Lucy Stone
Lucy Stone is the founder of Climate Spring, the global organisation funding and supporting scripted and unscripted storytelling that changes the way society sees the climate crisis. Climate Spring works with all stakeholders in the industry as a funder, advisor, convenor and facilitator. Lucy is a leading narrative change expert and climate innovator having set up many successful organisations and initiatives. Lucy has been a leader in philanthropy, in social enterprise, advising UN organisations and governments.
Josh Cockcroft
Josh is a British-Zanzibari producer and changemaker. After a brief stint working in finance and a longer one producing for theatre, he began working in the screen industries. He has worked for broadcasters, distributors and independent production companies and as a script consultant, specialising in projects tackling social and political issues. Josh has authored research on the cultural industries, including a 2024 paper on the equitability of the BFI’s funding practices.
Josh set up Climate Spring with Lucy Stone and James Durrant in 2020. Josh also works for the Esmee Fairbairn Foundation, where he leads work on research, DEI and funder collaboration, and is a Trustee of both the Arvon Foundation and the Cultural Philanthropy Foundation.
David Leach
Since 2006 David has been a TV Freelancer in the nations and regions based in Manchester, Liverpool, Bristol, Cardiff and Leeds.
As a development Exec David has been on the creative teams at some of the UK's leading production companies including True North, Multistory, Boom Productions, Icon Films, BBC Unscripted, BBC Arts, Plimsoll, KEO Films, Lime Pictures and BBC Features & Daytime.
Meanwhile, his production CV is packed with famous formats including Embarrassing Bodies, Panorama, Snog Marry Avoid, Countryfile, Geordie Shore, and Back in Time for... Outside of TV, he is a singer-songwriter, stand-up comedian and an enthusiastic knitter.
Len Rowles
Len is a development and acquisitions consultant and an independent producer known for her focus on visionary filmmakers, and stories with the potential for global resonance. At Climate Spring, Len is building the international film and TV slate and providing editorial and market support to climate projects from development through to distribution. Len previously built and managed Protagonist Pictures’ in-house development and production slate, producing Walter Mosley’s "THE MAN IN MY BASEMENT," directed by Nadia Latif, and starring Corey Hawkins and Willem Dafoe for Disney-ESPN’s Andscape. She also served on Protagonist’s EP team, which secured private finance and structured co-productions on sales titles. Prior to Protagonist, Len ran the development slate at two-time Oscar nominated Wildgaze Films and was on the Creative Team at Pathé UK, developing and overseeing acclaimed socio-political titles such as "SELMA”, "SUFFRAGETTE," and "PRIDE," through to distribution. Len has been drawn to climate storytelling since her earliest films; BIFA nominated "SKYBORN" and BAFTA and EFA nominated "ORBIT EVER AFTER." She has been recognised as a Screen Star of Tomorrow and one of Moviescope’s One’s to Watch.
Sarah Stack
Sarah's role is to focus on the origination, support and development of TV projects, growing Climate Spring slate, and attracting the very best creative talent to bring the full range of their imagination to Climate Storytelling. Working closely with the leadership team, she develops the creative strategy of the company whilst seeking new commissioning opportunities with UK and international broadcasters and partners.
The Climate Crisis is the biggest threat to humanity, and we have lacked imagination in how we tell stories about it. When my children ask me, ‘What did you do, mum?’, I want to have been part of the solution.
Sarah is also currently a Commissioning Editor for C4. Before joining Climate Spring, Sarah was the Head of Development at Kudos and prior to that Senior Script Executive with BBC Northern Ireland where she managed an extensive slates. Sarah’s previous roles have included script editing and executive producing across a range of BBC Dramas including Paula on (BBC 2), Jamaica Inn (BBC 1), and On Expenses (BBC4). She has also initiated and run several new writing programmes and awards including the 360° Script Writing Festival in Belfast and The Tony Doyle Award for television writers.
