Neil Gibbs

Role: Associate Expert, Australia

Location: Melbourne, Australia

Affiliation: Marchment-Hill Consulting, Managing Principle

Neil Gibbs is a well-known and highly-respected professional management consultant who has served the utilities and infrastructure industries in Australia and around the world for over 20 years. Neil specialises in business strategy, market reform and development, business transformation, organisational change management, and is an authority on organisation effectiveness for utilities.

Prior to founding Marchment Hill Consulting, Neil held leadership positions in major international consulting firms PA Consulting Group, AT Kearney and Cap Gemini Ernst & Young.

Neil leverages his industry insight and enthusiasm for change to help MHC’s clients deliver more sustainable outcomes. He firmly believes that the energy industry must undergo sweeping change in the years ahead. He is ‘determined to make a difference’.

Cameron O’Reilly

Role: Associate Expert, Australia

Location: Sydney, Australia

Affiliation: CEO, Energy Retailers Association of Australia

Cameron O’Reilly is the CEO of the ERAA. With a longstanding background in energy and public policy, he has worked at the centre of government and business relations for most of his career – advising on policy, as an executive for outsourcing firms, as well as consulting on public affairs.

Cameron holds a Bachelor of Economics from Sydney University and a Master of Management and Public Policy from Monash University, where he undertook a major research essay on the genesis of the National Electricity Market (NEM). He is also a Fulbright scholar where he undertook research at the University of Texas on the impact of climate change policy on the US energy sector.

Cameron also holds positions in the following Boards and Advisory Groups:

• Director of the Australian Gas Industry Trust (AGIT)

• Chairman of Energy Assured Limited

• Member of the Federal Government’s Smart Grid, Smart City Strategic Policy and Regulatory Steering Committee

• Member of the Telecommunications Universal Service Management Agency (TUSMA)

Duncan Sedgwick

Role: Associate Expert, UK

Location: London, UK

Affiliation: Independent Consultant

Duncan Sedgwick now acts as a strategic advisor and Non-Executive Director to a number of clients within the energy sector. These include Engage Consulting, G4S Utility Services, On-Line Direct, UK Public Health Association, VPhase, Airwave Solutions, Age Concern and AMT Sybex. This experience of a classic portfolio career enables him to use his 37 years experience across the range of the sector particularly as it impacts upon the customer experience.

Duncan was previously the inaugural Chief Executive of the Energy Retail Association in the UK, the Director of Business Transformation for E.ON UK, the Director of Retail Mass Markets for Powergen and the Customer Services Director of East Midlands Electricity, as well as CEO of Secure Electrans.

Outside of the energy sector he has always had an interest in local communities having been Chairman of the Learning & Skills Council in his previous home county of Nottinghamshire and Chairman of the Citizens Advice Bureau for the East Midlands

Dr Sarah Darby

Role: Associate Expert, UK

Location: Oxford, UK

Affiliation: Environmental Change Institute, University of Oxford, UK

Sarah Darby researches social and behavioural aspects of energy use. Sarah gained a BSc in Ecological Science from Edinburgh University. and her D.Phil degree was awarded by the University of Oxford for a thesis on ‘Awareness, action and feedback in domestic energy use’. She is deputy leader of Lower Carbon Futures at the Environmental Change Institute, an interdisciplinary programme with researchers from many backgrounds who are committed to extending our knowledge of energy systems and developing practical ways of reducing their environmental impact..

Sarah was a co-author of 40% House, a widely-debated major study of the prospects for reducing carbon emissions from the UK housing stock, and has maintained an interest in the dynamics of energy demand in buildings and in fuel poverty issues. She was part of the external evaluation team for the UK EDRP trials of smart meters and feedback, is on the advisory panel for the UK Consumers’ Association magazine Which?, and contributed to the recent VaasaETT/Pöyry report ‘SG4-GHG: measuring the potential of the Smart Grid to lower greenhouse gas emissions around Europe’.

