Renewable | Energy 2021

About Energy

2021

Energy 2021 is dedicated to revolutionize the way we consume, save, generate, and store Energy. Glenn spends countless hours searching the Planet in order to bring to the Region the most revolutionary solutions related to ENERGY.

Entrance Fee: $195

Student Rate: $165

Speakers

Schedule

Our
Speakers

Ignacio Diaz

Director of Sales & Marketing at Glenn International Inc. with a 30 + year career in the ENERGY Industry directs three Divisions of Glenn International — Energy, Illumination, and Telecommunications. Passionate about energy efficiency and renewable energy sources, which he believes are essential for the survival of the Region’s economy. Electric Vehicle early adopter and promoter of technology and infrastructure needed to support worldwide deployment. BS Degree in Finance and MIS, with a minor in Psychology from Marquette University in Wisconsin. Before joining Glenn International, Ignacio worked for IBM and NYNEX in several States in the USA.

Roger Ballentine

Roger Ballentine is the President of Green Strategies Inc., where he provides management consulting services to corporate and financial sector clients on sustainability strategy; decarbonization; investment and transaction evaluation; clean energy procurement strategies; and the integration of energy and environmental policy considerations into business strategy. He is also a Venture Partner with Arborview Capital LLC, a private equity firm making growth capital investments in the clean energy and energy efficiency sectors. Previously, Roger was a senior member of the White House staff, serving President Bill Clinton as Chairman of the White House Climate Change Task Force and Deputy Assistant to the President for Environmental Initiatives. Prior to being named Deputy Assistant, Roger was Special Assistant to the President for Legislative Affairs where he focused on energy and environmental issues. Before joining the White House, Roger was a partner at Patton Boggs LLP. Over the years, Roger has helped some of the world’s leading companies and institutions increase competitiveness and manage market and regulatory risk through cutting edge energy and sustainability strategies. Using his expertise and deep relationships, Roger has helped clients develop better business strategies, make better investment decisions, negotiate new business partnerships, build critical alliances with stakeholders, and develop and implement clean energy and other sustainability measures that achieve corporate buy-in and yield bottom-line value.

Roger serves on the Board of NetPower LLC, and the Advisory Boards of Clean Capital LLC, 8 Rivers

Capital, and Uptake Technologies, and is a member of Trane Technologies’ External Advisory Council on Sustainability. He was a founding Board member of the American Council on Renewable Energy (ACORE) and was a long-serving advisory board member of the Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory. Roger is Roger also serves as the Co-Chair of the Aspen Institute’s Clean Energy Innovation Forum and is a Trustee of The Nature Conservancy’s MD-DC Chapter.

In addition to being a frequent speaker, media commentator and writer, he has been an Adjunct Professor of Law at the Georgetown University Law Center and a Lecturer on Law at Harvard Law School teaching in the area of energy and climate law, and a Senior Fellow at the Progressive Policy Institute in Washington D.C.

Dr. Boualem Hadjerioua

Boualem Hadjerioua, PhD, F. ASCE “Bo: Ha Jerry Wa” Director of River System Studies & Hydro Operations Mesa Associates, Inc. and Adjunct Professor at Vanderbilt University, Nashville, Tennessee Dr. Hadjerioua is one of the leading national and international experts in water resources, waterpower technologies, and integrated river system operations and a visionary for river system development and optimization, with over 35 years of experience. Currently, he is the Director of River System Studies & Hydro Operations at Mesa Associates, Inc., Mesa is a full-service engineering firm, with approximately a thousand employees, specializing in power generation, transmission, and delivery projects in the utility industry. https://www.mesainc.com/. Prior to joining Mesa in March 2020, he was the leader of the waterpower technology team at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), from 2010 to 2020. He managed projects for the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) and U.S. Department of State (DOS), focusing on developing technologies, decision-support tools, and methods of analysis that enable holistic management of water-dependent energy infrastructure and natural resources. He has served as the DOE representative to the International Energy Agency (IEA), serving as the liaison on intergovernmental initiatives and was also responsible for implementing memorandum of understanding partnership efforts. He led several DOE national task forces technical expert teams. Dr. Hadjerioua has supported DOE international affairs Office and DOS South East Asia projects, sharing tools that improve water resource integrated system analysis and hydropower generation efficiency in Thailand, Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia, and Myanmar. Before joining ORNL in January 2010, Dr. Hadjerioua had 19 years of experience balancing the many stakeholder demands for the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) integrated river system. His unique expertise in operations, optimization, engineering, problem-solving, and decision-making for TVA’s integrated river system has earned him several presidential excellence awards. Dr. Hadjerioua is a distinguished Alumni of the University of Arizona and a Fellow with the American Society of Engineers (ASCE) and a Chairman of several professional society technical sessions and committees. He holds a PhD from the University of Arizona; he has authored more than 165 technical publications.

