Panelists

Sprouting Economic Opportunity

Panelist and Participant Information

KEYNOTE SPEAKER: BRITTA K. GROSS, General Motors, Director, Global Energy Systems and Infrastructure Commercialization. Britta K. Gross is Director, Global Energy Systems and Infrastructure Commercialization within GM R&D and Strategic Planning. In this role she is responsible for assessing energy system alternatives and steering the commercialization efforts for new infrastructures required to support GM’s biofuel, battery-electric and hydrogen fuel cell electric vehicle programs. Britta has an extensive and diverse background in Automotive and Aerospace industries. She received a degree in Electrical Engineering from Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge, Louisiana and studied language arts at the University of Wurzburg in Germany. She serves on the Board of Directors of the National Hydrogen Association.

HOST: MAYOR RICK BAKER, St. Petersburg Elected in 2001 to lead Florida's 4th largest city, re-elected in November 2005 by over 70% of the vote, winning every precinct in the city. Appointed by Governor Charlie Crist to serve on Transition Team as Group Leader of Growth and Environment. Chosen as vice chair of Governor's Action Team on Energy & Climate Change. Appointed by Governor Jeb Bush to Chair Municipal Mentoring Initiative and the Century Commission for a sustainable Florida. Served as president, Children's Dream Fund. Chairman, St. Petersburg Area Chamber of Commerce. Chairman, Florida International Museum. Chairman, Leadership St. Pete. Founder, YMCA Neighbor to Neighbor Christmas Program and CONA Neighborhood Leadership Program. Chair, National League of Cities - School Improvement Task Force

MODERATOR: JONI JAMES, Deputy Editor of Editorials, St. Petersburg Times She worked for newspapers in Winston-Salem, N.C.; Indianapolis; Rochester, N.Y.; and Eugene, Ore., before moving to Florida in 1996 to join the Orlando Sentinel, where she got her first taste of Florida political reporting. She worked at the Wall Street Journal and the Miami Heraldbefore joining the Times' Tallahassee bureau in 2003. She has happily called Tampa Bay home since 2007, when she moved to the paper's main office to become an editor. She is a native of North Carolina and a 1989 graduate of Wake Forest University, where she helped found the dormitory recycling program. She and her husband, Mark Howerton, live in St. Petersburg with their young daughter.

PANELIST: IKE BRANNON, a chief economist for the House Energy and Commerce Committee Prior to that he was Senior Policy Adviser for the Republican Policy Committee for the U.S. Senate. He previously worked as Senior Policy Advisor and Chief Economist for John McCain 2008, and prior to the campaign he was Senior Adviser for Tax Policy at the U.S. Treasury, Principal Economic Adviser for Senator Orrin Hatch on the Senate Finance Committee, and Chief Economist for the Joint Economic Committee. Before working for Congress he was an associate professor of economics at Indiana University and the University of Wisconsin. He has a Ph.D. in economics from Indiana University and a b.a. in math, Spanish, and economics from Augustana College.

PANELIST: MARK SHARPE Hillsborough County Commissioner. A fiscally conservative Republican, he has been instrumental in keeping alive the idea of a light-rail system for Hillsborough and environs. Arguing that transit makes financial sense for both the suburbs and the exurbs, he is optimistic that the right plan could transcend partisan divisions and provide a truly regional solution. He led the way to the recent 7-0 commission vote in favor of putting a 1-cent sales tax for light rail on the 2010 ballot.

PANELIST: B. TOD DELANEY, Ph.D., P.E., BCEE, President, First Environment, Inc. Dr. Delaney provides strategic direction and management oversight at First Environment, an environmental engineering and consulting firm that delivers greenhouse gas management, environmental management system, and corporate sustainability services. Dr. Delaney is also a chemical and environmental health engineer with over 30 years of industry experience. Over the course of his career, he has worked for and consulted to hundreds of clients in the energy, chemical, manufacturing and services sectors as well as numerous public entities. Dr. Delaney serves as chairman of the board for the Business Council for Sustainable Energy, a trade group organization created by senior executives in the energy efficiency, electric utility, renewable energy, independent power and natural gas industries in the United States.

