Climate advisory firm Foresight appoints Marina Lou as Director
Foresight, a boutique climate advisory and sustainability firm, has appointed Marina Lou as Director.
Lou brings a background that cuts across climate risk and disclosure, climate communications, equity research, management consulting and environmental law.
She served as research director at Zero Carbon Analytics, where she closely worked with the UNFCCC to communicate the findings of the IPCC Sixth Assessment Report to policymakers worldwide. She subsequently co-founded Accela Research, an independent equity analysis research house that interrogates the credibility of corporate climate targets to guide investment decisions by leading global institutional investors.
Commenting on the appointment, Foresight founder and chief executive Josh Martin said: “Marina has worked at the frontier of climate science, analysis, interpretation and communication globally and built research infrastructure that institutional investors trust.”
Foresight chair and executive director Terence Jeyaretnam said the firm is deliberately assembling expertise that sits outside the traditional consulting pipeline.
“In addition to a leadership that is ex-Big Four and therefore able to best prepare our clients for reasonable level assurance on climate related financial disclosures, what we are building is a team that understands the science, understands how capital markets interpret risk and disclosure, and understands the regulatory environment that companies are now operating in,” Jeyaretnam said.
“Marina’s background as an environmental litigation lawyer and her consulting experience means she is best positioned to advise organisations when they are under pressure, at a time when they need advice that cuts through the noise the most.”
The appointment reflects a broader shift in the Australian professional services market, where specialist boutiques are increasingly competing with – and winning work from – the major firms on complex climate and sustainability mandates.
Founded in 2022, Foresight has over the past four years steadily grown its teams in Melbourne and Sydney. For Lou, the move to the consulting firm represents a deliberate bet on its specialist model.
“The science is unambiguous, the regulatory direction is clear, and investors are no longer satisfied with boilerplate transition plans,” she said. “What’s missing in most organisations is the capability to connect climate risk analysis, investor expectations, regulatory pressure and commercial reality into an actionable plan that actually improves business resilience. That is what Foresight does.”
