Oliver Franklin-Wallis is an award-winning British journalist, whose writing has appeared in GQ, WIRED, The Guardian, The New York Times, The Times Magazine, The Sunday Times Magazine, The Economist, and many other publications. Ceaselessly curious about our world, Oliver has reported on art fraudsters and deep-sea explorers, reported from Liberia on the ebola virus and from the UK on vaccines, chronicled the fractious race to build a hyperloop, and profiled countless startup founders, scientists, pro athletes, and Hollywood celebrities. In the process, his travels have taken him from some of the world’s poorest places, to the boardrooms of some of the world’s biggest companies. Passionate about the environment, Oliver has long reported on sustainability and climate issues.
His first book, Wasteland: The Secret World of Waste and the Urgent Search for a Cleaner Future (Summer 2023), has been called an “urgent call to action” (Publisher’s Weekly) that “should prompt serious discussion in boardrooms and parliaments” In his book and through his virtual and in-person talks, he tackles our growing waste crisis: from the 2 billion tons of solid waste we discard every year, to the plastics and sewage flooding our rivers and seas. A sought-after speaker, he provides audiences – from colleges to corporations – a roadmap of practical approaches including behavioral change and technological innovation to combat our urgent global waste problem.