PANELIST: TODD WOOTEN, Director, Southeast Climate Resources Center at the Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions, Duke University. Todd Wooten, an expert on climate policy and carbon market design, and is the Director of the Southeast Climate Resources Center at the Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions at Duke University.Before Duke, Mr. Wooten came from Van Ness Feldman, an energy policy law firm based in Washington, D.C., where he served as senior director for governmental issues. Prior to that, for more than five years he was legislative counsel in the office of U.S. Senator Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.), where he analyzed policy on issues involving climate, energy, environmental issues, tax, transportation, judicial nominations, homeland security, intelligence, and armed services. He also served as an energy staffer for Lincoln on three Senate committees with biofuel jurisdiction: Agriculture, Energy & Natural Resources, and Finance.

PANELIST: BENJAMIN SCHLESINGER, Ph.D., President, Benjamin Schlesinger and Associates, LLC. Dr. Schlesinger, founding president of BSA, LLC, is one of North America’s leading independent energy consultants, specializing in gas and electricity marketing, pricing, infrastructure, trading practices, strategic planning, and power plant development worldwide. He has nearly four decades of experience in managing and carrying out engineering/economic analyses of complex energy issues, with particular focus on North American energy commodity movements and pricing, policies and programs. Dr. Schlesinger has advised over 400 clients in the U.S., Canada, and 25 other countries, including the top utility, energy trading and producing, manufacturing, regulatory, educational, private power, and financial services companies. A former vice-president of the American Gas Association, Dr. Schlesinger has testified before the U.S. Congress and in 16 states and provinces on the direction of the gas industry, gas contracting, purchase and sales prices, royalty valuations, market value, hedging and risk management, and related industry practices.

PANELIST: GREG MUNSON, General Counsel, WRS Compass. Mr. Munson began his career in the U.S. Air Force after graduating from the United States Air Force Academy in 1989. He attended Vanderbilt University Law School and became an Assistant General Counsel to Governor Jeb Bush. In 2002, he became an Assistant United States Attorney for the United States Department of Justice. Mr. Munson’s subsequent position was General Counsel for the Florida Department of Environmental Protection. As the state’s chief environmental lawyer, he was involved in litigation and negotiations surrounding America’s Everglades, Florida’s controversial Total Maximum Daily Load program, and the tri-state water dispute between Georgia, Alabama, and Florida. He became General Counsel for WRS Infrastructure & Environment, Inc., in February, 2007. WRS Infrastructure & Environment, now WRScompass, is a full-service environmental remediation firm with 750 skilled employees, and offices throughout the United States. Recently, Mr. Munson was asked to join the Cap and Trade Technical Working Group, reporting to Florida’s Climate Action Team on global warming.

PANELIST: JOSEPH TRESHLER, Vice President, Business Development, Covanta Americas, Inc. Mr. Treshler has more than 28 years of experience in a wide range of disciplines related to the Waste to Energy industry plus six additional years of experience in fossil fuel air pollution control. Joseph joined Covanta Energy, Corp. in 1985 as the Project Manager for the implementation of the Hillsborough County, Florida Resource Recovery Facility. Over the past 23 years, he has served in a wide variety of roles for the company related to the development and implementation of renewable energy facilities in the United States including coordination of competitive bid preparation, project agreement negotiation, government, public and media relations, client relations, operation & maintenance and construction contract negotiation, project permitting, financing and business management, including project and construction management He currently is responsible for Covanta’s business development and project implementation efforts for Waste-to-Energy in the Southeastern United States and the Caribbean. He is a member of SWANA, The Florida Chamber and the Council for Sustainable Florida. Mr. Treshler earned his B.S. degree in Chemical Engineering in 1974 from Iowa State University of Science and Technology. He is a Registered Professional Engineer.

PANELIST: SANDRA KING, Chief Environmental Scientist, ECO2ASSET SOLUTIONS. Sandra has over 15 years experience as an environmental consultant and an educator and is currently completing a PhD in geography and environmental science at the University of South Florida. She is a subject matter expert on greenhouse gas accounting protocols whose goal is to improve the science and reduce the cost of carbon quantification in biomass and soil carbon technology. Kling has conducted comprehensive greenhouse gas inventories for the City of Clearwater’s government operations; a Pinellas County inventory disaggregated into the 25 municipalities located within Pinellas County; a carbon sequestration study for the University of South Florida; and greenhouse gas inventories and carbon offset project development for landowners of timberland, ranch and agriculture. Sandra’s technical capabilities include: Geographic Information System (Arc GIS 9.3 software); Remote Sensing (ENVI 4.5 software); Multivariate Statistics (SPSS software); Environmental Database Management programs. Sandra holds several degrees including: Doctoral Student, University of South Florida, Geography and Environmental Science & Policy (Attended 2007 to Present: 36 units completed); Master of Teaching, Chapman University, Orange, California (Graduated 2006); Master of Science, Geology (emphasis in Hydrogeology), California State University, Long Beach (Attended 1994: 12 units); Bachelor of Science, Earth Science/Geology (Outstanding Senior/Dean’s List), California State University, Northridge, (Graduated 1991).

