Learn More about the Midwest Energy Storage Summit Speakers
Energy Storage Summit Speaker and Moderator List
Mary Powell
CEO/President
Green Mountain Power
Mary Powell is nationally recognized as an energy visionary, positioning Green Mountain Power as a leading energy transformation company. Mary Powell will be the Keynote Speaker at the Summit and Green Mountain Power was recently featured in this New York Times article for its efforts to rethink carbon-based power systems
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Mary has served as president and chief executive officer for GMP since 2008. She initiated and implemented a strategic and comprehensive restructuring of the company that dramatically transformed GMP, and she has been the backbone of a cultural transformation and service quality improvement. Fast, fun, and effective is her motto. Under Mary’s leadership, GMP became the first utility in the world to become a certified B Corp, showing a commitment to use energy as a force for good.
Mary has delivered on an ambitious energy vision to provide low-carbon, low-cost and highly reliable power to Vermonters. As a result, GMP became the first utility to offer to help customers go off-grid, built Vermont’s largest wind farm, made Rutland, Vermont, the Solar Generation Capital of New England, and installed smart grid technology across GMP’s service territory.
In 2012, Mary led the acquisition of Central Vermont Public Service, with a promise to generate $144 million in savings for customers. GMP has grown from serving 88,000 customers in 2008 to serving over 260,000 customers, with revenues of more than $640 million and $2 billion in assets.
And in 2015, Mary led another partnership with Tesla, with GMP becoming the first utility anywhere to offer customers the Tesla Powerwall battery.
In 2014, Mary was recognized by Powergen as the Woman of the Year, in 2015 The Burlington Free Press named her Vermonter of the Year, in 2016 Fast Company named Mary one of the 100 most creative people in business, and in 2017, Mary was named one of the top 25 Most Influential Women of the Mid-Market by CEO Connection.
Chistopher B. Clark
President
Xcel Energy– Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota
Chrisopher Clark is responsable for the strategic plan and financial results of Xcel Energy as well as the company’s customer, community, regulatory legislative and governmental relationships in Minneosta, North Dakota and South Dakota.
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George Crabtree
Director
Joint Center for Energy Storage Research
Argonne National Laboratory
George Crabtree is Director of the Joint Center for Energy Storage (JCESR) at Argonne National Laboratory and Professor of Physics, Electrical and Mechanical Engineering at University of Illinois-Chicago (UIC).
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Kelly Speakes-Backman
Chief Executive Officer
Energy Storage Association
Prior to coming to the Energy Storage Association Kelly Speakes-Backman spent over 20 years working on energy and environmental issues in the public, NGO and private sectors.
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Ellen Anderson
Executive Director
Energy Transition Lab, University of Minnesota
Prior to coming to the Energy Transition Lab, Ellen Anderson served in the Minnesota Senate, was a senior advisor to Gov. Mark Dayton, and served as chair of the MN Public Utilities Commission.
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From 2012 to 2014, Anderson was senior advisor on energy and environment to Gov. Mark Dayton and assisted the Minnesota Environmental Quality Board on energy and environmental issues. Anderson helped coordinate state climate change planning, led the implementation of Gov. Dayton’s Executive Order 11-32, including organizing the EQB’s Minnesota Environmental Congress, issuing Minnesota’s Environment and Energy Report Card, and initiating and drafting the EQB’s Minnesota and Climate Change: Our Tomorrow Starts Today report.
In March 2011 Gov. Dayton appointed Anderson chair of the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission, where she served until early 2012.
Anderson served in the Minnesota Senate from 1993 to 2011 and was re-elected five times, representing several neighborhoods of St. Paul and the city of Falcon Heights. She chaired the Jobs, Energy and Community Development Committee; the Commerce Committee; the Energy and Telecommunications Committee; and the Environment, Energy and Natural Resources Finance Committee. Her signature legislation includes the Renewable Energy Standard, the Community Based Energy Development law, the Next Generation Energy Act, and many other energy and consumer protection laws, including a law raising the minimum wage; the Clean Water, Land, and Legacy Amendment (co-author); the Mortgage Foreclosure Prevention Act; and the first law in the nation, now in federal law, protecting nursing mothers in the workplace.
