NYPA Customer Clean Energy Exchange 2022

Following a 15-year career with the New York Rangers where he was a three-time NHL All-Star, Stanley Cup Champion and Olympic Medalist, Mike Richter received his degree in Ethics, Politics and Economics with a concentration in Environmental Politics from Yale University.

He has become a key spokesperson for environmental issues, speaking frequently about environmental regulations and public policy before many audiences, including The U.S. Senate Special Committee on the Climate Crises.

Justin E. Driscoll is the Interim President and Chief Executive Officer of the New York Power Authority. He is responsible for developing and implementing the statewide utility's strategic vision and mission and for supervising its operations, legal and financial matters and relationships with external stakeholders.

At NYPA, Justin previously served as EVP and General Counsel and supervised the activities of the Hydropower Licensing Group, the Regulatory/Energy Markets functions, Legislative and Community Affairs Group, Environmental Justice, the Corporate Secretary and the Chief Ethics and Compliance Officer. He also served on the Enterprise Risk Management Committee and was management’s liaison to the Cyber and Physical Security Committee and Audit Committee to the Board of Trustees.

Justin is a graduate of American University in Washington, D.C. with a bachelor’s degree from the School of Public Affairs. He received his law degree from New York Law School and attended the New York University School of Law, L.L.M. Program in trade regulation He is a member of the New York City Bar Association, and the Energy Bar Association.

Ethan Zindler is the Head of Americas at BloombergNEF. Ethan manages the company's analyst and commercial teams in New York, Washington, San Francisco, and Sao Paulo and oversees a team devoted to tracking lower-carbon policy developments around the globe impacting renewables, biofuels, and energy efficiency. Ethan also manages the production of Climatescope, a project to profile clean energy investment conditions in emerging markets previously underwritten by the Inter-American Development Bank, the UK Department for International Development, and USAID.

Donnel Baird is the founder of BlocPower, a Brooklyn-based climate tech startup whose tech platform analyzes, finances, and installs clean energy and building decarbonization upgrades in buildings in underserved communities – creating jobs for qualified local low-income workers, energy savings for building owners, reduces carbon emissions and asthma rates, and provides financial returns to investors.

Vlada Kennif is the Vice President of Energy and Sustainability, Capital Projects Division, at the New York City Housing Authority where she is responsible for leading the comprehensive Sustainability Agenda for the nation’s largest public housing authority toward a decarbonized future, healthier homes, while leveraging ongoing and future capital work of over $1 billion to afford training and hiring opportunities for NYCHA residents. In her role, she has focused on transformative waste management programs such as procuring the first pneumatic system as a retrofit to an existing building, mechanical waste collection and waste yards redesigns. In the clean energy space, Vlada has been leading the work on transforming heating and cooling through the Clean Heat for All Challenge and an ACCESSolar Program which is focused on training and hiring NYCHA residents.

Prior to joining NYCHA, Vlada has spent over a decade working at NYC Department of Environmental Protection and has earned a M.S. in city and regional planning from Pratt Institute. She is a Ph.D. candidate in information studies at LIU Post.

Yves Noel is NYPA’s Senior Vice President and Chief Strategy Officer, where he is responsible for operationalizing NYPA’s strategic plan – VISION2030 – as well as establishing an internal consulting group and overseeing sustainability efforts. He is a member of NYPA’s Executive Management Committee, which helps establish and guide NYPA’s long-range strategic plans and initiatives.

Yves is an experienced management consultant with more than 15 years of experience shaping businesses and implementing new systems and processes.

During his time as Mayor of White Plains, Tom has spearheaded important environmental and sustainability initiatives including banning the dirtiest heating oils, creating the first dedicated bike lanes (including the first protected bike lane) in the county, and establishing a network of electric vehicle charging stations in municipally owned parking structures.  Under Mayor Roach, the city has streamlined the residential solar permitting process, replaced all of its street lights, as well as the lighting in several city-owned garages, with LEDs, and initiated textile recycling at the City’s Gedney Yard.

As Senior Director, Origination & Structuring, Brian Stanton leads NYPA’s Retail Power Supply program under its Expanded Authority legislative mandate – an ambitious addition to NYPA’s traditional economic development supply programs that offers a competitively priced blended power product to help customers achieve sustainable energy goals.

Stanton also manages NYPA’s large scale renewable supply program, under which NYPA sources and manages long-term off-take agreements for energy, capacity and renewable attributes. 

Brian has over 20 years' experience in retail and wholesale power marketing with various leadership roles at Constellation Energy and Truelight Energy.

Bill Hanes is the President/CEO of Hanes Supply Inc. 

Hanes Supply Is a diversified contractor/industrial supplier which specializes in the manufacturing of slings for lifting applications Worldwide.

In addition, we offer tools repairs, rentals and training of our products and services.

