Leading clean energy experts confirmed to date for the 2013 Clean Energy Finance Conference

Kaarina heads Private Equity investments at Feri, a German asset management and advisory firm with EUR 18 billion AuM. Kaarina oversees the private equity investment activities and portfolio management at Feri. Prior to Feri, she did private equity research and manager selection at CalSTRS Alternative Investments. Previously, she worked over ten years as an M&A and transaction attorney for international industrial groups.

Christopher Mansfield is head of DIF's Renewable Energy business, being responsible for overseeing the origination of investment opportunities in wind and solar PV assets, and asset and portfolio management.  Prior to joining DIF in 2008, Christopher has had leading roles in the origination, development, financing, management and, or sale of renewable energy projects for PowerGen (now Eon), NEG Micon/Vestas, BP Alternative Energy and Allco in Europe, North America and India, leading his first wind project transaction in 1993 in the UK.

Pjotr worked in sales at Electrabel Nederland before joining RWE Trading as Senior Originator and then becoming Director at Rabobank International, responsible for Energy Derivatives and Structuring. In 2008 Pjotr joined Nidera Handelscompagnie as Head of Energy Origination, responsible for energy project development. Most recently, he became Managing Director of Everest Energy in 2010, focusing on project development in a biobased economy.

Tom Murley leads HgCapital's renewable energy team.  Hg's renewable funds have over €900 million AUM and have invested in over 40 renewable energy projects worth more than €1.5 billion.  Tom joined HgCapital in 2004 and has nearly 20 years' experience investing in conventional and renewable power.  He is a Non-Executive Director of the UK Green Investment Bank.  Tom also chairs the British Venture Capital and Private Equity Association's Cleantech Board and sits on the Steering Committee of the Low Carbon Finance Group.

Rory is a Managing Director on the Clean Energy and Infrastructure team in Investment Management at Capital Dynamics. He has 17 years of experience across a range of finance, advisory, and business development roles associated with the global energy industry. Prior to joining us, Rory was the chief financial officer at Novera Energy plc, where he was responsible for all financing activities including capital raisings (equity and debt markets), investment origination, negotiation, and completion.

Ian Berry leads the Infrastructure and Renewable Energy fund management business at Aviva Investors. The business focuses on acquiring assets with lower risk, regular income streams. The team’s strategies include European renewable energy, UK unleveraged assets and infrastructure debt. Ian has over 15 years’ experience in infrastructure finance. Previously, Ian worked at BlueCrest Capital as an Investment Director investing in renewable energy infrastructure. Before this, Ian worked at Ambac Assurance as Vice President, European Structured Finance.

Joris van der Geest is advisor to institutional investors and investment funds. His advice relates to the investment strategy, deal sourcing / structuring and optimizing value by long term portfolio management. Clients include SUSI Sustainable Euro Fund and Ampere Equity Fund.  This advisory is based on his experience as CIO of Ampere Equity Fund, where he headed the investment team and was responsible for all investments of the fund from first closing until the end of the investment period. He coordinated 16 acquisitions of wind and solar projects across Europe, including the Walney offshore wind farm. After the end of the investment period, he supervised the fund’s portfolio management.

Sadia is a Senior Investment Officer in IFC's Western Europe Department in charge of business development and relationship management with UK and Irish companies investing in emerging markets. Sadia joined the IFC Treasury Department in Washington DC in 2000 and moved shortly thereafter to the Mining Department covering mining sector investments globally. She transferred to London UK in mid-2004 to join IFC's Syndication and Resource Mobilization Department where she was responsible for IFC's syndication activities in Europe, Middle East and Africa region covering all major sectors until December 2011.

James Clarke spent 3 years working on renewable gas, innovation and asset strategy. Now at Skanska he is spear heading the company’s move into the development of renewable energy enabling its clients to be more efficient with the energy they generate. Skanska are exploring new horizons within the construction, investment and O&M arenas for renewable energy, expanding their current global portfolio.

Nick joined Fortis (latterly BNP Paribas Fortis) in April 1999 after spending more than twenty years with National Westminster Bank. Nick has driven the development of the Bank's renewable project financing capability across Europe where it has developed a specialist expertise in the wind sector.