PANELIST: SEAN STAFFORD, Special Consultant to Florida Crystals. Sean Stafford has 15 years’ experience as governmental consultant representing some of the nation’s largest and prestigious, agriculture, biomass and energy companies before the Florida Legislature, Executive Agencies, and the Public Service Commission. He is a founding partner of Advantage Consulting Team, located in Tallahassee. In 2008, Mr. Stafford was tapped by Governor Charlie Crist to be a Climate Change Delegate on the Governor’s Trade Mission to Europe, where he participated in working groups on sustainability, renewable energy development and new developments in agriculture and biomass power generation. He continues to advocate on behalf of Florida’s premier agribusiness which owns and operates North America’s largest biomass renewable electric plant, as well as the nation’s leading waste-to-energy company. His practice also focuses on business development within the renewable and alternative energy sector.

PANELIST: DAVID BUBENICK, Director - Carbon Management Practice, The Shaw Group, Inc. Mr. Bubenick has over 25 years of experience in management consulting, environmental program development, facility operations management and air/waste technology assessment. He leads Shaw’s GHG initiative in the area of development of carbon emissions reduction portfolios and related program assistance for commercial and government clients. Among his credentials in air consulting, Mr. Bubenick led a team that published the first comprehensive life cycle analysis of acidic deposition (SO2 and NOx) in North America (US DOE). He also convened and hosted the first US EPA Greenhouse Gas Emission Reduction Options conference with the former Deputy Administrator of the US EPA. Mr. Bubenick holds a BS degree in Civil Engineering and a BA in Economics from Rutgers University and a MS degree in Environmental Engineering from the University of Illinois.

PANELIST: ANN NEWHOUSE, Manager, Business Energy Efficiency Services, Efficiency & Innovative Technology: DSM and Alternative Energy Strategy, Progress Energy Florida. Ann Newhouse is Manager of Business Energy Efficiency Services for Progress Energy Florida. Ann leads a team responsible for researching, developing and implementing the company’s business energy efficiency programs in Florida. Her focus is on designing and implementing commercial energy programs and solutions that reduce operating costs and maximize efficiencies for business customers. Ann is a career leadership professional with twenty nine years of utility experience and sixteen years of experience in the energy-efficiency field with both residential and commercial programs throughout Progress Energy Florida’s service territory. In addition to her current role of Manager of Business Energy Efficiency Services, Ann has led Progress Energy Florida’s award winning Staging and Logistics organization for several years. Ann graduated from Rollins College, Winter Park Florida with a degree in Organizational Communications.

PANELIST: H. DAVIS GANDEES, Florida Energy Services Coalition. Mr. Gandees has been involved nationally with over $500,000,000 of energy related projects since 1977, and is quite proud of the associated reduced environmental emissions. A graduate of Florida Atlantic University and an educator by profession, Mr. Gandees has used his teaching skills to promote energy conservation and sustainable strategies. He has worked in various energy services, sales and management positions nationally, including Honeywell, Johnson Controls, PG&E and TECO Energy, providing solutions to commercial and institutional customers. In 1992 Mr. Gandees assisted with the original Florida energy performance contracting legislation, F.S. 235.215 and with amendments in 1997, 2000 and 2008. In 1997, at the urging of state and national energy leaders he organized the Florida Energy Services Companies Steering Committee, dedicated to providing quality and ethical energy services standards in Florida. This group transitioned into the Florida Energy Services Coalition (FESC) in 2002 and Mr. Gandees served on the original Board of Directors and is currently a private sector co-chair. He is the Florida Higher Education Manager for Johnson Controls, Inc. and is a member of the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC).

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