Rachael Mills

Rachael joined the ADE Board in 2018, as part of the merger with the Association for the Conservation of Energy where she was also a Board member. Rachael is a co-founder and Director of SE2, a small but perfectly-formed consultancy that helps communities and organisations – in both the private and public sectors – make a difference in the world of climate change. She has a strong grounding in the building environment and energy efficiency, but is probably best known for her stakeholder facilitation and event management work. At the beginning of 2019, the empire grew when she co-founded Chirpy Heat, providing impartial expert advice to not-for-profit heat network operators: she is also co-founded and is the secretariat for The Heat Network, a peer group for social housing providers to meet and share good practice on their communal and district heating schemes, representing nearly 20% of all heat network customers across the UK and supported by the National Housing Federation. Perhaps Rachael’s proudest collaboration though is the District Heating Divas. Recognising the supportive power of women working together, Rachael co-founded the Divas in 2019: it’s now one of the fastest growing diversity and inclusion networks in the UK energy industry. The Divas grew from 15 people to nearly 300 members. The initiative has already launched regional branches across the UK, launched the first heat network industry mentorship programme and a Young Professionals group, and has hosted two highly successful and oversubscribed conferences which were the talk of the town!