Will is a Senior Development Manager with The Crown Estate, the land owner of the seabed within UK territorial waters and the owner of renewable energy rights within the UK Economic Zone.  Will manages a team responsible for the Crown Estate’s interests in the offshore wind projects in the waters off the east coast of England and sits on the offshore wind programme management team that is focussed on supporting the safe and sustainable deployment of renewable energy throughout UK waters.  Will is a Chartered Civil Engineer with experience of project and programme management of infrastructure programmes in the water and power industries, both in the UK and overseas.

Enrique Alvarez-Uria has five years experience in the offshore wind sector and currently leads EDPR’s international offshore wind Business Initiatives team. He has coordinated the start up of EDPR’s offshore wind activities, namely in the UK where EDPR is developing 1500 MW net in two projects located in Scotland.  Prior to joining EDPR, Enrique worked for the energy group Areva as a Contract and Risk Manager in several international projects related to the nuclear industry.

Giles Dearden is a Director at Natural Power overseeing the Planning & Development Services team in delivering UK Onshore & Offshore wind farm projects for a multitude of clients through the feasibility, survey, EIA and planning process and to financial close. Giles is also responsible for Marine, Biomass & Solar site feasibility & planning services - a growing part of the company’s business. Giles and the team have delivered over 1000MW onshore and over 1200MW offshore sites to consent for clients, with a 99% success rate on MW’s consented

Federico focuses on the financing of renewable energy throughout Britain and Ireland. Before joining KfW IPEX, he was Director of Energy & Environmental Finance at Bank of Scotland, in charge of developing the solar market in Southern Europe for the bank, closing several solar project finance transactions in Spain. He also assessed funding opportunities with solar panel manufacturers and silicon producers around Europe. Previous experience includes the operating leasing sector at Royal Bank of Scotland and the project finance field in Latin America.

Michael Wilkins is a Managing Director in the Infrastructure Finance Ratings group of Standard & Poor’s Ratings Services based in London and also has responsibility for the firm’s global carbon and environmental finance sectors. Michael experience at Standard & Poor’s includes seven years as Head of Infrastructure Finance Ratings, the analytical group within Standard & Poor’s which covers utilities, project finance, PPPs and transportation in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Michael was also co-head of the Corporate Securitisation group. He joined Standard & Poor’s in London in January 1994 and has also worked in the Melbourne and Hong Kong offices.   Michael’s expertise encompasses the European power, water, environmental, transportation and social infrastructure sectors.

Martin Berkenkamp is the Policy and Marketing Director Europe for GE Renewables.
In 2000 Martin joined Enron Wind as Competitive Assessment manager. After the acquisition of Enron’s wind assets from GE in 2002 Martin held various Marketing and Product Management positions in the Renewables Business. In 2006 Martin became the Marketing Leader for GE Thermal Business in Europe. In 2007 Martin build up a government realtion function in Europe and served as the Policy Leader Renewables Europe. In 2012 Martin was given responsibility for Policy and Marketing. Martin holds a Master Degree from the Universität of Münster in Germany.

With more than 15 years’ experience in the China market, Lise Bertelsen has worked with a wide variety of companies, organisations and government departments within a broad range of sectors, both in China and the UK.  Lise advises companies in all sectors throughout London and the South East, but has a particular focus on Low Carbon, Environment and Water. 

Georg Grodzki is Head of Credit Research at Legal & General Investment Management. Prior to his current role he managed the credit research teams at RBC Capital Markets and at Credit Suisse in London. His previous professional experience includes assignments as Senior Analyst at Moody's Investors Service as well as posts in merchant banking, management consulting and regional government. Mr Grodzki obtained a Master of Business Administration at INSEAD, Fontainebleau, and a Master of Economics at the University of Cologne.

Torben Kjaergaard has 25 years of experience working in the financial community developing innovative financing models and investment vehicles including project finance and investment opportunities in wind energy. With Offshore Wind Capital, Torben Kjærgaard has now turned his full attention to the offshore wind industry working on ways to provide investors with prudent investment opportunities in the offshore wind space.

