Meet the team
We are a small core team with a diverse network of trusted partners and consultants, enabling us to quickly assemble agile project teams with the right experience and skills.
Molly Webb
Energy Unlocked Founder
“Closing the climate ambition gap requires an unprecedented coordination effort to ensure that game-changing innovations are seen, funded and able to flourish in global markets. This was my impetus for creating Energy Unlocked.”
Molly has 18+ years experience in market acceleration and policy advocacy for global innovation in tech, climate change, smart cities and energy. She has worked in partnership with companies (Google, Cisco, BT, Living Labs Global, Metropolis) and cities (London, Southend and eThekwini and the Coalition for Urban Transitions), for The Climate Group and UK think tank Demos.
At The Climate Group, Molly led the work on SMART 2020, a multi-year Information and Communications Technologies industry advocacy agenda on climate mitigation, including open access to data, smart grid, artificial intelligence and digital energy policy. During this time she co-authored the SMART 2020 flagship report. As green innovation strategy advisor for Skype-founder’s Zennström Philanthropies in 2013-14, Molly developed an innovation strategy for how philanthropy can best support civil society and innovation to break through existing policy path dependencies.
Molly established Energy Unlocked in 2015 to run programmes advancing market access for startups, including advising startups directly and through the UK’s Energy Catalyst Accelerator Programme with Eigen Ventures (LO3 Energy, Gommyr, Upya). Molly has sat as a jury member for numerous digital and clean tech awards and is a Venture Partner at Conduit Connect supporting the impact investor-focused network to evaluate innovation companies. Before turning to energy and climate markets, Molly spent 5+ years in software and IT product development in New York, Tokyo and London. In 2023 she co-founded PeerCo with business partner Elaine Trimble, a climate start-up offering carbon accounting and verification software for investors in behind-the-meter electrification and decarbonisation. She participates in industry coalitions including Perseus to advance SME lending based on automated energy and carbon data, and OpenEAC Alliance to standardise timely measurement and reporting of energy actions and their climate in buildings.
Sophie Yule-Bennett
Director of Policy and Governance
“The common thread running through my work has been a passion for fighting discrimination against and exclusion of innovators and energy users in markets. We need to amplify the voices of those currently underserved by policies, services and value opportunities.”
Sophie is a lawyer specialising in energy markets and competition. She has 17+ years regulatory and policy experience spanning the UK’s Government Legal Department, a City law firm, climate-tech start ups and non-profit organisations. As former General Counsel of a demand flexibility company and energy supplier, Tempus Energy, Sophie gained firsthand experience of market challenges facing smart energy innovators, and was an early champion of Energy Unlocked when it was founded in 2015.
For the past decade, she has worked with UK and EU NGOs and philanthropic foundations - including the European Climate Foundation, ClientEarth and Energy Unlocked - on energy and climate policy, strategic litigation and governance.
Sophie’s Senior Advisor consultancy role at the Regulatory Assistance Project included developing policy strategies to unlock demand flexibility in Europe, co-authoring RAP’s flagship reports The Joy of Flex (2022) and Flex-ability for All (2024). Following the theme of inclusive flexibility innovation, she recently led Energy Unlocked’s advisory and management role in the CarbonFlex SIF R3 Discovery pilot project (2024) in a London social housing block, Trellick Tower.
Sophie has provided expert evidence to the UK Parliament’s Energy and Climate Change Committee, the All-party Parliamentary Group on Energy Costs and the Competition and Markets Authority. She has participated in policy working groups, including the UK government’s Alternative Energy Market Innovation Programme, Ofgem’s Half-Hourly Settlement group and National Grid’s Demand Response programme. She is also a member of the UK Energy Demand Research Centre’s Policy Co-Production panel.
Collaborators and advisors
Jason Adcock, Director, Head of Alumni Services Oceania and Energy Unlocked Advisor
Jason has 20 years in business transformation, strategy and innovation for government, telecommunications and technology business including BT, Tech Mahindra, Telstra, sky and others. Managing highly complex projects impacting thousands of employees, 80% of the FTSE and Billions of pounds in revenue. Co-founder of Verdant Horizons, focused on software to enable corporate social and environmental performance.
Sara Bell, CEO, Ample and Energy Unlocked Advisor
Sara has 16+ years in climate change and clean tech, driving market change in the energy and fashion industries. As founder and CEO of Tempus Energy, Sara was a pioneer in demand-side flexibility retail markets, fighting tirelessly to remove incumbency bias in energy and capacity markets. Before becoming an entrepreneur, she spent a decade in financial market risk management for a range of Investment Banks. Sara has been a member of the Strategic Advisory Council for Energy for the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), Director of the Association of Decentralised Energy and a Trustee of Sustainability First.
Jim Walker Energy Unlocked Advisor
Jim co-founded The Climate Group, an international NGO sharing best practices on climate change solutions. He was founding CEO of the We Mean Business coalition, establishing projects in India and China and globally to accelerate markets for LEDs, electric vehicles and access to energy. Jim is also a jury member for the world's largest green innovation prize.
Mark Bornhoft, Director, Eigen Ventures and Associate, Energy Unlocked
Mark works with early and seed stage clean-tech ventures on business development, market engagement, and investment. He spent 20 years in technology innovation and commercialization, and designed, set-up and directed low-carbon business incubation programmes for DECC, Carbon Trust and ERDF delivering business support to over 200 SMEs.
Robert Friel, Director, Apteno Consulting and Associate, Energy Unlocked
Robert is an expert in the management and regulation of energy systems with over 20 years’ experience in the challenges faced by London gained with UK Power Networks and its predecessors, responsible for regulatory and commercial policy on smart grids. Robert is now focused on the challenges of creating a smart energy system, facilitating the innovative commercial and technical solutions that will enable a low carbon future.
Aneysha Minocha, Founder, Quant Energy and Associate, Energy Unlocked
Aneysha is the founder of Quantenergy, a convergence of 19 years of experience in energy efficiency, facilities management and technology. She brings her experience of devising and implementing Carbon, Sustainability and Corporate Responsibility strategies for customers.