Although ACOPS UK is a funding Board Member of ACOPS FR, both entities have the same overall mission and are designed to function in a complementary and mutually reinforcing manner, they are managed separately.

TRUSTEE & CHAIR OF THE BOARD – Youna (Le Berre Lemaire )  Lyons

Youna Lyons (PhD) is a marine policy expert with degrees in international law (France), oceanography and marine affairs (USA), completed with a PhD on scientific criteria to identify sensitive marine areas that brought these different areas of knowledge together (Australia). She has 30 years of professional experience in the private sector and academia in Europe and Asia; she focuses on marine environmental issues of global and regional ocean governance and especially on the interface of science, law and policy. Areas of particular interest include regional regime building for the protection of the marine environment, marine environmental data for law and policy-making, marine geoengineering and carbon capture and storage, seabed mining, offshore wind developments, pollution from marine plastics, marine sensitive areas and threatened species, as well as Environmental Impact Assessments and the implementation of an ecosystem approach to marine policy and of coherent governance frameworks and mechanisms.

Formely a Visiting Associate Professor with the Ocean Law and Policy Programme of the Centre for International Law (CIL), National University of Singapore (NUS) where she focuses on Southeast Asia where she spearheaded and coordinated several multidisciplinary research projects. She recentered her research activity to the needs of the bodies ACOPS has consultative status with, remaining affiliated with CIL and NUS. She now leads research initiatives designed to support and inform their work within and outside larger research projects and/or sits on the Advisory Board of research projects lead by academia. She also serves on several editorial boards and is frequently invited as a guest lecturer, including for for the Rhodes Academy for Oceans Law and Policy and the World Maritime University.

TRUSTEE- Sian Prior

Sian Prior (PhD) specializes in interpreting marine science to support conservation and management policy development for advocacy purposes. Priority areas of work include ocean governance and ecosystem-based management in relationship to shipping and offshore industries, marine protected areas and fisheries management and polar issues. She has over 30 years of experience contributing to a variety of international and regional marine management and conservation frameworks, including the International Maritime Organization and the Arctic Council. In addition to acting as an ACOPS Trustee, Sian advises the Clean Arctic Alliance and the Antarctic & Southern Ocean Coalition.

TRUSTEE- Jeanie Facloner

  Jeanie Falconer, formerly a journalist in Turkey, joined one of the first Europe-wide public affairs consultancies as the European single market was being developed in the late 1980s. She was based in London and Brussels, and then increasingly in Eastern Europe as it opened up. She now runs a successful vineyard business in the west of the UK.

SPECIAL ADVISER – Philomène Verlaan

Philomène Verlaan (PhD) is an oceanographer and an attorney-at-law, member of the Florida Bar. She is a Visiting Scientist at the Department of Oceanography, University of Hawai’i.

HONORARY PRESIDENT – Lord Hunt of Chesterton

Lord Hunt’s current position is Visiting Fellow of the Malaysian Commonwealth Studies Centre in Cambridge University. He is a Fellow of Trinity College Cambridge and an Honorary Professor in the Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics, University of Cambridge. He is also a J.M. Burgers Visiting Professor at the Delft University of Technology, Visiting Professor at Arizona State University, Pierre Fermat Visiting Professor in Toulouse (2007-2008), and Academic Director of the Lighthill Risk Network. He is Emeritus Professor of Climate Modelling in the Department of Earth Sciences, and Honorary Professor of Mathematics at University College London. He was Director-General and Chief Executive of the Meteorological Office from 1992-1997. He was created a Baron in the House of Lords (with the title Lord Hunt of Chesterton) in May 2000.

In 1986, Lord Hunt and his colleagues at the University of Cambridge formed a company – Cambridge Environmental Research Consultants Ltd (CERC) – which developed environmental software and, in collaboration with other organisations, a new air pollution dispersion model which is now the standard model for the UK Environment Agency. He has been Chairman of CERC since 2001.

While at the Met Office, Lord Hunt was elected to the Executive Committee of the World Meteorological Organisation. He was active in negotiating new international arrangements for the exchange of data to ensure that National Meteorological Services worldwide can continue to collaborate with each other at the same time as encouraging the commercial applications of meteorology worldwide. He lectured on behalf of the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) at the UN World Conference on the International Decade for Natural Disaster Reduction in 1994, and on urban problems at Habitat II in Istanbul in 1996. He also worked at WMO to improve international warnings for disasters ranging from tropical cyclones to volcanoes and to emphasise urban meteorology. He actively promoted collaboration in Europe and was elected Chairman of the Informal Conference on West European Directors for 1994-95.

In the House of Lords, Lord Hunt sits on the Labour benches and has served on select committees on ‘Animal experiments for scientific procedures’ (2003), ‘Chips for everything’ (2004), ‘International Scientific Treaties’ (2004), ‘EU and Climate Change’ (2005), and the joint pre-legislative scrutiny committee on the Marine Bill (2008).

SOCIAL MEDIA AND WEBSITE MANAGER – Catarina Santos

Catarina Santos holds an MA in Applied Cultural Analysis from Lund University. She is currently pursuing a joint PhD program in Anthropology at Iscte- University Institute of Lisbon and NOVA University of Lisbon. Her research topic focuses on offshore wind infrastructure through the lens of anthropology of infrastructure, energy and maritime studies. She has a particular interest in human cultures and the natural environment.
Her work for ACOPS consists of the exploration of the multifaceted nature of ‘ocean connections’ with humans and communicating it through social media. Catarina developed and manages the ACOPS Instagram account @oceanconnections_byacops. This marine musing activity of ACOPS is built around a weekly theme of exploration and a Sunday meme to expose cultural aspects of ocean connections and connect people with the ocean along the way.

ACOPS FR is registered as an Association under French law. Accordingly, its main organs are a Board (Conseil d’Administration) and a General Assembly (Assemblée Generale). All the members of ACOPS FR are a member of the General Assembly. The management of current affairs is handled by the Bureau composed of a President, a Vice-President, a Treasurer and a Secretary.

PRESIDENT – Youna Lyons (see above)

VICE-PRESIDENT – Joëlle Richard

Joëlle Richard is a research engineer specializing in marine conservation and capacity building. Holding a PhD in biological oceanography, she has developed over twenty years of expertise in the sustainable management of marine socio-ecosystems, from polar regions to the deep sea.

At the Joint Research Unit AMURE, a multidisciplinary research and training center in social and human sciences applied to the sea (University of Brest, France), she coordinates national and international projects on high seas governance and biodiversity protection. She works closely with institutional, scientific, and intergovernmental stakeholders, and takes part in international negotiations, notably at the ISA and BBNJ. Combining social and natural sciences, she also designs educational programs and awareness tools, such as role-playing games and multilingual training modules. Areas of particular interest are area-based management tools in the high seas, seabed mining and the implementation of an ecosystem approach.

SECRETARY – Philippe Janvier

After a decade aboard surface vessels and submarines, Philippe held various positions within the maritime administration, focusing on ship safety and security and the protection of the marine environment.

In May 2018, he was appointed to France’s Permanent Representation to the IMO. Since 2023, he has held the position of Director of Studies on the Ecological Transition of Maritime Transport at CEREMA.

Philippe Janvier holds a master’s degree in “Law and Safety of Maritime and Ocean Activities” from the University of Nantes.