George has over 15 years experience in financing and investing in emerging markets and transition economies with an emphasis on the power and energy sector. Since joining EBRD in 2001, George has led several complex power project financings involving debt, equity, syndications and intensive policy dialogue at the highest level in Governments and with reputable domestic and international strategic investors. He has also worked in diverse group of countries including inter alia Bulgaria, Romania, Slovenia, Slovakia, Hungary FYROM and Albania. Prior to working at the EBRD, George worked for Barclays Capital, and for the Commonwealth Development Corporation, in London, focusing again in power sector financing in Europe, Africa, Middle East and Latin America.

Fintan co-founded Mainstream Renewable Power in February 2008.  He is Corporate Finance Director where his role includes creating a direct opportunity for investors seeking exposure to the construction and long-term operations phases of Mainstream’s three offshore wind projects in the North Sea totalling over 7.5GW.  Previously, Fintan spent eight years as Corporate Finance Manager for Airtricity in a similar role where he raised in excess of €1bn in project and corporate debt to fund the company’s rapid development and build programme.  In January 2008, Airtricity sold its European business to Scottish and Southern Energy and its North American business to E.on in a deal totalling some €1.8bn. 

Leon has 25 years experience in the energy industry and has been responsible for the development, financing and realization of an extended range of energy concepts (Biomass, Wind, Solar, Hydro, Gas, Coal, Lignite, Waste, Grid).
He is developing and presenting leadership in Investment Management in the energy industry for Business portfolio strategy, Asset development and realization, Asset acquisition and integration, Asset divestment

David has responsibility for wind farm balance of plant, offshore transmission and field maintenance business activities.  He joined Technip from Vattenfall where he was UK Country Manager and Director of the East Anglia Offshore Wind joint venture between Vattenfall and Scottish Power Renewables.  David was responsible for the delivery of the Thanet and Ormonde offshore wind farms.  David led Vattenfall's team in the negotiations with The Crown Estate and with Scottish Power Renewables for the  East Anglia Round 3 offshore wind joint venture project, and has continued his leadership role in the Vattenfall-led EOWDC project offshore Aberdeen, now being responsible for Technip's input to the project.

Peter is co-founder and director of EIDC and is a career infrastructure investor with > £1bn third party equity deployed, managed and exited in over 100 successful global infrastructure investments covering all sectors including transport, social and environmental. Former Director at Land Securities Trillium (“LST”) responsible for waste and secondary infrastructure investments. Former Partner of Secondary Market Infrastructure Fund which was exited to LST for £927m at a significant multiple (capital value of ~£5bn). Founding member of Challenger’s infrastructure business.

Eric Marchand, Vice President, is an Investment Manager within the Private Equity team. He joined Unigestion in 2012. Eric began his career in 2003 with General Electric, spending four years in the company’s corporate finance and audit departments across various businesses. In his last position with GE from 2007 to 2010, he was an Associate Director for the Capital EMEA Equity business responsible for the European fund of funds portfolio and financial services direct investments. Eric then worked for CDC Group from 2010 to 2012, where he was an Investment Manager focusing on the firm's Asian funds portfolio.

Christopher R. Kaminker works as a liaison with the Office of the Secretary General, and advises the Environment Director on infrastructure finance and special projects. His research at the OECD focuses on institutional investors and green bonds, clean energy finance policy and climate change finance. Prior to joining the OECD in 2010, Christopher worked in investment banking in New York City, focusing on clean technology and carbon finance across sales & trading, principal investing and advisory at Société Générale and Goldman Sachs.

Jason Anderson is Head of Climate  and Energy at the WWF European Policy Office, managing a team in Brussels, leading European policy among a network of 15 offices, and contributing to WWF’s Global Climate and Energy Initiative.  He is also chairman of the Board of Directors of Climate Action Network Europe.

George Day is Head of Economic Strategy at the Energy Technology Institute, responsible for strategy on economics and policy across a range of low carbon technologies.  George’s current focus includes carbon capture and storage, smart systems and heat, bioenergy and light transport.  Before joining ETI, George was director of network regulation, and then director of metering and charging at Ofwat, leading many aspects of water sector regulatory policy.  During the 1990s he worked on agricultural policy reforms and projects in south Asia and Southern Africa for DFID, the World Bank and the European Commission.