Most of her research work now concentrates on demand response, tariffs, user feedback and smart grid developments from the energy user’s standpoint, and on the evaluation of community energy initiatives. She writes and speaks widely on socio-technical energy issues

Tomaz Oresic

Role: Associate Expert, Slovenia and South Eastern Europe

Location: Slovenia

Affiliation: EFT Group, Group Head of Marketing for Central and Western Europe

Tomaž is a energy utility manager with international experience in energy sales as well as in the energy related legal issues. From 2007 Group Head of marketing for Central and Western Europe at the London based EFT Group. EFT Group is the market leader in terms of electricity trading in SE Europe and also developing several investment projects in its own generation capacities. From 2003 to 2007 Tomaž was a Member of the Board of Elektro Maribor d.d., the second biggest electricity distribution company in Slovenia. His responsibilities included primarily electricity supply, trading, services and strategic development of the company.

Tomaž is also the Chairman of the annual international conference on electricity market and distribution ENERGIJA 09 (www.energija09.si), as well as a programme committee member and a speaker at several international events, focusing on energy legislation issues, unbundling and electricity supply activities.
In addition to the listed responsibilities he has been a Chairman or Member of Supervisory Boards of 6 Slovenian companies during the last 10 years.

Tomaž holds a Mechanical Engineering diploma from the University of Maribor, where he graduated in 1996. Subsequently, he studied an MBA programme at the same University. Tomaž lives and works in Maribor, Slovenia.

Jason Cox

Role: Associate Expert, Australia

Location: Melbourne, Australia

Affiliation: Marchment-Hill Consulting, Senior Consultant

Jason Cox draws upon his experience in organisation design, operating model definition, asset management capability development and performance management to deliver value to Marchment Hill clients in Asia and the Middle East.

Jason has successfully implemented a variety of projects for over 60 water, gas and electrical utilities, organisations and regulators, and he has participated in numerous industry forums, global benchmarking and research engagements. Jason is known for his depth of knowledge, his ability to deliver measurable results, and his capacity to build and maintain strong relationships with both clients and stakeholders.

Johanne Mose Entwistle

Role: Associate Expert, Denmark

Location: Denmark

Affiliation: The Alexandra Institute

Johanne trained as an anthropologist at the university of Aarhus and has been working at the Alexandra Institute since 2008. Through her work she has extensive experience with anthropological fieldwork in different contexts such as private homes and organizational settings. She has focused on themes such as people’s practices in relation to IT, new and existing technology, energy consumption, indoor climate and light, health and health management through technology etc.

Through her anthropological approach, which is a broad and open approach, she has gained knowledge about different people’s practices and furthermore an understanding of why people do what they do. Which diverse meanings do different people attribute their own and other’s practices and behavior? How is this related to what motivates them in their current behavior? What are the barriers for change?

Johanne also teaches Anthropology and User involvement at different institutions such as the Engineering School of Aarhus, Aarhus University, and Kolding School of Design.

Morten Bremild

Role: Associate Expert, Smart Home/Home Energy Management (HEM)

Location: Denmark

Affiliation: Independent

As a ‘Thought Leader’ in the in the Smart Home and Energy Management/Smart Grid industry, Morten Bremild draws on more than 15 years of experience as Business Development and Marketing Executive with a strong Innovation and Strategy skill set!

Morten has gained a unique market, customer and industry insight during a long career in global electrical distribution and energy incumbent, Schneider Electric, as well as innovative start-up ventures in the Smart Home industry.

Fields of experience span from hands-on conceptual sales and marketing, business intelligence and business model innovation to corporate strategy development and its successful implementation.

When working with companies in the industry, Morten takes point of departure in his analytical and comprehensive understanding of the Smart Home/Energy Management/Smart Grid industry structure, its dynamics, the patchwork of technologies and the prevailing megatrends.

Morten holds an Executive MBA from Copenhagen Business School and an HD (Graduate Diploma) Degree in International Business and Economics. His analytical and strategic work has been subject to keynote presentations at industry conferences during recent years.

Alex Henney

Role: Associate Expert

Location: London UK

Affiliation: Independent

A former chairman of the London Electricity Consultative Council and board member of London Electricity, Alex is a highly experienced and renowned expert in the liberalised UK and international electricity and gas industries.

A pioneer of the global liberlaization of the energy industry, as far back as 1987 Alex wrote the highly influential “Privatise Power” for the Centre for Policy Studies,  advocating a competitive restructuring of the electric industry in England & Wales. Then involved with the Department of Energy under Cecil Parkinson in the early debate on restructuring. Subsequently he advised extensively on electric restructuring in Britain, Europe, North America, and ANZAC, and undertook comparative international studies of various facets of electricity industries.

