Experts Only

This week's guest is Joe Bonfiglio, President of EDF Action. EDF Action is the Environmental Defense Fund’s 501(c)4 sister organization, advocating to protect the environment and the health of American families. Under Bonfiglio’s leadership, EDF Action has successfully fought against budget cuts for the EPA and other agencies, lobbied against unqualified nominees for important protective roles, an...

This week's guest is Marilyn Waite, Program Officer in Environment at the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation and author of the book 'Sustainability at Work: careers that make a difference'. Marilyn manages the foundation’s grantmaking on climate and clean energy finance with the ambitious goal of addressing climate change by accelerating the transition to a climate-friendly economy. Her book, no...

On this episode of Experts Only, host Jon Powers moderates a special live recording at the Energy Storage Summit USA conference in March 2020. Entitled "Accelerating US Storage: Unlocking Hybrid Projects", the panel discussion features Ken-Ichi Hino, Director of Energy Storage at Geronimo Energy; Holly Christie, General Counsel for Hecate Energy; and Gary Dorris, CEO & Co-Founder of Ascend Ana...

On this special episode of Experts Only, host Jon Powers talks with Lisa Jacobson, President of the Business Council for Sustainable Energy (BCSE)and Ethan Zindler, head of Americas at Bloomberg NEF. Bloomberg NEF produces and BCSE underwrites the Sustainable Energy in America Factbook, which provides up-to-date, accurate market intelligence about the broad range of industries that are contributin...

This week's guest is Mona Dajani, partner and global leader of the Energy, Infrastructure & Water team at Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman. As an international known deal maker in the renewable energy industry for over 20 years, Mona has advised on multiple acquisitions, dispositions, financing, tax equity, leasing and project development transactions involving energy and infrastructure facilit...

This week we speak with David Sandalow, Inaugural Fellow at the Center on Global Energy Policy and co-Director of the Energy and Environment Concentration at the School of International and Public Affairs at Columbia University. He founded and directs the Center’s U.S.-China Program. David has served in multiple senior positions in the government at the White House, State Department, and most rece...

In the first Experts Only episode of the new decade, Jon sits down with renowned climate scientist Dr. Michael E. Mann. Dr. Mann is Distinguished Professor of Atmospheric Science at Penn State and director of the Penn State Earth System Science Center. His research involves the use of theoretical models and observational data to better understand Earth's climate system, and his conclusions have pu...

On this special episode of the Experts Only podcast, CleanCapital CEO Thomas Byrne hosts a conversation at the 2019 NYSERDA Green Innovation Showcase (New York City, 11/6/19). Our guest is John Santoleri, partner and board member at Clean Energy Venture Group and Innovation Advisor for the NYSERDA Investor Advisory Board. Hear John's insights on the state of cleantech investing and why NYSERDA is...

On this special episode of the Experts Only podcast, Jon Powers moderates the keynote panel at Solar Storage & Finance 2019 (New York City, 10/29/19). "Terawatts & Trillions" explores the need for trillions of dollars in investment if we are to hit our climate change mitigation goals. At the same time, the power sector is undergoing a fundamental shift as generation becomes more decentrali...

This week, Jon sits down with Ryan Popple, president and CEO of Proterra. Proterra is the leading innovator of zero-emission, battery-electric buses. This conversation centers on Ryan’s journey into the clean energy space and the role Proterra plays in leading the transition from fossil fuels to clean energy. Prior to Proterra, Ryan was a partner at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and the sen...

This week, host Jon Powers sits down with Jamie Redford, Chairman and Co-Founder of The Redford Center. A nonprofit media entity, The Redford Center engages people using film, video and new media to inspire environmental action. Jamie discusses his film “Happening: A Clean Energy Revolution” and the dawn of the clean energy era. Prior to creating “Happening: A Clean Energy Revolution,” Jamie has w...

In this very special live episode of Experts Only, Jon Powers of CleanCapital hosts a panel of guests at the Solar Power International convention in Salt Lake City, Utah. Guests include: Bill Bush | CFO, STEM Bill drives project financing efforts and corporate funding initiatives at Stem, which builds and operates the largest digitally connected energy storage network. Adam Browning | Executive Di...

