Executive Leadership Team

Phillip Starkins, BA, MInternatRel (Monash), MPPM (Melb), GAICD, joined the Australian Marine Oil Spill Centre in 2012, and was appointed as Chief Executive Officer in February of 2023. His roles at the centre have included responsibility for delivery of preparedness activities such as training, projects and consultancy, and leading the centre’s policy and advocacy work in Australia and abroad.

Prior to AMOSC he worked for both Australian and Victorian Government Agencies in policy and programme administration within the maritime, aviation, surface transport and energy sectors, focussing on emergency risk management and sectoral/business resilience.

Outside of work Phillip enjoys playing golf (badly), supporting the Essendon Football Club and spending time with his primary school age children.

Jessica is General Manager, Capability Building & Projects for the Australian Marine Oil Spill Centre (AMOSC), having joined in 2011. Jessica is an oil spill response professional with operational and technical experience in oil spill incidents across the UK, NZ and Australia.

At AMOSC, Jessica leads the Capability Building team in the delivery of a suite of preparedness services include environmental and technical advice, capability and capacity assessments, the review and preparation of oil spill planning documentation, accredited training and exercising. Her key responsibilities includes leadership in oil spill response management, capability building and projects, staff management and executive support. Jessica represents AMOSC on a number of National Plan Working Groups, the Environmental, Science and Technical (ES&T) Network and within the Global Response Network (GRN) working groups.

Jessica is a Committee for Geelong – Leaders for Geelong (LfG) 2020/21 graduate and alumni mentor. Having completed a two year leadership program that addresses social, economic and environmental issues of importance and builds regional leadership capacity.

Prior to joining AMOSC, Jessica’s focus was marine research. Her studies looked at quantifying larval dispersal and connectivity in freshwater and marine fish populations using transgenerational isotopic labelling. Jessica holds degrees in Marine Biology/Zoology and a Master of Marine Science from the University of Melbourne.

Jessica is an accredited Cert.IV workplace trainer/assessor.

Nathan Young is the Manager Operations having joined AMOSC in early 2013 after 10 years experience in the oil industry.

Nathan commenced his career in the industry with Exxon Mobil as a mechanical technician in their UK based refinery, Fawley. During this time, Nathan picked up technical qualifications in mechanical operations and maintenance throughout the refinery. After this, Nathan moved into oil spill response with the Oil Spill Response Ltd based in Southampton. He worked mainly in the Operations and Projects team providing specialised services to clients. Nathan has also worked in various spills throughout Europe, Africa, the Middle East, Asia and the USA. He also led and conducted training and advisory work in all of these locations.

Nathan is an accredited Cert.IV workplace trainer/assessor

Joanne Taylor joined the Australian Marine Oil Spill Centre in 2024 as Manager Business Services.