Alex has published widely in for instance The Electricity Journal (US), Public Utilities Fortnightly (US), Power UK, and five books – “Inside local government: a case for radical reform” (1984); “The economic failure of nuclear power in Great Britain” (1989); “The electricity industries of eleven west European countries” (1992); “The privatisation of the electricity supply industry in England & Wales” (1994); “The British Electric Industry 1990-2010: the rise and demise of competition” (2011).

Alex studied engineering at the Universities of Bristol and Virginia, with an English Speaking Union/Du Pont Fellowship and a Fulbright Scholarship. He had a varied early career prior to entering the energy industry including time in McKinsey & Co. and being chief housing officer for the London Borough of Haringey, where developed the fastest large housing scheme around London. He was also seconded to the civil service for a while for the review of housing policy.

Dr Philip E. Lewis

Role: Expert

Location: Helsinki, Finland

Affiliation: VaasaETT, CEO and Founder

A leading international specialist in energy and utility competition, marketing, customer behaviour and psychology as well as related issues including Customer Loyalty and Switching, Demand Response/Eco-Home/Smart Grid/Energy Efficiency, Billing and CRM/CIS.

During 15 years in the liberalized utilities industry Dr Lewis has conducted research and strategic support in over 50 countries for well over 300 organizations including Shell, E.ON, EDF, RWE NPower, Panasonic, BP, Nokia, British Gas, Duke Energy, ABB, BC Hydro, Nuon, Fortum, RAO, Electrabel (GDF/Suez), E-Control (Austrian Regulator), CRIEPI (Central Research Institute of the Electric Power Industry of Japan), Landys & Gyr, Union Fenosa-Gas Natural, ADEME / World Energy Council (WEC), DECC (Department of Environment and Climate Change, UK), Capgemini, Australian Energy Market Commission (AEMC), Energy Retailers of Australia Association (ERAA), Aurora Energy (Australia) and Hansen Technologies (Australia).More…

Jessica Stromback

Role: Expert

Location: Helsinki, Finland

Affiliation: VaasaETT, Chairman; SEDC, Executive Director

Jessica is a founder and Executive Director of the Smart Energy Demand Coalition (SEDC).  As Director she actively works actively with European policy makers to enable demand side participation throughout European energy markets.

She is Chairman at VaasaETT, Global Energy Think Tank based in Finland.  She specializes in smart metering and demand response as well as market structure and requirements for demand side program development.  She is a co-founder of the Retailers Taskforce working under the Smart Grids Technology Platform for the European Commission.   She has acted as research director or participated in multiple research projects. She has acted as project manager for such projects as ‘SG4-GHG’ measuring the potential of the Smart Grid to lower green house gas emissions around Europe, ‘Empower Demand’ comparing 100 residential pilot projects according to 23 variables involving over 450,000 households and ‘Respond 2010’ an 18 month multi-client study reviewing the development of residential Smart Metering and Demand Response in 23 national markets.

Christophe Dromacque

Role: Expert

Location: Helsinki, Finland

Affiliation: VaasaETT, Senior Analyst

Christophe Dromacque is an expert in various energy market issues including European and International electricity and gas prices, Demand Response effectiveness, and other market benchmark data.

Since joining VaasaETT in 2008, Christophe has participated in numerous ground-breaking research projects and has provided consulting work for various organizations such as the World Energy Council, ADEME, Panasonic, CRIEPI (Central Research Institute of Electric Power Industry of Japan), Onzo, E-Control, and CapGemini among others.

Christophe took part in one of the leading global studies into Smart Metering-based Demand Response and related In-Home Services (Respond 2010) which was released at the end of May 2010, and also helped design and is currently the lead researcher of the renowned Household Energy Price Index (HEPI) which monitors residential energy prices in Europe.

Christophe Dromacque is familiar with collecting and correlating comparable benchmark data from nearly all European Markets and is experienced at gathering, analysing and presenting data in a form which delivers clarity, transparency and value to regulators, consumers and other interest groups.

Mike Gordon

Role: Associate Expert, Demand Response and Aggregation

Location: New York, USA

Affiliation: Joule Assets

Mike is strategic lead for Joule* He is responsible for reaching out to beneficiaries and conceptualizing and developing products and services. Mike has historically played a central role in founding industries in the energy field. He has particularly focused on building Energy Reduction Asset Markets and on empowering consumers in those markets.