This week on the pod we speak with Melanie Nakagawa, Head of Climate Initiative at Princeville Capital. Melanie previously served as Deputy Assistant Secretary for Energy Transformation at the U.S. State Department (2015 - 2017) where she helped countries implement clean energy commitments and led engagements in high growth markets such as India and Morocco. Additionally, she served as a strategic...

This week on the pod we speak with Mike Casey, president and founder of the cleantech public relations firm Tigercomm. Tigercomm has been involved in some of the most significant political and public affairs battles in the energy sector. Mike has a background in politics, having worked on the Dukakis (1988) and Clinton (1992) campaigns and later as Communications Director for the Democratic Congre...

This week on the pod, we speak with Miranda Ballentine, CEO of the Renewable Energy Buyers’ Alliance (REBA). REBA works with businesses and organizations—Google, Facebook, and GM among them—seeking to procure renewable energy across the US. Our conversation centers on how the buying power of these large energy consumers is changing energy markets and driving America’s shift to clean energy economy...

On this episode of Experts Only, host Jon Powers talks with Lisa Jacobson, President of the Business Council for Sustainable Energy (BCSE)and Ethan Zindler, head of Americas at Bloomberg NEF. Bloomberg NEF produces and BCSE underwrites the Sustainable Energy in America Factbook, which provides up-to-date, accurate market intelligence about the broad range of industries that are contributing to the...

This week on the pod, we're speaking with Amy Francetic, Managing Director of Energize Ventures. Amy is a business executive and entrepreneur with more than 25 years of experience in the energy and technology. She is a successful entrepreneur, fundraiser, and investor, who just last year founded Energize Ventures: a $165 million venture fund, one of the largest first-time venture funds raised in C...

This week, we're talking to Dr. Jennifer Gerbi, Associate Director for Technology and a Program Director at the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E). In addition to supporting program development, recruitment, and coordinating project management across the Agency, her programmatic focus at ARPA-E includes improving energy efficiency and management of buildings via advanced sensing sys...

This week we're speaking with Andrea Luecke, President and Executive Director of the Solar Foundation. Andrea started out as the sole employee for The Solar Foundation in 2010 and has since expanded the organization from a shoe-string budget to a multi-million dollar set of programs dedicated to advancing solar energy growth. Prior to The Solar Foundation, Andrea ran the City of Milwaukee’s Depart...

This week on the pod, Jon Powers sits down with Dr. Lucas Joppa, Chief Environmental Officer at Microsoft. They discuss Joppa's background studying ecology and biodiversity, how that led him to a career at Microsoft. He currently leads the company’s environmental sustainability efforts as well as the AI for Earth project, a 5 year, $50 million cross-company program dedicated to AI research and tec...

This week on the pod, Thom Byrne speaks to Daniel Oros, co-founder of G2VP. Byrne and Oros discuss the state of venture capital and the sustainable companies G2VP invests in. In 2009, Daniel joined Kleiner Perkins and led investments for the Green Growth Fund before co-founding G2VP. Daniel’s primary focus has been on rapidly growing technology companies in the industrial, consumer, and financial...

This week on the pod, Jon Powers speaks to Michael Terrell, Head of Energy Market Development at Google. Michael leads energy market strategy at Google, where he is part of the business team responsible for the company’s data centers and global energy portfolio. In this role, Michael has advanced new approaches to Google’s procurement of 3 gigawatts of renewable power, pioneered innovative renewab...

This week on the pod, Jon Powers speaks with Rob Davis of Fresh Energy to discuss the link between pollinator insects and solar energy. In their discussion, Davis and Powers explore bees’ impact on the environment and human agriculture, and how solar farm designs can help a pollinator population in crisis. Rob Davis began his career working with technology start-ups and created the international c...

This week on the pod, guest host Marc Garrett, Chief Technology Officer speaks with Charlie Isaacs, the Chief Technology Officer for Customer Connection at Salesforce who has a successful track record of R&D leadership at companies like Verizon, Answer Systems, Broad Daylight and Kana. He’s been an early adopter and leader in the ever evolving customer relations management(CRM) and Internet of...

This week on the pod, Jon Powers and Anthony Leiserowitz, Director of the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication, dive into how social, economic and behavioural norms affect the way humans view climate change. In their discussion, we learn about the 6 different views Americans hold regarding climate change, the types of questions scientists ask when studying human behaviour and climate, and...