energy storage summit 2018

Melisa Johns is vice president of Business and Product Development for Duke Energy’s Distributed Technology team.  She is responsible for leading the development, origination, execution and implementation of investment opportunities and customer offers related to distributed assets for the regulated companies which includes solar, wind, energy storage, CHP and micro grids.

Previously, Melisa was responsible for developing strategy for the Emerging Technology team and directing Duke Energy’s technology demonstration projects which provide lessons learned regarding the technology application, operational implications, and technology transfer within the business.

During her tenure with Duke Energy,  she also served as director of wholesale origination and was responsible for leading the wholesale origination team in the execution of long-term sales contracts from the regulated generation portfolios of Duke Energy Carolinas and Indiana and for the procurement of supply side resources for the company. In addition, she has operational experience in system, planning and operating, and power delivery, as well as experience in regulatory affairs and business planning.

Melisa earned her Bachelor of Science degree and Master of Science degree, in Electrical Engineering, from Clemson University. She has also completed the Strategic Leadership Program at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Jackie Sargent rejoined the Austin Energy team as General Manager in August 2016. She brings almost 30 years of utility experience, as well as the focus and passion to continue the utility’s cutting edge reputation while providing tremendous community benefits.
From 2010 to 2012, Sargent served as Senior Vice President of Power Supply and Market Operations at Austin Energy before joining Platte River Power Authority in Fort Collins, Colorado, as General Manager and CEO. Sargent also served as Vice President of Power Supply and Renewables Integration for Black Hills Corporation in South Dakota.

Throughout her career, Sargent has demonstrated leadership by working with teams to accomplish goals and plan for the future. Some notable accomplishments include managing major construction projects, developing resource plans, supporting acquisitions and mergers, leading utility rate cases, negotiating power purchase and sale agreements, developing and growing energy marketing departments, integrating renewable resources, and creating collaborative energy efficiency programs.

Sargent believes Austin Energy can be a great value to its customers by focusing on these five core values: safety, financial integrity, operational excellence and reliability, exceptional customer service, and engaged employees. A strong financial base along with operational excellence allows a publicly owned utility to be competitive while creating value for the community. By continuing Austin Energy’s standard of exceptional reliability and advancements in grid technology, the utility will be able to offer new levels of communication and collaboration with its customers. But these achievements can only happen with engaged employees in a safe environment that extends to the customers the utility serves.

Sargent is a licensed professional engineer and holds a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering and a Master of Science in Technology Management from South Dakota School of Mines and Technology.

Mr. Mark A. Frigo currently is Vice President, Head of Energy Storage, North America for E.ON, an international privately-owned energy supplier which is focused on renewables, energy networks and customer solutions.  Mr. Frigo has spent over a decade of his career at E.ON.  He currently leads the energy storage business for E.ON in North America, and is responsible for all aspects of that business, including business planning, personnel, and project development and execution.  Mr. Frigo was lead on E.ON’s successful endeavor to establish its first energy storage facility in Arizona, launching the company’s efforts to bring reliable and efficient storage solutions to that region.  His team has subsequently built two additional energy storage projects in Texas helping to stabilize the ERCOT grid.  During his time at E.ON, Mr. Frigo has also led other critical groups for E.ON’s North American business, including the Energy Marketing group, which was responsible for all revenue related activities including power purchase agreements, hedges, and renewable energy credit transactions, the Market Operations & Analysis group, which is responsible for all generation dispatch and scheduling, regulatory compliance, transmission, and market analysis functions in North America, as well as the Risk & Investment group, which was responsible for all structured finance, credit, financial modeling, and insurance functions.  His past accomplishments at E.ON included assisting with implementation of a US$5.7 billion capital build program, which successfully brought 3,136 MW (20 projects) of wind generation and 73 MW (5 projects) of solar generation on-line, enabling E.ON to become one of the top renewable companies in North America.