Cecilia Ramos

Cecilia E. Ramos is the Sr. director - Architectural Market for Lutron Electronics. Cecilia's background and expertise is in lighting design and architecture. Also, she has a passion for the intersection of technology, art, and design. Cecilia received her degrees in architecture from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) (BSAD) and Princeton University (Masters of Architecture).

Before joining Lutron, she traveled the world designing the lighting of luxury retail brands such as Louis Vuitton, Christian Dior and Hublot as a Director with award winning lighting design firm L'Observatoire International. As principal of her own design consulting practice, she worked with clients such as the Guggenheim Museum, Princeton University Art Museum, and MacroSea. In her current role, Cecilia leads the architect business for Lutron. She also played a key role in the design and construction of the award-winning Lutron New York Global Experience Center as well as the Ketra Headqurarters in Austin, TX. She is a co-author of the book "Architectural Lighting, Designing with Light and Space" (Princeton Architectural Press, 2011).

Luis Ortiz

Luis Ortiz is Vice President at Anbaric. Prior to joining Anbaric, he served as Executive Vice President and Chief Technology Officer of Solar Grid Storage (SGS). Mr. Ortiz is also the co-founder and former President of Ambri (formerly known as Liquid Metal Battery Corporation), an early stage company working to develop and commercialize a new battery technology that will revolutionize grid-scale electricity storage. From 2008-2011, Mr. Ortiz served as the Research Director of GroupSadoway at MIT.

Mr. Ortiz has nearly twenty years of experience in the commercial battery industry serving as both an independent consultant and as a Program Manager for technology transfer while with Valence Technology. Prior to entering the energy sector, Mr. Ortiz was a Six Sigma Blackbelt in Honeywell’s Electronic Materials Division. He holds an S.B. and Sc.D. from MIT’s Department of Materials Science & Engineering.

Matteo Vecchiato

Matteo is a senior BD manager with 20+ years of experience across a broad range of functions within the renewable energy industry. He has gained extensive experience on projects related to wind power, rooftop, and ground mounted photovoltaic, biomass cogeneration and heating and distributed-hybrid-solutions. Matteo is also a certified energy auditor UNI CEI 11339.

For the past five years he has been Export Sales and Investment Funds Relationship Director at ESPE Srl, a leading Italian EPC of solar photovoltaic, as well as a manufacturer of small-medium wind turbines hydro turbines, and biomass-energy technologies. This position at Espe comes after several years serving as managing director of various companies active in the field of solar EPC and project development, energy efficiency consulting and PV plant O&M services. Matteo holds an MBA from the University of California at Berkeley and a law degree from the University Cattolica del Sacro Cuore in Milan.

Eng. Ferdinand A. Ramos Soegaard

Ferdinand Ramos-Soegaard holds a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering (BSEE) from the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta, GA. His degree is specialized in power distribution and telecommunications systems.

Mr. Ramos-Soegaard is a licensed professional engineer in the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico and the state of Florida. Throughout his professional career Mr. Ramos has been involved in all aspects of the design, construction and maintenance of electrical distribution systems, including high voltage transmission lines and renewable energy interconnections in the Puerto Rico electrical power grid.

General Russel Honore

General Russel Honoré is a decorated 37-year army veteran, a global authority on leadership, and an expert on climate change and disaster preparedness. The General led the security review of the U.S. Capitol’s security infrastructure following the attacks on January 6, 2021. As the commander of Joint Task Force Katrina, he became known as the “Category 5 General” for his leadership in coordinating military relief efforts in post-hurricane New Orleans.