Anderson holds a B.A. from Carleton College and J.D. cum laude from the University of Minnesota Law School. She was an adjunct faculty member at Metropolitan State University and the University of Minnesota, teaching courses in law, energy, and sustainability. She has served in numerous leadership and community volunteer positions and received dozens of awards for her leadership in energy, environment, and economic and social justice. Most recently, Anderson received the 2013 Ecological Society of America Regional Policy Award for Informing Policy with Ecological Science and served on the advisory committee for the 2014 Midwest Innovation Summit. She currently serves as a member of the Citizens League Electrical Energy Study Committee, an observer to the e21 project on new utility business models, and the advisory boards for the U of MN Joint Degree Program in Law, Science & Technology, and the Will Steger Foundation.
Eray S. Aydil
Department of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science
University of Minnesota
Dr. Eray S. Aydil is the Ronald L. and Janet A. Christenson Chair in Renewable Energy.
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Ed Burgess
Senior Manager
Strategen Consulting
Ed helps to lead Strategen’s utility and government consulting practices. He specializes in evaluation and design of policies and programs to advance deployment distributed energy resources, demand-side management programs, energy storage and grid integration of renewable energy.
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Christopher Clack
Founder, CEO
Vibrant Clean Energy
Dr. Clack is an expert in Renewable Energy, Atmospheric Science, Energy Modeling, Computer Programming, and Optimization. Dr. Clack recently collaborated with the Energy Transition Lab and Strategen Consulting to conduct an analysis of the energy storage opportunities that exist in Minnesota.
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Lin Franks
Senior Strategist, RTO, FERC & Compliance Initiatives
Indianapolis Power & Light Company
Ms. Franks has worked towards the creation of appropriate FERC and RTO tariff and business practice rules to incent interconnection of batteries with the grid.
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Ms. Franks is the Senior Strategist, RTO, FERC & Compliance Initiatives for Indianapolis Power & Light Company (“IPL), an AES company. As part of IPL’s active engagement with the Midcontinent ISO (MISO) Stakeholder process, she represents IPL for market, reliability and transmission issues. She has over the past three years worked toward the creation of appropriate FERC and RTO tariff and business practices rules to incent interconnection of batteries with the grid. She spearheaded integration of the first lithium ion battery, IPL’s Harding Street BESS, into MISO. She also coordinates the drafting and submittal of comments to FERC for all US AES Entities.
Ms. Franks was the sponsor of and Chairman of the Electric and Natural Gas Coordination Task Force from its beginning in 2012 till September 2015. She previously served as the Chair of the MISO Ancillary Services Task Force and as the Chair of the State Ratemaking Study Group, and the Long-Term FTR and Planning Task Force, the Vice Chair of the Interconnection Process Task Force, the Supply Adequacy Working Group and the Stakeholder Governance Working Group.
Ms. Franks has more than forty years industry experience in the United States and Western European energy industries. Her electricity experience covers real time operations, transmission and generation planning and more. She has held both line and officer positions in the electricity and natural gas sectors and contributed to the success of the two most notable natural gas hubs/market centers in the world, Henry Hub and Zeebrugge. Her natural gas experience includes designing and drilling natural gas wells, physical and financial trading of hydrocarbons as well as hub and pipeline operations. She was a contributing author in a book published by Risk Publication, “The US Power Market” and the March 2000, “Telecommunications Revolution.” She also contributed to the Energy Publishing Enterprises 2000 publication “Energy Derivatives: Trading Emerging Markets.”
William Grant
Deputy Commissioner, Division of Energy Resources
Minnesota Department of Commerce
As Deputy Commissioner of the Energy Resources Division within the Minnesota Department of Commerce, William Grant oversees Utility Planning and Advocacy, Low Income Home Energy Assistance and Weatherization programs, and the State Energy Office.
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Mike Gregerson
Energy Infrastructure Program Consultant
Great Plains Institute
Mike Gregerson has over 30 years of management, executive and consulting experience in the electric utility arena including environmental and regulatory affairs, customer service and energy policy negotiations.