Mr. Boris Schubert is General Manager, solar and storage, at Shell New Energies and a Director at Silicon Ranch Corporation. With more than 15 years of experience in cleantech, electric utilities, technology and consulting, Borish has held executive roles at Q-Cells International USA Corporation, ET Solar Industry Limited, ET Capital Solar Partners, Inc., and Hanwha Q CELLS USA. He has deep expertise in solar project financing, development, EPC and O&M management. He started his career as a management consultant at Accenture, where his client work included developing market entry strategies for Distributed Energy Resource players, B2B CRM process optimization and data warehousing, and analytics reporting for utilities. Boris holds a Bachelor of Science degree in industrial engineering and a Master of Business Administration degree, both from the University of Augsburg, Germany.

Kate McGinnis is Managing Director for North America at Fluence, a joint venture between Siemens and AES Corporation and a leading global provider of energy storage systems and services. In this role, she leads sales to utilities, IPPs, and developers in the region. Prior to joining Fluence, she spent three years working with AES Energy Storage, resulting in nearly 200MW of contracted projects in the western US. Her start in storage was with Chevron Technology Ventures, where she led development of stationary storage projects co-located with oil & gas infrastructure globally. She has nearly two decades of experience in the energy space, and has worked in areas including energy efficiency, carbon markets, and a variety of renewables. Kate is a board member and past chair of the California Energy Storage Alliance. She holds a BS in Environmental Science from George Washington University and an MBA from Cornell.

Brandon currently leads Distributed Energy innovation & integration for Microsoft's Energy Strategy & Research team. Her background combines renewable energy asset management and project finance experience with political risk consulting and environmental policy. Prior to joining Microsoft, she has held senior positions at SunEdison, Bloom Energy and Albright Stonebridge Group. Brandon holds a BA, Environmental Studies and a MESc Environmental Science from Yale University; and an MBA from Stanford University.

Kevin Vannoy is MISO’s Director of Market Design.  He has over twenty three years of Management and Consulting experience in the electric utility industry, including Regional Transmission Organizations, and regulated and deregulated markets.  He has been with the Midcontinent Independent System Operator (MISO) since 2005. 

He was MISO’s Director of Forward Operations Planning from June 2015 to September 2017, his responsibilities included; Transmission and Generation Outage Coordination, Tariff Administration and Scheduling, Forecast Engineering and Seams Administration.

He was MISO’s Director of Market Administration from 2010 to June 2015, responsible for administering Auction Revenue Rights (“ARRs”), the Financial Transmission Rights (“FTR”) Markets, the Day-Ahead Energy and Operating Reserves Markets, Resource Adequacy Administration, Forecast Engineering, the Forward Reliability Assessment Commitment and Real-Time Ex-post Locational Marginal Pricing functions. 

Kevin managed Market Services starting in 2005 following the launch of the Midwest Energy Markets.  He led Market Quality and Dispute Resolution, Market Settlements, Tariff Pricing and Transmission Settlements until 2010. 

Kevin has been involved with numerous Market development and improvement initiatives at MISO, including the Ancillary Services Markets implementation, Revenue Sufficiency Guarantee Allocation Redesign, Financial Transmission Rights Funding efforts, Transmission Multi-Value Project Auction Revenue Rights Allocation, Annual Resource Adequacy Auctions, and Extended Locational Marginal Pricing.

Kevin holds a Bachelor of Science Degree in Civil Engineering from the University of Florida.  Prior to joining MISO, he held management roles with both the Structure Consulting Group LLC in their Regional Transmission Organization Consulting Practice, and Accenture (formerly Andersen Consulting) in their Utilities Industry Practice.  Prior to joining Andersen Consulting in 1995, he served as a Commissioned Officer in the United States Navy.

Shounok currently leads the Products & Structuring function for Constellation Energy’s Distributed Energy business. He is based in Baltimore and focuses on the renewable and distributed energy sector. At Constellation, Shounok has led the new product development, financial structuring and asset acquisition efforts for competitive bidding and internal underwriting helping deploy over $1B of capital on Distributed Energy development; opportunities span multiple asset classes including Solar PV, Storage, Fuel Cells & Biomass. In addition, Shounok has extensive experience in Project Financing and was involved in non-recourse debt offerings on utility scale renewable and gas generation assets totaling over $1.5B. Shounok holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Instrumentation Engineering from BMS College of Engineering, India and has a MBA from the University of Maryland at College Park.

