Being the change, Francis' Story

Joined April 2018, London – The past four years have flown by in a period where I have had three roles with Lightsource bp, from International Business Development Bid Manager to Development Manager – UK and Trinidad & Tobago. Throughout these roles I have assessed opportunities in 52 countries and supported country entries for Egypt, Spain, Italy, Portugal, Brazil, Poland, Trinidad & Tobago, as well as Development Manager responsibility for projects in Oman, Azerbaijan and Indonesia. Also, in this time I have had two children, re-located from Kenya to the UK to join Lightsource bp and moved my family to Trinidad last year during lockdown.

Before joining Lightsource bp, I started my career with an Oxford and Nairobi based business called ClimateCare, which aptly defined my professional ambitions and personal values. Whilst at ClimateCare I realised that to make a real difference in the world of climate change I needed to understand how the global energy geo-political and economic system worked which led to the next step in my career.

I joined the BP Graduate programme in 2012 working in Upstream Procurement and Supply Chain Management. During this time, I worked for two years on the Shah Deniz 2, West Chirag Oil, Sangachal Terminal expansion and South Caucasus Pipeline Expansion (SCPx) projects in Azerbaijan, Georgia, and Turkey. I spent two further years working in the Global Facilities Hardware team at BP’s Sunbury offices, supporting projects in the US, Trinidad and Tobago, Oman, Egypt, Angola, Indonesia, the UK, and Azerbaijan. You’ll notice the common geographies from my time here at Lightsource bp. I left BP in 2016 to re-join ClimateCare and start a Solar and Cookstove business operating in East Africa located in Nairobi, Kenya.

In 2018 I joined the Lightsource bp International Business Development team working under Vlasios Souflis as the first external hire in the team.  I have loved every minute of the mad solar-coaster that is life as a developer. I now work across the UK with Kate Johnston, Tara Reale and all the UK development teams.

This is an especially exciting time as I am travelling to Trinidad & Tobago this week to confirm project agreements with the Trinidad & Tobago Government, which will enable us to confirm the start of construction this year and delivering operational Photovoltaic systems in Trinidad by 2023. The solar projects on the island of Trinidad, Brechin Castle 119MWp and Orange Grove 24MWp, will be the largest solar projects ever built in the Caribbean and are the first ever renewables projects in Trinidad & Tobago. Lightsource bp teams, along with our partners at bp and Shell – the project sponsors – and the Trinidadian Government themselves have worked tirelessly for nearly four years on these deals and to be nearing this massive milestone is the proudest moment of my career.