An American hero and sought-after media commentator, General Honoré shares his experience, candid and sometimes colorful views with the public, from Congress to cable news to the private sector.

Eric Back

Eric Back is a Vice President at Sargent & Lundy focused on the electric vehicle and transportation sector. Eric has more than15 years in the energy industry focused on power delivery, clean energy, and electric transportation. During this time, he has developed innovative approaches towards deploying the next generation of DCFC charging hubs, microgrids, and large load centers that will be introduced through light, medium and heavy duty asset classes. In addition, he has architected one of the largest EV charging stations in the US and the first charging station microgrid to collocate and incorporate renewable power and battery storage. Eric's previous experience includes leadership roles at E-Tech, a clean energy company, and PG&E, a leading clean energy utility in CA, as well as management consulting where he worked in more than 40 countries around the world.

Eric has an MBA from the London Business School as well as a Master's and Bachelor's degree in Mechanical Engineering from UC Davis and is licensed as a Professional Engineer in CA. When not working towards the transportation of the future, Eric enjoys mountain biking and competing in endurance events and is a three time finisher of the Escape from Alcatraz triathlon.

Lic. Luis Bernal

Luis Bernal currently serves as Deputy Assistant Administrator in the USDA Rural Utilities Service- Electric Program (RUS-EP). Luis oversees the Policy and Outreach Branch, the Engineering Standards Branch, and the Technical Standards Committee A. In his role, he leads the Electric Program’s responses to interagency regulatory reviews, as well as operational and policy efforts. Luis leads RUS-EP support to the interagency federal partners involved in the Puerto Rico’s power sector recovery efforts and serves as the EP’s delegate to the Recovery Support Function Leadership Group-Energy Subgroup. Luis has over 12 years of experience in the energy field in different roles at the federal and state level. Luis had a significant role in the design and implementation of the Rural Energy Savings Program. Through this program, utilities and certain entities that provide or propose to provide energy efficiency solutions, are able to use loan proceeds to relend for the implementation of energy efficiency measures that are repaid through a recurring service bill.

Prior to joining RUS-EP he served as Executive Director of the Puerto Rico Energy Affairs Administration in the Government of Puerto Rico from 2009-2012. In that role, he established and implemented policy for renewable energy and energy efficiency and conservation projects and investments; liaised with the US Department of Energy; oversaw the implementation of federally funded programs and the daily operations of the organization. Representative programs implemented during his tenure as the PREAA Executive Director included the Weatherization Assistance Program, the State Energy Program, the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant and launched the Green Energy Fund, a program sponsored by the Government of Puerto Rico. The aggregated budget for the energy efficiency and renewable energy programs worth more than $150 million in budget.

Luis holds a Masters of Laws in Energy and Environmental Law from the George Washington University Law School and a Juris Doctor Degree from the Interamerican University of Puerto Rico School of Law.

Ing. Angel Zayas

Holds a bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Puerto Rico at Mayaguez Campus (1992) and a Master's Degree in Engineering Management from the Polytechnic University of Puerto Rico (1996).

Since 2000, his engineering firm, AZ Engineering LLC, has worked on the design of residential, commercial, and industrial projects. Motivated by a friend and seeing the vision that renewable energy was going to overtake the energy market, in 2007 Eng. Zayas began working with solar systems receiving a Certification of Installation of Photovoltaic Systems from Florida Energy Center, 2008 Certified Photovoltaic Installer in Puerto Rico and 2009 NABCEP Professional Installer Certification.

Zayas is one of the Instructors for the design and installation of photovoltaic systems official course in Puerto Rico, training more than 1000 individuals and has had the opportunity to instruct others in the Dominican Republic, Panama, Costa Rica, Colombia, Bahamas, and Barbados. He is Past President of ACONER.org (Association of Renewable Energy Consultants and Contractors of Puerto Rico), an association dedicated to promoting renewable energies in Puerto Rico.

He is a social media energy influencer with his #martesinformativo at 6:30 pm via YouTube channel @DrPowerPR and Facebook @azgrouppr.