Howard Smith graduated Clemson University in 1977 with a BS degree in Electrical Engineering. 

Currently, Howard is the Manager of Distributed Energy Resource Policy.  In this role, he is responsible for tracking current and future trends and activities involving the broad aspects of DER.  Also, he is responsible for developing plans and policy positions related to DER in support of Executive Management’s efforts in the establishment of goals, actions and policies for the Southern system.

At the present time, Howard is on the Advisory Council for the new Smart Electric Power Alliance (SEPA) which is the merged Solar Electric Power Association (SEPA) and Association of Demand Response and Smart Grid (ADS) associations.  In addition, he was formerly the Chairman of the Board of Directors for the ADS, and he served on the Alabama Governor’s Advisory Team for Industrial Energy Efficient and CHP.  He has made numerous regional and national presentations on integrated resource planning, demand-side management, smart grid and other electric industry related topics. 

Prior Work Experience:

Duke Power

While attending Clemson, he worked as a student engineer for Duke Power Company in their Anderson operating district. Upon graduation, Howard worked as a Quality Assurance/Special Project engineer in distribution.  In 1979, he worked in the Duke Power corporate office as a distribution staff engineer responsible for distribution design and equipment standards, outdoor lighting, and special projects.

Georgia Power

In July 1981, Howard went to work for Georgia Power in their Transmission Substation Design department.  From 1983 through 1992, he held various jobs within Transmission, Generation and Market Planning.  In 1993, Howard became responsible for developing the Integrated Resource Plan (IRP). In addition, he was responsible for the development, filing and approval of Purchase Power Contracts that were the result of competitive bidding of generation needs through a Request-for-Proposals process.    Also, in 2003, Howard became the Metro Team Manager for Key Accounts in the Sales Organization.  In 2005, he became the Manager of Technical Sales and his team was responsible for promoting electric end use processes for non-electrical customer processes.  Also, his team was responsible for the evaluation of Customer Cogeneration Opportunities.

Alabama Power

In May 2008, Howard became the Manager of Resource Planning and Demand Response Operations for Alabama Power.  He was responsible for the development of the generation supply-side and demand-response plan to meet the future needs of Alabama Power’s customers.  This responsibility includes seeking cost effective resources such as: combined heat and power generation, renewable resources (wind, solar, biomass, etc.), traditional generation and customer energy efficiency and demand controlled resources.

Kelly Speakes-Backman is the first CEO of the Energy Storage Association. Kelly has spent over 20 years working in energy and environmental issues in the public, NGO and private sectors, including organizations such as United Technologies, SunEdison and Alliance to Save Energy. She is a former Commissioner of the Maryland Public Service Commission where she also served as Chair of the Board of Directors of the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, co-vice chair of the NARUC Committee on Energy Resources and the Environment, and member of the EPRI Energy Efficiency & Grid Modernization Public Advisory Group.  She is a mechanical engineer from Boston University.

Dr. Apurva Somani holds a Ph.d. in electrical engineering from the University of Minnesota and is currently the Research and Development Lead for the Dynapower Energy Storage Group. He was responsible for leading the team that developed and deployed Dynapower’s award-winning family of DC/DC converters (250kW/375kW/500kW).

Anastasia Palivos was appointed to the Illinois Commerce Commission by Governor Bruce Rauner on January 19, 2018, to a five-year term.  An Illinois native, Palivos is the first Greek-American woman appointed to the Commission and, at 28, the youngest-ever appointed commissioner.  During her first five months at the Commission, Palivos hosted a policy session to examine the nexus between electric vehicles and grid stabilization, and later published an article in Public Utilities Fort Nightly discussing EV deployment in Illinois.  Palivos also hosted a policy session on the future of energy storage in Illinois, which provided an overview of the history of energy storage, explored the various types of energy storage, and considered best practices to operate and integrate energy storage with the electric grid.

Prior to her appointment, Palivos was a legal and policy advisor to the chairman of the ICC from April 2015 to July 2016.  During that time, Palivos planned, organized, and moderated policy sessions on important and emerging industry issues, such as business and IT investments in cloud computing arrangements, energy efficiency in affordable housing, smart cities, and solutions to resource adequacy.  Palivos also spearheaded a Notice of Inquiry to explore the prudency of utility investment in cloud computing by evaluating issues such as cybersecurity and customer rate impacts of such investments.  Her efforts ultimately led to a Commission rulemaking proceeding.

