Our Environmental Consultants

Steve Towner – Envirosphere Consulting Principal & Lead Consultant

View Steve Towner on Linkedin

Bachelor of Science (BSC), Diploma of Conservation and Land Management (Dip. CALM), Certificate IV in Project Management, Certificate IV in Government Statutory Investigation and Enforcement.

Steve began his career in the environmental industry in 1998. He has worked with the public sector, NGOs and for private enterprise throughout South East Queensland, to provide communities with a variety of important services tailored to their respective needs. Steve has worked closely with a diverse range of stakeholder groups on a variety of natural resource management issues during his years in the industry, and his success in achieving positive outcomes has been considerable. Specifically, Steve has been responsible for the technical, managerial and consulting aspects of a variety of projects. He has worked with multi-disciplinary teams on many large, complex environmental projects. Steve has an extensive background in environmental impact assessment, flora ecology, vegetation management, flora fauna and pest surveys, ecological restoration projects, and protected areas management.

Kristina Entwistle – Senior Environmental Consultant

Master of Marine Science and Management (MSc); Bachelor of Applied Science (B. AppSc); Diploma of Conservation and Land Management

Kristina is a Senior Technical Consultant with Envirosphere Consulting, specialising in ecology and environmental planning.  She has over 15 years experience working for both the private and public sectors within Australia, and internationally in the UK.

Kristina’s environmental consulting roles have seen her work throughout Queensland, northern New South Wales and the Northern Territory; where she’s been involved in private and commercial land development, resource projects requiring EIS, and conservation management and land use planning projects on behalf of local government authorities. Prior to this she has worked as an environmental planner, planning policy officer, project officer and conservation ranger for local and federal government. She has also volunteered on threatened species projects in New Zealand and Canada.

As a result of her diverse work history, Kristina has acquired a broad range of skills in flora and fauna surveys (terrestrial, coastal, and marine), ecological restoration, environmental impact assessments, environmental monitoring, strategic and environmental planning, project management, scientific research and project design, community engagement, and Indigenous/cultural heritage liaison.

Simon Muirhead – Senior Environmental Scientist and GIS Analyst

Bachelor of Science (BSC), and Approved drone operator

Simon’s Career in the environmental industry has spanned more than 18 years and during that time he has gained diverse experience. Simon’s focus is on providing Envirosphere clients with services in the areas of fauna ecology, impact assessment, environmental management plan preparation, project management, GIS technologies and drone mapping. His technical skill set includes extensive fauna survey experience and fauna spotter/catcher qualifications, a solid understanding of local, state and federal environmental legislation, development of comprehensive technical reports and management plans, statistical analysis, high level GIS analysis and comprehensive map production, UAV operations (Drone) for ecological, infrastructure and environmental surveys.

Carolyn J. Einig – Principal Water Resource Scientist / Catchment Planner / Associate

Master of Resource Science (MSc), Bachelor of Science (BSc) Natural Resource Management, Interdisciplinary Studies Certificates (ISC) in Conservation Biology and Environmental Policy
Carolyn has 15 years of experience as an environmental consultant, serving in technical specialist and project management roles, working primarily in the water resources sector. Her technical expertise is in freshwater ecosystems, and she focuses on social-ecological systems the catchment level/landscape scale. Interdisciplinary skill set shaped by ecological evaluations, impact assessments, mitigation planning, restoration design, and biological monitoring, permitting, regulatory compliance, and stakeholder engagement. She has worked in development, land-use planning, agriculture, energy, mining, oil and gas, transportation and recreation sectors. Her skill set includes natural disaster planning and recovery from drought, fire, flooding, earthquakes, and invasive species. Carolyn was elected board member for a 2-year term at Society of Ecological Restoration, and she is currently appointed as adjunct professional fellow with Southern Cross University GeoScience’s Landscape Hydrogeochemistry Group. Her experience includes catchment level ecological analysis and planning in Western North America and Eastern Australia.

Paul Coyne – Business Consultant / Associate

Paul has an Information Technology background, having been Principal of an IT company that received Business of the Year and World Quality Day awards, and was nominated as a top 400 privately owned Queensland company. Paul has also worked for a leading global IT company designing and implementing large-scale training programs and workshops.

From 2002 to 2019, Paul owned a 49ha rural property in the Scenic Rim and leveraged formal property management planning (PMP) to return the property to its native state. As a result of his experience in PMP, Paul was contracted by SEQ Catchments to assist in the creation of a comprehensive PMP training program for peri-urban landholders. Paul also managed the implementation of community-based natural resource management projects and workshops.

Paul specialises in the business process aspects of environmental protection and restoration, including the facilitation of management meetings and the design and facilitation of community workshops.

Renee Courtney – Ecologist and Environmental Consultant

Bachelor of Science (BSc), Cert 2 in Conservation and Land Management.

Since graduating in 2003, Renee has worked in the environmental industry for 15 years within both the public and private sectors. Renee has carried out a variety of flora and fauna survey roles with well-developed skills in landscape weed mapping, flora and fauna surveys, Biocondition assessments and ecological restoration plans. The foundations of her vegetation knowledge were laid many years ago when she worked as a Conservation Ranger, Restoration Officer and Catchment and Landcare group Liaison Officer for City of Gold Coast and Lord Howe Island.
Following four years of travelling the world and living abroad, Renee returned to Australia and worked in fauna management and conservation for major construction projects including long term koala radio tracking and monitoring for the Moreton Bay Rail Extension Project and several years working as the Wildlife Spotter Catcher Project Coordinator on the construction of the BMA Cavil Ridge Coal Mine.

Evan Thomas – Associate & Principal Environmental Scientist, Soil Scientist and GIS Analyst

Bachelor of Applied Science (BSc -Biol, Maths) Master of Engineering, (MEng)Doctor of Philosophy (PhD).

Evan has over 30 years of experience as a professional environmental and land resource scientist. He has worked in both the public and private sectors in both Queensland and New South Wales working on Nationally funded projects associated with woodland systems and the movement of pesticides from land into waterways as well as researching the movement of sediments and the application of systems models to understanding sustainable land management. Evan has extensive experience in environmental assessment and monitoring and has successfully led teams to complete land resource surveys, over more than 100,000 ha for various major clients and has been invited to provide expert advice on land resource management and on the development of land resource legislation. Evan has utilised GIS systems, spatial databases, applications and mapping products for a number of years. He has expertise in geographic information analysis using a variety of GIS systems including MapInfo, ArcGIS, Esri and QGIS products. With his GIS knowledge Evan can carry out desktop surveys or design high quality maps for management plans.