethanol production and extensively researched the use of immunosensors to improve available Leukemia treatments. Adele began her career in the FMCG R&D sector during her industrial placement year, where she gained experience in project management and pilot scale equipment commissioning. Adele returned to Progressive post-graduation to work on delivering carbon capture and transport across the UK cement sector.

A mechanical engineer who specialised in energy system design; James’ core expertise lie in technical and strategic development of low-carbon projects with a focus on full-chain value optimisation. At Progressive Energy he has led the development of non-pipeline transport solutions for CO₂ in CCS projects as well as providing process engineering, financial modelling, and consultancy support. James is a member of various parliamentary advisory groups on energy, as well as a committee member with BSI and ISO, he is also an industrial mentor for the Progressive-sponsored A-Level Arkwright Engineering Scholar.

Jack has recently completed studying for an MEng (Hons) in Chemical Engineering at the University of Bath. Working closely within our CCUS, Hydrogen Distribution and Whole-System Modelling teams, Jack provides process modelling expertise, technical analysis and due diligence across a range of areas in the HyNet North West and South Wales industrial cluster projects.

In his 35+ year career, he has led capital project development, managed R&D and technology transfer, undertaken equipment design and manufacture, and provided extensive technical and commercial advice to lenders, investors and developers. He has experience of strategic leadership, project management, team management, business development, financial appraisal and commercial management.

Throughout his career, David has focused primarily on the technologies, projects, market structures and policy instruments that are contributing to the decarbonisation of energy systems in the UK and globally.  He has a strong appreciation of the commercial application of a wide range of energy conversion technologies and processes, set in the context of the economic, regulatory and market factors that can lead to their success.

David has contributed over a number of years to various professional bodies and industry groups. He is a longstanding member of the Renewable Power Committee of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, has been a member of the industrial advisory board of the Supergen Bioenergy Hub and has sat on British Standards committees.  He has represented the UK on various international committees and has chaired and presented at numerous conferences in the fields in which he has worked.