Most recently, Palivos worked as a business development strategy analyst for a Chicago-based health intelligence firm.  She graduated magna cum laude from DePaul University, with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science and later earned her Juris Doctor at DePaul University College of Law.  During her studies, she engaged in a number of volunteer opportunities, including volunteering at the Domestic Violence Courthouse and received the Chancellor’s Service Award.  Palivos is a founding board member of the Hippocratic Cancer Research Foundation, which provides philanthropic support for cancer research teams at Robert H. Lurie Comprehensive Cancer Center of Northwestern University.

Kevin is General Manager of Anza Electric Cooperative, Inc., located in Southern California’s Riverside County. One of only three electric distribution cooperatives in the Golden State, Anza Electric serves 5,000 meters across a 550 square mile rural area.

With a background in electrical engineering and solar contracting, Kevin has brought a fresh perspective to the business operations of Anza Electric. After 67 years, the Cooperative still maintains a rate structure far below the surrounding investor owned utilities while retiring more than $11M in capital credits to their members. 

In late 2012, Kevin laid the ground work for ConnectAnza, a high speed broadband ISP offering for Anza Electric members. This is a full fiber-to-the-premises deployment, bringing a 100 Mb/s symmetric initial offering to its members for $49 per month. Near future plans include full megabit speeds for all subscribers. Since Anza Electric is a not-for-profit cooperative, the ConnectAnza service is offered at cost for members. Anza is one of the first electric cooperatives in the nation to not only offer high speed internet, but to do so at cost.

In 2015, ConnectAnza won a competitive grant from the California Public Utilities Commission in support of rural broadband deployment in the amount of $2.7M, the first such grant in Riverside County. ConnectAnza began construction in December 2015, and now has over 500 miles of aerial fiber deployed, with nearly 2,000 area businesses and residents signed up for service. In 2018, another grant was received by the cooperative for an additional $1.2M in funding to complete their fiber build out.

In late 2016, The Anza Board of Directors approved the installation of an Electric Vehicle Charging station, open to the public. The station is the first in the region, serving more than 700 square miles previously unserved by EV infrastructure. This project was funded through the California Pollution Control Financing Authority’s California Capital Access Program (CalCAP). Anza’s loan was the very first successful loan in this state program.

Anza dedicated its SunAnza Solar project in June 2017, a 2 MW solar array adjacent to their headquarters. The second phase of the project will include an additional 1.7 MW of generation, as well as battery storage facilities for peak load reduction and micro grid capability. The second phase of this project will feature microgrid capability through additional solar and battery deployment.

Miriam Makhyoun is a Power Supply Contracts Manager at MCE, California’s first Community Choice Aggregation Program. Miriam supports MCE’s portfolio management and is responsible for oversight of power supply contracts, Request for Offer administration, Integrated Resource Planning, supplier performance monitoring, and portfolio optimization activities.  She managed MCE’s May 2018 Energy Storage Request for Offer process, focusing on grid asset and behind-the-meter energy storage products.  Her past experience includes portfolio management at Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E) procuring Resource Adequacy and carbon compliance instruments as well as educational non-profit work focused on promoting and developing cleaner energy options at Smart Electric Power Alliance (SEPA), where she also focused on energy storage, authoring the 2014 report, “Electric Utilities, Energy Storage and Solar: Trends in Technologies, Applications and Costs” and at North Carolina Sustainable Energy Association (NCSEA).

Dr. Sonja Glavaski is a Program Director at the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) overseeing  portfolio of projects developing innovative and disruptive technologies that would facilitate cost-effective building energy audits, more efficient renewable energy generation, and enable electricity grid to be more responsive and resilient. Her technical focus area is data analytics, and distributed control  of complex, cyber-physical systems with emphasis on operations and security of energy systems.  Dr. Sonja Glavaski spearheaded development and is currently helming ARPA-E Network Optimized Distributed Energy Systems (NODES) Program that aims to develop transformational grid management and control methods to create a virtual energy storage system based on use of flexible loads and distributed energy resources (DERs).