Anjam Mughal has over 15 years experience in developing and financing power generation projects. Starting his career at the AES Corporation, he worked for 7 years on the development of large thermal power projects in the UK, Eastern Europe and Africa. Anjam moved onto financing renewables at Platina Partners closing several wind farms in France and the UK. Anjam, a project leader for the Chirnogeni project worked for over 4 years on all aspects of the deal from development to financing.

Simon is global head of our energy team and is recognised as a leading lawyer in the field of renewable energy.  He specialises in the development, financing and acquisition of projects in the renewables sector. Simon works for sponsors, commercial lenders, governments, development banks, ECAs and international financial institutions. He is recognised as one of Europe's leading renewable energy lawyers and has worked on some of the most ground breaking projects in recent years. He has worked on over 10GW of wind transaction and 2GW of solar transactions and has experience working on renewable energy transactions in over 40 countries.

Salvatore is a corporate banker with more than 12 years’ experience in the infrastructure, energy and utility sectors.
Salvatore has extensive experience of non-recourse, project financing of EMEA and CEE renewable energy and infrastructure assets. Salvatore is currently part of the DNB Energy, Project Finance & Advisory team and was previously working for The Royal Bank of Scotland’s Infrastructure Finance team in London, focusing on large ticket utility and infrastructure assets in the EMEA region

Bill started his career at Environmental Resources Management, moving on to various operational experiences, including helping to turn around a start up in the metals sector. Prior to joining Ludgate in 2008, he was General Manager of Strategy and Portfolio for Royal Dutch Shell in their Renewables and CO2 division and then latterly, gained experience in cleantech private equity working with Vantage Point Venture Partners.

James Donaldson has been with Investec Bank for over 11 years and for the past 6 years has focused on serving clients in the power and waste sectors.  James has provided senior debt, mezzanine and equity both in the UK and many of the major Eurozone countries.  James and colleagues have closed deals in the wind, solar, biomass, waste to energy, conventional power, hydro power and landfill gas sectors.  Examples of recent closed deals James has worked on include provision of senior debt to a UK solar project qualifying for ROCs and the Daggenham IVC / AD plant.

Richard Howard is the Chief Economist at The Crown Estate, working in the Energy and Infrastructure team. His recent work includes contributions to the Offshore Wind Cost Reduction Pathways study and the DECC Cost Reduction Taskforce; and an ongoing review of the offshore wind market in the UK. Richard also leads the Crown Estate’s thinking on energy policy, and offshore wind project economics and financing.

Oliver Griffiths is currently Head of Government Affairs and Policy at the Green Investment Bank, recently moving on from his role as an Executive Director in the Shareholder Executive, managing the Government's 100% shareholding in UK Green Investment Bank plc and having led the project to set up the Bank.  Oliver practised as a solicitor at Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer before joining the civil service in 2002, where he has specialised in domestic and international micro-economic policy. He managed the Government's shareholding in Post Office Ltd between 2009 and 2011, following three years at the British Embassy in Washington DC.

César Hidalgo has been leading the Solar Practice in GL Garrad Hassan since 2007. Previously, he acted as Senior Engineer in many renewable projects in Europe and Latin America.
César Hidalgo has been working in the renewable sector since 1995 working in wind energy, biomass, solar and cogeneration projects. Most of his experience has been in consulting and engineering firms in Europe and Spain.

Nick has been involved in technical innovation and research since 2003 across a number of fields. Currently working in the technology innovation team of UK Power Networks, the UK’s largest distribution network operator, he has worked on a portfolio of projects relating to smart grid communications, asset tracking and energy storage. Most recently, Nick led a successful bid to receive £13.2m funding for a project to explore the economics of large-scale energy storage.

Georg Grodzki is Head of Credit Research at Legal & General Investment Management. Prior to his current role he managed the credit research teams at RBC Capital Markets and at Credit Suisse in London. His previous professional experience includes assignments as Senior Analyst at Moody's Investors Service as well as posts in merchant banking, management consulting and regional government.

Clément Weber is one of the founders of Green Giraffe Energy Bankers (GGEB), a financial advisory boutique focused on renewable energy. He was part of the team that closed the EUR 1 billion financing for C-Power in 2010. Clément has opened the GGEB’s London office in 2011 and has been involved directly in Walney refinancing, which was successfully brought to financial close in December 2012. Clément has 6 years of experience in the renewable energy project finance industry, formerly at AFD and Dexi.