Bill is also the president/CEO of the following companies, Engineered Lifting Technologies, www.eltlift.com which specializes in manufacturing 

Below the Hook Lifting Devices, www.kinedyneinc.com a manufacturer of infrastructures bridge components including expansion joint and bearings, and New Green Umbrella, www.greenumbrellasystems.com, a provider of proprietary concrete products and systems for environmentally friendly building and maintenance solutions.

Bill is a 1980 graduate of the University of Buffalo with a BA in Civil Engineering. Valerie and Bill Hanes are blessed with 6 children and 5 grandchildren. 

Our Families are proud to be lifelong Western New Yorkers, our home.  

Alana Appenzeller is a Manager on the Key Account Management team at NYPA where she is primarily responsible for the management of NYPA’s economic development customers statewide. Alana works cross functionally with internal teams, state and local economic development organizations, and industry associations to deliver NYPA’s low-cost power and related products and services to eligible commercial and industrial businesses, as well as facilitate access to other New York State incentives. She has over 12 years of experience with NYPA, most of which involved promoting the ReCharge NY program and other incentives to businesses looking to expand, remain in, or locate to New York.

Peter McCartt is the Director of Energy Conservation and Sustainability for Westchester County. He has extensive business experience with a focus on the environment, energy conservation, and sustainability.

Peter is a founding board member of Sustainable Westchester, created and has chaired Eastchester’s Environmental Committee since 2006, created and is Executive Director of the Friends of Twin Lakes County Park, helped formulate and chaired the Advisory Board of Southern Westchester Energy Action Consortium, and is President of the Twin Lakes Civic Association.

Mayor Kathy Sheehan is in her third term as Albany’s 75th mayor. Mayor Sheehan has dedicated her administration to creating a city of opportunity, leading with a commitment to equity and responsive government that includes diverse community voices.

Mayor Sheehan’s innovative streetlight purchase and conversion program has reduced Albany’s carbon emissions, improved pedestrian safety, and saved millions in taxpayer dollars – plus, her administration is further combating climate change by planting 2,025 new trees by 2025, installing electric car charging stations throughout the city, and empowering its Director of Sustainability to keep the city on track to meet its 2030 climate goals.

Joseph Crimi is the Senior Program Manager for Western and Central New York with the New York Power Authority, overseeing NYPA’s Economic Development and Energy Efficiency customers’ needs. Joseph has over 10 years’ experience with the Power Authority and nearly 25 in the energy field. Prior to program management, he performed scores of energy audits and project management for energy construction upgrades.  His experience spans from LED Streetlighting & HVAC to Solar PPAs and Distributed Generation.

He is an alumnus of SUNY Buffalo’s Mechanical Engineering School and Canisius’ Wehrle Graduate School of Management and holds certifications in Project Management (PMP) and Energy Management (CEM).

Aaron Jevons is the lead energy and mechanical engineer within the facilities organization at GlobalFoundries (GF) Fab 8 in Malta, N.Y.

Aaron has over 14 years of experience in the mechanical engineering and energy industries. Prior to GF, he worked as an engineer designing mechanical systems, performing ASHRAE level two energy audits, and building energy models for commercial, industrial, and municipal buildings. Aaron has also worked on and modeled a number of buildings that have achieved LEED certifications.

At GF, Aaron is responsible for modeling the energy usage at Fab 8, operations and maintenance of the central heating and cooling plants, and assists in the design of new facilities and energy saving projects at existing facilities. He also helped achieve LEED Silver and Gold certifications for existing Fab 8 facilities.

Aaron is an alumnus of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute with a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering. Aaron is a NYS Registered Professional Engineer, a LEED AP, and member of ASHRAE.   

Christopher D. Johnson has been involved in the fuel cell industry since 2009 and currently serves as the Product Manager for Hydrogen Systems at Plug. In his role he is responsible for managing multiple product lines across various industries to effectively deploy hydrogen infrastructure to continue to enable to rapid growth of the hydrogen economy.  Prior to joining the product management team, Chris held the role of senior manufacturing engineer, where he was responsible for introducing all new product designs to manufacturing for hydrogen infrastructure. 

Before joining Plug Power, Chris served as a Manufacturing Engineer at Simmons Machine Tool Corporation where he drove product design of metal cutting machines, spearheaded implementation of all major capital equipment and orchestrated continuous improvement efforts. During his time at Simmons Machine Tool Corporation, Chris helped to eliminate human error and reduced programming time by 95%, while forging strong relationships with tooling vendors that resulted in 70% savings on yearly tooling spending. He has also held numerous roles working as an undergraduate and graduate research assistant in hydrogen fuel cells at the Center for Automated Technologies and Systems at RPI.

Christopher received his Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering and his Master of Business Administration from Simon Business School at the University of Rochester.

Emilie Bolduc is the Vice President of the NY Energy Manager program at NYPA where she is responsible for the NY Energy Manager, DER Advisory, and Demand Flexibility services. Emilie has 15 years of energy efficiency and energy management experience having worked with distribution utilities as an energy efficiency program consultant and with private companies as a strategic energy program advisor.