Prior to joining ARPA-E, Dr. Glavaski served as Control Systems Group Leader at United Technologies Research Center advancing knowledge and technology in the area of control & intelligent systems. Before being at UTRC, Dr. Glavaski led key programs at Eaton Innovation Center and Honeywell Labs. During her 20-plus-year career, Dr. Glavaski has contributed significantly to technical advancements in numerous product areas, including energy systems, hybrid vehicles, energy efficient building HVAC/R systems, and aircraft systems. Dr. Glavaski received Ph.D. and MS in Electrical Engineering from California Institute of Technology, and Dipl. Ing and MS in Electrical Engineering from University of Belgrade.

Carl has over 40 years of utility industry experience managing energy for California’s sixth largest utility, the Imperial Irrigation District, as the Energy Manager and the Portfolio Management Officer. During his tenure at the utility, Carl initiated strategic project management, implemented processes that saved hundreds of millions in costs, and oversaw the implementation of battery storage projects. As a member of the Geothermal Energy Association board, Carl helped initiate the use of renewable energy as a catalyst for addressing the Salton Sea environmental issues.

Carl is the Vice President of Imperial Valley Development and Storage Integration for 8minutenergy. He oversees the development of renewable projects in Imperial Valley and works with 8minutenergy’s storage team to bring energy storage projects to fruition.

Dan Loflin currently serves as the CEO of Geli, a leading supplier of software solutions to the energy storage industry. Under his leadership, Geli closed its Series A funding and expanded business operations to New York City and Australia. Dan comes to Geli with more than 20 years of experience developing and commercializing market-defining technologies, and has held senior management and advisory roles at Locus Energy, IBM, LG Electronics, and McKinsey & Company. Dan holds a BA from Columbia University and a MBA from the Kellogg School at Northwestern University.

Scott Zimmermann is an attorney in the San Francisco office of Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, where he is a member of the firm's energy and infrastructure practice, focusing his practice on representing the leading and emerging companies in the distributed solar, energy storage and energy efficiency markets. Scott advises new and established companies and their investors on issues affecting the energy, infrastructure, and clean tech industries, including project development, energy regulatory counseling, debt and tax equity project finance, joint ventures, and start-up counseling. Having previously supported the design and construction of international oil and gas projects, Scott brings over 20 years of experience working in the energy industry to his practice. His clients include Stem, Vivint Solar, Sunrun, Carbon Lighthouse and Redaptive.

Erin Minear is a Technical Leader for the Energy Storage Program at the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI), managing projects related to integrating energy storage assets into the utility grid. Erin has previous experience in developing commercial behind-the-meter and utility distribution-connected energy storage systems for an engineering, procurement, construction (EPC) firm. She also has 7 years of experience as a power systems engineer implementing projects to drive reliability and efficiency improvements, including transmission and distribution upgrades, microgrids, renewable energy, and energy storage. Erin is a registered Professional Engineer in the state of California and has a BS and MS in Electrical Engineering from California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo.

Matt Owens has 20 years experience in the energy technology and utilities industry working in product marketing, product management and business development roles.  He has significant experience with Smart Grid and DER solutions and he is currently leading West Monroe Partners market and business development initiatives in the west region.   Matt previously worked at Stem where he lead utility business development and Itron where he lead Product Marketing and Management for Itron’s Smart Grid solutions.  Matt earned his BS in Mechanical Engineering from UC Davis and his MBA from the Haas School of Business at UC Berkeley.

David Kirkpatrick is a Director at Marathon Capital where he has led multiple project and company M&A transactions in the wind and solar industries along with capital raising for emerging growth and technology companies. Prior to joining Marathon Capital, Mr. Kirkpatrick worked for 20 years as an executive in the energy arena for companies including Ernst & Young, the Boston Consulting Group, General Electric Wind Energy, EDF-EN/enXco, Imperium Biofuels, and NRG Solar. Mr. Kirkpatrick has closed over $3 billion worth of transactions including company and project acquisitions and sales, venture investments, power purchase agreements, procurement of GW’s of wind/solar equipment, joint development agreements, land acquisitions, procurement of feedstocks and chemicals, rail/barge/and storage leases, and EPC contracts in the wind, solar, and biofuels industries.