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Dr. Imre Gyuk
Director of Energy Storage Research
Office of Electricity Delivery and Energy Reliability, US Department of Energy
Dr. Gyuk has managed the Electrical Energy Storage research program in the Office of Electricity for the past 12 years.
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Jessica Hellmann
Director
Institute on the Environment (IonE), University of Minnesota
Jessica Hellmann provides overall strategic leadership for IonE, an internationally recognized organization working to solve grand environmental challenges.
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Jessica Hellmann is the director of the Institute on the Environment at the University of Minnesota. She provides overall strategic leadership for the institute, an internationally recognized organization working to solve grand environmental challenges while promoting interdisciplinary research, teaching and leadership across the university and engaging external partners and stakeholders. She is also the Russell M. and Elizabeth M. Bennett Chair in Excellence in the Department of Ecology, Evolution and Behavior in the College of Biological Sciences.
Hellmann’s research focuses on global change ecology and climate adaptation. She was among the first to propose and study ways to reduce the impact of climate change through new techniques in conservation management. Hellmann led an important paradigm shift in ecology and natural resource management by showing that adaptation — living with climate change — is just as crucial to the future of humanity and Earth’s ecosystems as slowing and stopping greenhouse gas emissions. Her research and that of her students also has shown that differences in the way populations respond to climate change are key to predicting and managing their future.
Hellmann regularly counsels state and national governments on habitat management, restoration and endangered species conservation so future generations can enjoy the beauty and function of nature as we do today. In addition, building upon her seminal findings in ecology, Hellmann has extended her work on climate change adaptation to human systems, including health, infrastructure, food and water. She works with governments and corporations to build investment in climate change adaptation and co-authored several climate assessment and adaptation planning efforts, including the biodiversity and ecosystem portions of the Chicago Climate Action Plan and the 2014 National Climate Assessment. She sits on the Board of Directors of the Great Plains Institute, the Science Advisory Council of the Environmental Law & Policy Center, and the Visiting Committee of the University of Michigan’s School of Natural Resources.
Before coming to the University of Minnesota in 2015, Hellmann was on the faculty at the University of Notre Dame in the Department of Biological Sciences. She also served as research director of the Notre Dame Global Adaptation Index, which assesses and ranks the vulnerability of nations around the world to climate change and their readiness to adapt to climate change. She continues to collaborate with ND-GAIN as a core research member, mentoring several ND-GAIN researchers based at the University of Minnesota and elsewhere around the country. In addition, she led the climate change adaptation program at Notre Dame’sEnvironmental Change Initiative and directed GLOBES, an interdisciplinary graduate training program in environment and society, among numerous other high-level academic and scientific responsibilities. She also founded Notre Dame’s undergraduate minor in sustainability.
Hellmann earned her Ph.D. in biology from Stanford University and served as a postdoctoral fellow at Stanford’s Center for International Security and Cooperation and the University of British Columbia’s Centre for Biodiversity Research. She is an alumna of Stanford’s Leopold Leadership Program and a recipient of a career enhancement fellowship from the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation. She became a member of the Notre Dame faculty in 2003.
Hellmann is a frequent contributor to leading scientific journals such as Proceedings of the National Academies of Science, Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment, BioScience and PLOS ONE. She serves on the editorial board of the journal Evolutionary Applications, is an associate editor with both Conservation Biology and Elementa, and serves on committees for the Ecological Society of America, the College Board and the National Academy of Sciences.
A skilled science communicator, Hellmann is routinely called upon by leading media outlets around the world such as CNN, NPR, Fox News, The Telegraph and the Chicago Tribune to provide expert input on topics related to global change and ways to minimize adverse impacts to people and nature.
Originally from Indiana and Michigan, Hellmann enjoys a wide range of activities, including marathoning, traveling the world, exploring the Midwest, gardening and spending quiet time with her husband and daughter.
Alexandra B. Klass
Distinguished McKnight University Professor
University of Minnesota Law School
As a Distinguished McKnight University Professor at the University of Minnesota Law School Alexandra Klass teaches and writes in the areas of energy law, environmental law, natural resources law, tort law, and property law.
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Bradley Klein
Senior Attorney
Environmental Law & Policy Center
As a senior attorney at the Environmental Law & Policy Center, Bradley Klein works on renewable energy and clean water litigation and policy.