Mike founded ConsumerPowerline in 2000, generally recognized as the United States’ first demand response aggregator. Specializing in serving end users in deregulated wholesale electricity markets, ConsumerPowerline (later “CPower”) built 1,000 MWs of demand response internationally, and until its sale to Constellation Energy Group (NYS:CEG), CPower remained the largest provider of short notice (defined as shed load within ten minutes of call) demand response in the world.

It was not Mike’s first foray into the energy field. In 1981, Mike took a job as the sole employee of a 127-home heating oil buying collective, that had negotiated an advantageous “collective buying” contract with a heating oil supplier in New York City, modeled after a similar collective in Ottawa, Canada. Fueled by the energy crisis, consumer advocacy, and media attention, within three years the collective served 3,000 homes and seven heating oil suppliers. Over the next year Mike negotiated “first of their kind” collective buying contracts for consumers in Washington DC, Maryland, New Jersey, New York and Massachusetts. Today, heating oil collectives serve a major portion of the Eastern residential market, saving consumers hundreds of millions of dollars each year.

Mike holds a Masters in Public Administration from Harvard’s Kennedy School and a Masters in Business Administration from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. Mike also holds a BA from the State University of New York at Binghamton.

*Joule Assets products and services are designed to inform people about Energy Reduction Assets (ERAs) and how they can invest in and create their own ERAs thereby reducing our dependence on carbon-based energy. Joule does this by highlighting consumers’ options, by describing what financing and earning opportunities are available in their location for selected measures, and by linking them to others who can help them achieve their energy reduction goals, e.g., equipment vendors, project developers, financial institutions, aggregators.

Jose Luis Malaquias

Role: Associate Expert, Energy Efficiency and Smart Grid

Location: Portugal

Affiliation: Independent

Jose Luis Malaquias hold a M.Sc. in Applied Physics. He taught for 10 years at the University of Coimbra, after which he moved to ISA-Intelligent Sensing Anywhere, where he became Innovation Director. He is now a free lance consultant, helping technological companies innovate by creating new categories of devices in the fields of Energy Efficiency, Remote Healthcare, and Ambient Assisted Living. He has been responsible for over 30 projects dealing with the introduction of new monitoring and actuation tools that help consumers, building managers, and industrial engineers, curb their energy budgets.

Sara Bell

Role: Associate Expert, Climate Change; Future Networks Commercialisation

Location: London, UK

Affiliation: Independent

Sara Bell is currently heading a feasibility study to design a business model that aggregates value across the whole electricity supply chain and shares the value appropriately between distribution, transmission, generation and supply in order to drastically reduce the cost of the move to a low carbon economy by enabling the financing of electricity storage and flexible demand.

Prior to this role, Sara Bell was responsible for developing UK Power Networks’ commercial strategy for future distribution network management and operation. This included delivering significant savings in traditional electricity network investment and substantial regulatory outperformance through developing commercial alternatives to network reinforcement, such as Demand Side Management.

Sara was driving UK Power Networks’ strategic commercial approach to the low carbon economy, helping to translate the UK Government policy in to action. This encompassed maximising opportunities, including smart metering and more flexible DUoS tariffs, distributed generation, and ancillary services procured from customers and generators, as well as ensuring the efficiency of new electricity loads such as Electric Vehicles and Heat Pumps.

Prior to joining UK Power Networks, Sara spent several years in Clean Technology and Energy Efficiency in South East Asia.

Sara sits on the ENA/ERA Smart Demand workgroup, on the National Physical Laboratory Centre for Carbon Measurement Stakeholder Group, on the EValu8 Plugged-in-Places Steering Committee, on the Advisory Board for London First’s Property and Energy Network, on the Sustainability First GB Electricity Demand Project and is a former member of the Singapore Government Climate Change Committee R&D workgroup.

Sara holds a Masters in Environmental Management and is a regular speaker at conferences and industry events.

Andy Phelps MA (Econ)

Role: Associate Expert

Location: Worcester, UK

Affiliation: Independent

A professional and well respected senior manager with extensive experience within the UK energy industry. Skilled in both strategic planning and commercial management with a history of successful project delivery. Acknowledged expert in UK and European energy network regulation.