Mr. Kirkpatrick completed his MBA at Harvard Business School, post graduate work at the University of St. Andrews as a Robert T. Jones Scholar, and his BA, cum laude at Emory University. Mr. Kirkpatrick holds his Series 63 and 79 licenses.

Jim Hughes has over 25 years of experience in electric power and gas infrastructure.  He is CEO and Managing Director of Prisma Energy Capital, a private entity focused on investments in energy storage.  He serves as Director on several Boards including Alcoa Corporation, TPI Composites Inc., and Eos Energy Storage.  He was also appointed to the Los Angeles Branch Board of Directors of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco on September 2013.

He is the former Chief Executive Officer and Director of First Solar, Inc., a leading global provider of comprehensive photovoltaic solar systems which use its advanced module and system technology.  He joined First Solar, Inc. in March 2012 as Chief Commercial Officer and was appointed Chief Executive Officer in May 2012.  He stepped down as Chief Executive Officer on June 30, 2016 and resigned from the Board on September 1, 2016.

Prior to joining First Solar, Mr. Hughes served, from October 2007 until April 2011, as Chief Executive Officer and Director of AEI Services LLC, a private company that owned and operated power distribution, power generation (both thermal and renewable), natural gas transportation and services, and natural gas distribution businesses in emerging markets worldwide.  From 2004 to 2007, he engaged in principal investing with a privately held company based in Houston, Texas that focused on micro-cap investments in North American distressed manufacturing assets.

He served as a Non-Executive Director of APR Energy plc, from 2012 to 2016. Previously, he served as President and Chief Operating Officer of Prisma Energy International, which was formed out of former Enron interests in international electric and natural gas utilities.  Prior to that role, Mr. Hughes spent almost a decade with Enron Corporation in positions that included President and Chief Operating Officer of Enron Global Assets, President and Chief Operating Officer of Enron Asia Pacific, Africa and China, and Assistant General Counsel of Enron International.

Mr. Hughes holds a J.D. from the University of Texas at Austin School of Law, a Certificate of Completion in international business law from Queen Mary’s College, University of London and a Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration from Southern Methodist University.

Edouard Bulteau is an Investment Director at Total Energy Ventures (TEV), the corporate venture arm of the energy major, Total. TEV identifies, funds and fosters innovative startups helping to solve the energy transition challenge. Edouard has been investing and working with startups in energy storage, smart grids, energy access and solar in the US, Europe and Africa. Prior to joining TEV, Edouard worked in academic research on systems engineering and ecology. He holds a M.Sc. in Civil and Environmental Engineering from UC Berkeley and a M.Sc. in Applied Mathematics and Ecology from Ecole Polytechnique in France.

Kyle Garton is Director of Product Development at AutoGrid Systems, responsible for DERMS and virtual power plant applications of energy storage, demand response and any flexible energy resource for residential to industrial scale deployments across the globe.

Prior to AutoGrid, Kyle held product management positions at Stem and SunPower commercializing distributed behind-the-meter energy storage products. Kyle has been involved in deployments of fleets of distributed energy resources across the US, Germany, Japan and Australia; providing value to both customers and utilities with local energy optimization and grid services capabilities. Prior to focusing on energy storage, Kyle held a business development role at SunPower, developing landmark solar projects for Fortune 100 clients, ranging from small rooftop systems to >20MW power plants. In his early career Kyle worked in academic research and development of next generation energy harvesting nanomaterials. Kyle holds a B.S. in Engineering Physics from UC Berkeley and a M.S. in Materials Science & Engineering from UC San Diego.

Following a lifelong passion to power cars with solar energy, Pete has devoted the past 15 years to advanced materials development for breakthrough energy storage technologies.  He co-founded Sepion Technologies in 2015 to commercialize must-have membrane components that boost the energy density, safety, and lifetime of lithium and beyond lithium batteries. His background in self-assembly and synthetic chemistry provides a unique vantage point to leverage innovative materials to solve long-standing battery problems.  Pete is an alumnus of the prestigious Cyclotron Road Energy Technology Incubator, and previously was a Project Scientist at Berkeley Lab, an Alexander von Humboldt Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Würzburg in Germany, and he holds a Ph.D. in inorganic chemistry from the University of British Columbia and a B.Sc. in chemistry from Idaho State University.

