Jack Guest has done it all. He landed himself a lucrative job in the City. Then he got burn out and left the rat race behind. He got himself an education, went through an anarchist phase and got pally with the Green Party. He became an eco-entrepreneur, giving up flying and launching a green travel website. He even set up his own organic juice company from home, which got him on the telly for the BBC’s Daily Politics. And then he got into movies, making a documentary on climate change that he researched, funded and went out and shot himself. Did we mention he’s just turned 25?

Jack’s popped in to introduce himself, due to our mutual involvement in the Future Friendly Awards; but as we’re all really looking forward to seeing his film, A Convenient Truth, we’ve twisted his arm to do an interview.

A local lad from Croydon, Jack went straight into the City after college but soon got fed up with London. Like many people his age – in between studying and working, or just at a loose end – Jack went on a ski season. And it was this experience, he admits, that started him off on his quest for a greener way of living.

“I had the time of my life, got in touch with nature and all that,” he explains. “I thought to myself, ‘I could do this for the rest of my life’. But I had this inner feeling that I needed to take some of this back with me.”

So Jack ended up at Norwich University where he became something of an activist, heading up the Debate Team and getting involved with the local Green Party.

“At university I got more and more behind climate change and green issues,” he says. “I felt climate change was symbolic of a lot of other issues, such as immigration, and why they weren’t working.”

Although Jack dabbled in direct action, it wasn’t long before he ran out of patience with student activism.

“Arguments among greens were often negative – about cutting and restricting,” he explains. “I’d been through my anarchist stage and had had enough. It ended with a G8 bike ride, where we couldn’t agree on who was going to read the map!”

Somewhere between launching a website promoting what he calls “slow travel” – advocating the appreciation of a journey to negate the massive footprint of a speedy commute – and setting up an organic juice company operating out of his student house, Jack ended up on television. It was then he realised the power of the media in spreading the word.

When Sweden announced it was going to end its oil dependency by 2020, Jack had to see it for himself. And after pitching the idea to TV in what he calls “a rather amateurish way”, Jack decided to go out and film it himself.

“It made sense to use the media because I wanted to show as many people as possible,” he says. “And a month before I went to Sweden, Al Gore’s film [An Inconvenient Truth] came out. It moved me and gave me a concept. I realised I didn’t have to start with the problem. I could just show what needed to be done.”

A Convenient Truth is essentially a road movie, made up of three distinct but at the same time inter-related journeys. The first is of discovery, that greener living is not the daydream of a few, but is in fact reality for the people of Sweden; the second is of a hopeless romantic on a cargo ship to Canada, buoyed on by his revived love for an ex and equally heartfelt desire to prove long-haul does not necessarily mean an aisle seat and deep vein thrombosis; and the third is of realisation, that managing life, love and the planet is a big ask, even for a multi-talented 25 year-old.

One year on, and with final funding still eluding him, Jack’s understandably concerned that his plan will come off. The edit has yet to be paid for, and the film’s release is still up in the air. But despite the delays and the setbacks, he remains upbeat – and it’s the deeply personal nature of his pilgrimage that seems to underpin this optimism.

“They still have a long way to go in Sweden, but they’ve got this far through collaboration,” he explains. “It’s the only way forward – Government, industry and citizenship, all working together. On a personal level, this was very important to me. I was pushed out of my comfort zone, because I was still a deep green. But they were really collaborating. That’s the key.”

It’s clear from talking to Jack that his incredible experiences have taken the edge off his ideology. He’s no longer an anarchist, and is more than comfortable talking about the business end of the media. But the street savvy kid from Croydon still has a glint in his eye. He may have ditched the one-size-fits-all, ‘them and us’ environmentalism of his student days, but he’s now more certain than ever that we have an answer to climate change – that we can do something, and that we can start today.

To find out where and when you can see A Convenient Truth, keep checking back at globalcool.org for updates.

If you can help Jack finish his film, email him at jack@aconvenienttruth.co.uk

And for more on the Future Friendly Awards, click here.