WISTA-UK Picks Dr Anne-Marie Warris as Personality of the Year 2013

Dr Anne-Marie Warris, an internationally respected expert in the fields of sustainable shipping, climate change and environmental management, has been chosen as Personality of the Year 2013 by WISTA-UK, part of the Women’s International Shipping & Trading Association.

Dr Warris recently retired from a leading environmental role at Lloyd’s Register to initiate a new venture, ecoreflect ltd, a UK-registered company, whose purpose is “to explore ‘eco’ and to ‘reflect’ on the interconnectivity within ‘eco’ that impacts us.” She continues to take a key role at the International Organization for Standardization (ISO).

Her accolade as WISTA-UK Personality of the Year was announced at a day-long WISTA-UK forum in London as part of London International Shipping Week. Dr Warris is now the UK nominee for WISTA International Personality of the Year, an award to be decided at the WISTA International Conference, which takes place in Montreal from October 2-4.

Maria Dixon, president of WISTA-UK, said: “Anne-Marie has a unique record of achievement in her field. She has long demonstrated a practical and common sense understanding of the maritime industry. She is a great communicator of sometimes complex issues, and has a down-to-earth quality that will make her an excellent ambassador both for WISTA-UK and for the aims of WISTA internationally.”

Dr Warris has more than 25 years’ experience of environmental matters. Among many professional activities, she has given the benefit of her expertise to the marine environmental protection committee of the International Maritime Organization, and is currently on the delegation from the ISO. She was the UK expert to the IMO Expert Group on Market Based Measures in 2010, and in 2013 UK expert to the IMO Expert Workshop on estimating greenhouse gas emissions from shipping.

While at Lloyd’s Register, she ensured that the society was one of the founder signatories of the Sustainable Shipping Initiative, a document drawn up in 2011 pledging businesses to invest in a cleaner future. She convened the group that wrote the IMO MEPC 65 / INF3 paper submitted by the Institute of Marine Engineering, Science and Technology on a ‘goal-based approach to fuel and CO2 emissions monitoring and reporting’.

She has been involved in the sustainability arena since 1998 and has provided input to many European Commission consultations covering shipping and monitoring, reporting and verification of land-based greenhouse gas emissions.

For ISO she drafted its climate change strategy and its submission to the 15th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, on the potential for a management system standard to support ‘nationally appropriate mitigation actions’ for monitoring, reporting and verification. She is chair of the ISO sub-committee responsible for environmental management systems, and of ISO’s joint task coordination group for management systems.

She delivered the Royal Academy of Engineering lecture on ‘A low carbon world – is it realistic?’ in April 2010.

She chairs Emission Trading Group (UK) Ltd, whose membership represents 95% of UK carbon emissions covered by the EU Emissions Trading System. ETG supports and informs UK businesses covered by the UK and EU climate schemes.

At Lloyd’s Register, Dr Warris’s most recent role was as environmental adviser reporting to the marine director. Her responsibility was to ensure Lloyd’s Register listened to and supported stakeholders in the environmental arena, and to demonstrate the acumen of Lloyd’s Register in the sustainability arena. She was instrumental in promoting and reflecting the environmental credentials of Lloyd’s Register to the wider public.

Her professional qualifications and memberships include Chartered Engineer, Chartered Marine Engineer, Chartered Environmentalist, Fellow of the Energy Institute, Fellow of the Institute of Marine Engineering, Science and Technology, Fellow of the Royal Society for the Encouragement of Art, Manufacture and Commerce, member of the Chartered Management Institute, member of the Institute of Environmental Management and Assessment, Principal Environmental Auditor and Principal EMS Auditor.

She runs the LinkedIn group on Sustainable Shipping.

[mappress]

WISTA-UK, September 12, 2013