Kiren Dhadwal
Kiren is a TV consultant for Climate Spring's scripted slate and is also a freelance story producer who started out in UK TV drama over 12 years ago. She has worked her way up as a script editor, working on shows for Sky, Disney, Channel 4, and primarily for the BBC. She is passionate about representing underrepresented communities through storytelling and she also teaches yoga and guides meditations, keen to heal as we collectively work towards building a world we all want to live in that allows us to thrive.
Sara Oberthaler
Sara is an experienced communications and PR professionals with extensive experience in devising and delivering integrated communications strategies across the screen industries as well as non-profit and creative sectors. Alongside her role in leading Climate Spring’s communications activities, Sara also works as a consultant for the British Film Commission. Previously, Sara also worked for London’s Southbank Centre, the Austrian Embassy in London and the International Film Festival Innsbruck (Austria), among others. Before her career in communications, she was the co-founder and deputy editor-in-chief of an Austrian cultural magazine. Sara is also a qualified translator in German and English.
Having grown up in heart of the Austrian alps, Sara has always had a strong connection with nature and our environment and has previously volunteered as a fundraiser for WWF and local nature conservation projects. Naturally, you’ll most likely find her exploring the great outdoors, hiking or rock climbing in her free time.
Phoebe Yemi Ara
Phoebe Yemi Ara is a Pan Macmillan Writer on The Rise (2024) London Library Emerging Writer (2021/22) and has been selected as a BFI x ICO Emerging Producer (2021, 2023) a Watersprite Hubs Producer (2024) one of Channel 4's Rise 2 Development Stream talents, designed to identify the next generation of filmmaking talent (2024) and of Edinburgh TV Festival's The Network (2021) designed to identify bright new talent in film/tv.
She has worked with the script development and commissioning teams at Sky Studios, Sony Pictures Television and Nexus Studios. She occasionally serves on advisory groups seeking to improve inclusion within the film/tv industries.
Phoebe is passionate about using film/television to bring about positive change, and conscious ethics within filmmaking.
Eva Ward
A graduate of the production section of the National Theatre School of Canada, Eva
began her career as a producer for dance and theatre in North America. She then spent
over 15 years as producer and development executive for Sweden's national broadcaster,
SVT Drama, working on drama series, feature films and children’s programs. Taking the
opportunity to become a freelance Creative Producer and Script Consultant in 2004, she
has since worked with a range of diverse filmmakers and their films across Europe and
beyond. Eva also consults on feature film projects in various workshops, focusing on
adaptations and early stages of development. She has worked with Torino Film Lab, TFL,
since 2012 and is since 2019 Head of Studies for ScriptLab, a year long workshop
developing 20 international feature film projects annually. At present, her interest lies in
creating a workshop supporting and inspiring narratives in a time of global crisis.
Maryam Pasha
Maryam Pasha is an expert at turning ideas into compelling stories. She does this at TED and TEDxLondon as a curator and with some of the world’s leading climate science and philanthropy organisations as a storytelling and speaking consultant. She also co-hosts the Climate Curious podcast and the Speechless podcast. She has worked with Nobel prize winners, community activists, billionaires and high school students to help them tell stories that change minds and inspire action. Talks she has worked on have been seen by 20 million viewers, influenced the UK government to change the law on child protection and raised over $1.3 billion to fight climate change.
Maryam has an honorary Masters from the Open University, is a Visiting Fellow at the Skoll Centre for Social Entrepreneurship at the University of Oxford and is a Patron for IKRWO, a charity which provides advice and support to Middle Eastern, North African and Afghan women and girls living in the UK, who have experienced, or are at risk of all forms of “honour” based abuse.
Our Partners and Funders
Albert
Arvon Foundation
CAA Foundation
Counterpoint Arts
Edinburgh TV Festival
Good Energies, Green Shoot
Heard
Hollywood Climate Summit
Norman Lear
Objective
Rare
Redford Centre
Responsible Media Forum
Science and Entertainment Exchange
Spark News
THINK FILM Impact
Browse our Ecosystem
We're compiling a continuously evolving database of organisations that work on sustainability, climate content and storytelling.