Equity-for-Delivery Investor | Environmental Approvals | Waste-to-Energy Australia
I take equity positions in early-stage companies where environmental approvals are the critical path risk. No fees. Skin in the game.
That model didn’t come from nowhere.
Twelve years ago I was navigating environmental approvals on some of Australia’s most complex and highest-stakes energy projects — Chevron’s Gorgon and Wheatstone LNG, INPEX’s Ichthys, MEPAU’s Waitsia Stage 2, and Hazer Group’s Hydrogen Commercial Demonstration Plant. Projects where a misstep in community engagement or a poorly framed scoping submission could cost hundreds of millions of dollars, add years to an approvals timeline, and where the pressure to get it right was real.
That experience taught me something: the approvals process isn’t an administrative step. It’s a strategic one. The projects that sailed through did so because someone understood the regulator’s unasked questions, engaged the right stakeholders before they became opponents, and treated the approvals pathway as a project within the project.
In 2013 I founded AES Environmental — part ambition, part frustration with how environmental consulting typically worked. What it taught me was that genuine partnership orientation creates a different kind of outcome entirely. Not just an approval sought and received. A project unblocked and set up for future success.
So I changed the model.
My current roles are built around a simple belief: genuine contribution to a project’s success should come with genuine accountability and ownership of an outcome.I now work with a small number of founders and developers building serious assets in the energy space. I bring the approvals expertise, regulatory relationships, and a strong industry network. They bring the project. We both win when it gets across the line.
Current focus: Waste-to-energy and unconventional gas project developments in Australia.
Open to: Introductions to early-stage companies where permitting is a genuine constraint.
Background
Australasian Environmental Solutions – Founder | Managing Director | Environmental Approvals and Compliance Specialist
2013-2024
Built AES from a solo practice into a 12-person consultancy delivering environmental approvals and compliance services to tier-one international energy companies including Chevron, INPEX, Woodside, and MEPAU. Sold to international firm EHS Support in 2024. The decade building AES taught me that genuine partnership orientation — showing up accountable to outcomes rather than deliverables — creates value that a consulting model will never fully capture. That insight became the foundation for how I work now.
Qualifications
- Graduate Australian Institute of Company Directors – Company Directors Course (2025)
- Bachelor of Science (Marine Science) – Murdoch University (2008)
Contact
Email: ash@sunflowersoul.com.au
Phone: 0438 945 694
LinkedIn: HERE
Please note that I only work with a small number of companies at any time. However, If you’re developing a project where environmental approvals are a genuine constraint, I’d like to hear about it.