Caroline Bird is an independent researcher doing the UK comparative element of the project. Her background and research interests are in environmental sustainability and the inter-disciplinary, cross-sectoral approaches necessary for the future. She recently carried out a research and knowledge exchange project for the University of Bristol working with local community energy groups to explore how they ‘maintain momentum’ after seed funding and how intermediaries can help to make the connections between policy and community activism. 

From 2009-2012, she worked as a Research Fellow in the WHO Collaborating Centre for Healthy Urban Environments at the University of the West of England, Bristol bringing together academics and practitioners in planning and public health to help develop healthy, sustainable cities in the UK and Europe through research, consultancy and training. She completed her MSc in Integrated Environmental Studies at the University of Southampton in 1999 and then worked in local government environmental policy. Even longer ago she was a Civil Engineer working on infrastructure construction projects.