Ajay has a depth of technology and project development experience, gained through progressive roles with Hatch's Industrial Clean Tech and Advisory practices. While working in the Industrial Clean Tech practice, Ajay gained in-depth engineering and project management experience through clean technology development in the lithium, cobalt, nickel, copper, gold, lead, zinc, molybdenum, and rare earth metals industries. His technical expertise spans the entire project lifecycle, from conceptual and pre-feasibility studies to construction and commissioning. Currently, Ajay serves as CEO of Li-Cycle™, a clean tech company with a proprietary and commercially scalable solution to recycle spent lithium-ion batteries. Ajay originally graduated from the University of Toronto in Chemical Engineering with honours.

Brett Simon is a senior energy storage analyst at Wood Mackenzie - formerly GTM Research, focusing on the U.S. behind-the-meter energy storage market. He leads GTM Research’s quarterly U.S. storage market report, The U.S. Energy Storage Monitor, published in collaboration with the Energy Storage Association. Prior to joining GTM, Brett earned a Master of Science degree in sustainable systems at the University of Michigan School of Natural Resources and Environment. He first became interested in energy storage systems and their potential to revolutionize the energy sector through his coursework and master's project. Brett also holds a bachelor’s degree in mathematics and environmental studies from New York University.

Prior to joining ENGIE Storage, Chris worked at Alta Energy as Chief Strategy Officer where he helped guide the expansion of service offerings for large corporate customers. Prior to Alta, Chris was CEO of SunLink, a balance of system equipment and service provider to the solar industry where he grew the company from its earliest stages to market leader. Prior to SunLink, Chris was President & CFO of Prevalent Power, a leading California solar integrator. Earlier in his career, Chris worked at Bechtel, Booz Allen and Santander Investment with a focus on the energy sector. Chris holds a BSME from LSU, an MSME from Purdue University, and an MBA from INSEAD in France.

Dr. Rahul Walawalkar is President & MD of Customized Energy Solutions India Pvt. Ltd. He leads the Emerging Technologies practice for Customized Energy Solutions globally with focus on energy storage, renewables, demand response, electric vehicles and smart grid technologies. Rahul is founder and Executive Director of India Energy Storage Alliance since 2012. He served as board member for Energy Storage Association, USA during 2009-15 and currently serves as Chair for Global Energy Storage Alliance. In 2014, he was nominated as part of Standing Committee on Energy Storage and Hybrid systems by MNRE and is currently working on drafting the national energy storage mission. He served as member of national taskforce for renewable integration by Central Electricity Authority & Ministry of Power during 2013-14. Under Rahul’s leadership Customized Energy Solutions’ has received various awards including IPPAI Power Innovation Award for creation of India Energy Storage Alliance in 2016-17, Brad Roberts Award for outstanding industry contribution by Energy Storage Association (USA) in 2016, USAID’s PACEsetter Fund Award for MICRO initiative in 2016 and CII Innovative Energy Services Award for Tata Power Demand Response program in 2012. He was recognized with India Smart Grid Forum (ISGF) President’s Award in 2018 for outstanding contribution to growth of smart grids in India. He is also recipient of Energy Storage Crusader Award from Renewable Energy India Expo in 2017, DSK Energy Award from Institution of Engineers (India) in 2014 and Computer Society of India’s Young IT Professional Award for 2000 and 2001. Rahul holds a Ph.D. in Engineering and Public Policy from Carnegie Mellon University, M.S. in Energy Management from NYIT and B.E. from Walchand College of Engineering.

With more than 17 years of energy industry experience, Bud Vos has in-depth experience with providing high-value software solutions to utilities. As president and CEO of Enbala, Bud is leading the company through the next phase of its business growth as it continues to expand its industry-leading Virtual Power Plant and DERMS solutions. Bud previously served as the COO of Simple Energy, a SaaS-based company that leverages data analytics to motivate utility customers to save energy. He was also senior vice president of utility sales and CTO of Comverge, a leading provider of integrated demand response, energy efficiency and customer engagement solutions. In addition, Bud was founder and vice president of engineering at Sixth Dimension, a provider of Internet-based control systems for demand response and distributed generation systems.