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David Kolata
Executive Director
Citizens Utility Board, Illinois
The Citizens Utility Board has been called the “gold standard of consumer groups nationwide” by the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
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Nancy Lange
Chair, Minnesota Public Utilities Commission
Chair, Committee on Energy Resources and the Environment, NARUC
Chair, Midcontinent States Environmental and Energy Regulators
Nancy Lange was appointed Commissioner to the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission by Governor Mark Dayton, effective March 4, 2013, and appointed Chair, January 23, 2017.
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Clair Moeller
Executive Vice President, Operations
MISO
As an executive leader of the office of the Chief Operating Officer, Mr. Moeller is responsible for MISO’s transmission planning functions and transmission services. He is a well-respected industry expert with more than 25 years of experience in the operation of power systems in the Upper Midwest.
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Lissa Pawlisch
RSDP Director
University of Minnesota Clean Energy Research Teams
Lissa Pawlisch is the Clean Energy Resource Teams (CERTs) Director for the University of Minnesota Extension’s Regional Sustainable Development Partnerships.
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Phyllis Reha
Principal
PAR Energy Solutions
Reha served as a Commissioner of the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission for a dozen years. While on the Commission, she was appointed to and served on the Board of Directors for the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners (NARUC), Chair of the Energy Resources and Environment Committee, and as a key member of the NARUC-Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) Collaborative on Smart Response which is the venue for State and federal regulators to discuss issues and make recommendations for State and federal policies to support both smart grid and demand response.
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Brett Simon
Energy Storage Analyst
GTM Research/Greentech Media
Brett Simon is an energy storage analyst at GTM Research, focusing on both U.S. and international behind-the-meter energy storage markets.
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Ken Smith
President and CEO
Evergreen Energy
Ken Smith, PE, MBA was named the president and CEO of Ever-Green Energy and District Energy St. Paul in 2010. A recognized leader in community and campus scale energy systems, Ken is actively engaged in industry, policy, and academic forums addressing our energy future.
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has participated in an energy policy exchange between Germany and the State of Minnesota. Prior to joining Ever-Green Energy in 2006, Smith worked globally in the engineering and construction industry for over 20 years: planning, designing and implementing highly reliable energy projects, including central plants, micro-grids, datacenters, and other mission critical facilities for advanced tech industry, campuses, international airports, and U.S. Department of Defense. Smith currently serves as vice president of the Midwest Renewable Energy Tracking System Board of Directors (M-RETS); executive board member of the Saint Paul Area Chamber of Commerce; and is a Fellow of the University of Minnesota’s Institute on the Environment (IonE). From 2014-2015 he served as Chair of the International District Energy Association board of
directors. He has a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from North Dakota State University and a master’s degree in business administration from the University of St. Thomas in Minneapolis, MN. Smith is a registered professional engineer in several U.S. states.
Beth Soholt
Executive Director
Wind on the Wires
Beth Soholt is the Executive Director of the non-profit organization Wind on the Wires (WOW). WOW is the Midwest’s premier organization focused on significantly expanding the penetration of wind power and overcoming the barriers to bringing wind power to market.
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Ted J. Thomas
Chair, Arkansas Public Service Commission
Vice President, Organization of MISO States
Ted Thomas of Conway was appointed Chairman of the Arkansas Public Service Commission by Governor Asa Hutchinson in January 2015.
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Chairman Thomas received a Bachelor of Arts with High Honors in Political Science from the University of Arkansas in 1986 and a Juris Doctorate from the University of Arkansas School of Law in 1988. He is licensed to practice law before the United States Supreme Court, the Arkansas Supreme Court, the United States Courts of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit and the Eight Circuit, and the United States District Courts for the Eastern and Western Districts of Arkansas.
Chairman Thomas is Vice President of the Organization of MISO States (OMS) and serves on the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners (NARUC) Washington Action Committee and the Committee on Electricity.
Sarah Van Cleve
Energy Policy Advisor
Tesla
Sarah manages Tesla’s energy storage policy development, collaborating with regulators and legislators on policies affecting the development of energy storage in US electricity markets.
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Learn more about the Midwest Energy Storage Summit and register today!