Ebba Schmidt is building the Pension Protection Fund’s (PPF’s) sustainable investment portfolio, currently focusing on farmland and timberland. She also leads the PPF’s responsible investment strategy.
Previously she worked at PIRC (the corporate governance advisors) and at Trucost (the environmental data provider). She has an M.Sc. in Geophysics focusing on polar climate research. She worked in oil and gas exploration, and ran a management fast track programme at a division of Schlumberger, the multi-national oilfield services company.

Roger is a Director in the Customized Fund Investment Group responsible for Renewable Energy and Infrastructure investments in Europe. Roger joined CFIG from Consensus Business Group (“CBG”), a multi-billion dollar UK private equity and strategic investment group, where he was the CEO of the Middle East business. AT CBG, Roger focused on establishing CBG as a leading private equity player in the Gulf markets and was a member  of the Group’s Investment Committee. Roger was a founding partner of the US$250 million Masdar CleanTech Fund which was established in partnership with Credit Suisse and the Government of Abu Dhabi and was an Advisor to the Saudi and Jordanian governments on their renewable energy agendas.

Graham Weale has been Chief Economist for RWE AG since 2007, based in Essen. In this capacity he is responsible for economic planning assumptions used throughout the company and for advising the Board on market developments. Previously he was Director of European Energy Services for Globalinsight. His responsibilities included projects for the European Commission, for European governments and regulators, and acting as an expert witness on a number of high profile gas arbitration cases. Previously he worked as a management consultant with Deloitte specialising in energy liberalisation issues.

David has been involved in renewable energy for over 20 years, having started his career with utility company SWALEC. He set up Energy Power Resources (EPR) in 1996 and later co-founded Eco2 in 2002, where he recently led the sale of Eco2’s 40MW straw-powered biomass plant in Sleaford, Lincolnshire in a landmark £170m deal. David was previously an Independent Grant Assessor for the DTI, a member of the government's Renewables Advisory Board and has also been a member of the DEFRA Biomass Implementation Advisory Group. He currently chairs the REA Biomass Group.

Mark recently left LDC as head of the Cleantech and Environmental sector coverage in London.  Previously Mark was with Investec where he was head of the Power and Renewable Energy team. His transaction experience encompasses numerous equity, mezzanine and project financings across the globe and he has published many industry articles.  Before this, Mark was at Société Générale and Dresdner Kleinwort Benson. LDC is the UK’s leading private equity firm for the mid-market - since 1981 they have completed over 400 investments, and have ongoing interests in over 60 businesses across the UK that have a combined valuation in excess of £2bn.

Jørn Fredsgaard Sørensen is Chief Consultant in EKF’s department for SMEs and Climate. With a broad background in export and investment finance, Jørn is primarily focusing on developing new business areas, particularly within the cleantech and renewables sector. Before joining EKF, Jørn set up and managed the “Global Competitiveness Facility - GCF” in Vietnam. Prior to that, Jørn has both been an independent consultant and an investment officer in IFU.

Allan Baker has worked at Société Générale for four years and has been involved in the power sector for more than 25 years, initially as an engineer and then in the finance sector. During his career he has advised on and financed projects in Europe, MENA, the US and Asia, and in sectors ranging from green-field renewable energy to the acquisition of large thermal power portfolios. This experience has also encompassed regulated, partially deregulated and merchant power markets.

Shane is a founding partner at EnerCap Capital Partners which manages the €98 million EnerCap Power Fund which invests in renewable energy projects in the CEE region. Shane has over 15 years of expertise in project finance and M&A in the energy sector and at EnerCap, Shane has responsibility for raising non recourse debt for the EnerCap investments. Prior to Enercap, Shane was a Director in the Renewable Energy team at Fortis Bank in London where he executed project finance debt for wind, biomass and landfill gas projects. Prior to this he was a Director in the Energy Advisory team at PricewaterhouseCoopers, and prior to this Shane acted as a lender’s engineer whilst at Mott MacDonald.