Enrico Ladendorf is the managing director and founder of Pason Power.  Pason Power offers an end-to-end energy intelligence software platform to design, control, manage, and aggregate advanced energy storage systems. Pason Power solutions are compatible with leading component suppliers and enable energy storage systems that reduce costs for end users, serve as reliable grid assets for utilities, and empower developers to deploy storage systems of all sizes with confidence.

Pason Power is backed by its parent company, Pason Systems Inc. (TSX:PSI), and leverages robust, industrial technology and expertise which has established Pason Systems as a world leader in energy data management and controls automation. Pason enjoys one of the strongest balance sheets in the industry and has a 40-year track record of adding value through energy data.

Enrico also serves as a Director in the Pason Systems New Ventures group which works to identify, assess, and execute upon new strategic business opportunities through organic growth in new markets, acquisitions and partnerships.

Enrico has been with Pason for over 10 years and has over 18 years of experience in engineering and business leadership positions.

Enrico Ladendorf holds bachelor degrees in Computer Science and Molecular Biology from the University of Texas at Austin and a Masters in Computer and Information Science from the University of Pennsylvania.

Ben Kass is an attorney with the law firm Husch Blackwell LLP, with over 30 dedicated renewable energy attorneys in offices across the U.S. Ben has worked on the development, construction, financing, operation, acquisition and sale of more than 3,000 MW of solar, wind, and battery storage projects in 24 U.S. States, Guam, Canada and Mexico. His clients include project developers, BOP/EPC providers, independent power producers, yieldcos and other project owners, as well as end users and corporate off-takers. Ben previously served as in-house counsel for a large international renewable energy development and construction company where, among other duties, he assisted in developing several utility-scale solar and battery storage projects, and helped launch the company’s distributed solar group, catering to utilities, municipal and regional cooperatives and corporate clients.

Joe Zhou is the CEO of Quidnet Energy, which commercializes a breakthrough in geomechanical pumped hydro for energy storage. Quidnet has completed a successful demonstration facility in Texas, and is underway to develop a set of grid-scale commercial facilities. Prior to Quidnet Energy, Joe worked at Green Charge Networks, a California-based energy storage project developer that was acquired by Engie in 2016. Joe started his career in advisory for heavy-industry capital projects at McKinsey, and in process engineering and hydraulics at ExxonMobil. Joe holds a B.Sc. in Chemical Engineering and a MBA.

Dan is the head of the Energy Storage team at Wood Mackenzie (formerly GTM Research), where he focuses on front-of-the-meter energy storage applications. He previously worked as a Senior Consultant with DNV GL where he focused on competitive energy markets and the intersection of emerging energy business strategies within the broader evolving technological and regulatory environment. Prior to DNV GL Dan worked with Navigant Consulting and the Department of Energy.

Dan has 10 years of experience in the energy space as a researcher, consultant, and analyst. Dan holds a Master’s of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering degree from the University of Massachusetts Amherst Wind Energy Center and a Bachelor of Science in Mathematics-Physics from Brown University.

Julian is a staff writer at Greentech Media, where he reports on energy storage and other clean energy sectors. He also has experience covering clean transportation, state and federal energy policy, and climate adaptation. Previously, Julian reported for CityLab at The Atlantic and conducted grant-funded climate change reporting in Bangladesh. He graduated from Duke University with a B.A. in political science.

Wade is the Global Head of Energy & Sustainability practice at Plug and Play - the most active early stage investor in U.s and a global corporate innovation center. He has built a collaborative platform with Siemens, PG&E, Dominion Energy, Tokyo Gas, Enerjisa and several other innovative utilities and energy corporates in oil and gas, to accelerate digital transformation. His mission at Plug and Play is to bring innovation into energy industry by bridging the startup ecosystem and corporate world. Wade holds master degrees in Chemical Engineering and Petroleum and Natural Gas Engineering.