Chris spent his early career with National Grid in business and project development, and then moved into offshore wind, most notably leading Airtricity’s team that developed the Greater Gabbard offshore wind farm project to the point at which construction commenced.  After a short spell in investment banking, Chris formed Transmission Capital to pursue investment opportunities in transmission.  Chris is now a Director of the Transmission Capital Partners consortium which has acquired and manages four of the OFTO first round projects and is preferred bidder on the first second round project to be awarded. Chris is a member of the DECC/Ofgem co-chaired industry body: the Electricity Networks Strategy Group.

Glenn Fox is Chief Investment Officer of Hadrian’s Wall Capital Limited, the investment adviser to an infrastructure debt fund being raised in a joint venture with Aviva Investors. Glenn began his career at HM Treasury, where he oversaw some of the earliest UK transport PFI projects. After spending two years as an adviser at Arthur Andersen, Glenn moved to the monoline industry, working at Ambac, MBIA and, most recently, FGIC, where he was Head of European Infrastructure.

Nick joined Fortis (latterly BNP Paribas Fortis) in April 1999 after spending more than twenty years with National Westminster Bank. Nick has driven the development of the Bank's renewable project financing capability across Europe where it has developed a specialist expertise in the wind sector.

Emma is currently working as a Vice President at NIBC bank in London, concentrating on financing renewable energy and infrastructure projects in Europe. Emma graduated from Oxford University in 2002 and went on to work as an energy finance lawyer with Allen & Overy in London and Gide Loyrette Nouel in Paris, advising African and Middle Eastern governments, sponsors and banks on the finance of large scale oil and gas, nuclear scale-up and renewable energy projects.  She has recently completed her thesis on the role of large-scale CSP projects in
addressing energy and water security issues in the MENA region.  While working with Nur Energie in France, she was responsible for all aspects of solar power development from negotiating land leasing to negotiating finance.

Peter T Jones is involved in freelance delivery of the low carbon waste infrastructure having Chaired a Planning Advisory Group for Advantage West Midlands which won the 2000 Infrastructure Award of the RTPI. That work reflected his prior involvement since 1995 in promoting Material Flow mapping, energy mapping and market led solutions in waste to resources management and the Biffaward £10 million Mass Balances programme. He is building on that work facilitating links between funders, technology providers, waste companies, property companies and fossil energy users.  He advises a wide range of blue chips with regard to Distributed energy from Waste, Chaired the WRAP sponsored Gas to Grid Group, advises BNP Paribas Bank on their Green Infrastructure Fund, Disruptive Capital, One Delta and Stoneforth-all companies expanding fast in the advanced resources treatment sector.

Axel manages the Primary markets activities of the London Stock Exchange Group across Europe with particular focus on the origination and development of relationships with European companies and various advisory groups. Prior to joining the Exchange, Axel worked for a Private Equity fund investing across Europe and spent 6 years within Corporate & Investment banking at UniCredit Group.

Liam is responsible for the syndication of project finance transactions in the EMEA region at Crédit Agricole CIB. He has been involved in project finance for over 20 years mainly specialising in the power and infrastructure sectors but more recently in oil and gas related transactions. Before joining Crédit Agricole CIB, he worked at CIBC and KPMG. Liam has a BSc degree in Civil Engineering from Bristol University. He is also a Chartered Accountant and a Fellow of the Association of Corporate Treasurers. Crédit Agricole CIB was named No.1 Project Finance Bookrunner in the EMEA region for the first half of  2011 by Thomson Reuters.

Dima is CEO of Paradigm Change Capital Partners, a leading financial services firm with expertise in advising institutional investors on low carbon investments, designing specialised collective funding vehicles to access such investments and arranging funding for private capital funds. Dima has two decades of experience in investment banking at several top tier banks, involving hundreds of investments globally and raising over $6bn. She is a member of the UK Green Investment Bank’s Advisory Group and founder of the Low Carbon Bond Group.

Juhani Sillanpaa is an Investment Director in AMP Capital Investors European team. AMP Capital is a leading infrastructure asset manager globally with more than 20 years of experience in the sector. Juhani’s responsibilities in the European team span across the investment value chain from deal sourcing, due diligence, transaction execution to asset management. He has over 10 years of relevant experience including project financing (RBS) and principal investing (ABN AMRO), and his sector expertise includes investing and managing assets in renewable energy and infrastructure investments.