Solar industry veteran Charlie Gay has joined the Energy Department’s SunShot Initiative as its new director. He replaces Rebecca Jones-Albertus and arrives at the SunShot program with more than 40 years of experience in the solar industry. Previously, Gay was the president of Applied Solar at Applied Materials and a booster of amorphous silicon. Gay served as the director of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory in the mid-1990s.
REC Solar, a provider of commercial solar and energy systems, named Matt Walz, a former Duke Energy exec, as its new CEO. Walz has worked at Duke Energy for 12 years and joins REC Solar after serving on the firm’s board. When Duke acquired its majority stake in REC Solar last year, it committed to invest up to $225 million in commercial solar projects. REC claims to have over $30 million in its pipeline from deals driven by its recently expanded channel partner program.
Speaking of Duke Energy, Greg Wolf, Duke's former commercial portfolio business lead (that business included renewables, power transmission, energy storage, and gas infrastructure) has left the firm to become CEO of Leeward Renewable Energy, an affiliate of ArcLight Capital Partners. Leeward currently owns and operates 18 wind farms across the U.S.
Mikey Heinz, formerly head of global field operations at SunEdison, is now CEO of Massachusetts solar installer Bright Planet Solar.
Lynn Hicks, formerly of Soligent, is now director of sales at wholesale distributor AEE Solar. Sunrun acquired REC Solar's residential division (solar sales, design, and installation), AEE Solar (distribution) and SnapNrack (mounting systems) back in 2014.
Tigo, a module-level power electronics manufacturer, added Kevin Kilkelly as VP of sales for the Americas. Prior to joining Tigo, Kevin held various executive positions at Unirac and SolarWorld. Earlier this year, SMA, the German solar inverter giant, took a 27 percent stake in Tigo for $20 million.
JLM Energy, a renewable energy and energy storage firm, is staffing up with:
- Bob Montano as VP of operations. Montano worked at JDSU, Nelson-Miller, Apple and HP.
- Ellen Howe as VP of marketing and corporate development. Howe served at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.
- Kellyann Lamb as VP of partnerships. Lamb joined JLM after six years at Sunrun.
- Emmitt Summers as VP of residential sales. Summers was VP of sales at Sunrun.
David Gelinas, formerly with Greentech Capital Advisors, is now director of capital markets and strategy at behind-the-meter energy storage firm Stem. Earlier this month, Stem added $100 million in new financing from energy infrastructure investor Starwood Energy Group. Stem's project financing resources now top $350 million.
EnergyHub named Chris Ashley as VP of utility sales. Ashley was most recently EnerNOC's regional director of utility sales. Alarm.com acquired energy management startup EnergyHub in 2013.
Genability added Patrick Franz as VP of engineering. Most recently, Franz managed the software and firmware teams at LumaSense. Genability develops software for solar, energy efficiency and distributed energy applications and received an investment from EnerNOC in 2014.
Logan Landry, formerly of PosiGen, is now CEO at Sigora Solar, a Virginia-based residential solar installer.
According to Fortune, Bart Nabbe, "who worked on computer vision, navigation, and artificial intelligence in Apple's secret self-driving car project, has left to join electric-car startup Faraday Future."
ESS added utility executive and former San Diego Gas & Electric president, COO and board member, Michael R. Niggli, to its board of directors. ESS builds an all-iron redox flow battery for commercial and utility-scale energy storage applications needing more than four hours of energy capacity.
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Enertech Search Partners, an executive search firm with a dedicated cleantech practice, is the sponsor of the GTM jobs column.
Among its many active searches, Enertech is looking for a Director of PMO - Distributed Energy.
This client is currently seeking a Director of PMO who will be responsible for designation and maintenance of the standards of project management and process. The position directs the day-to-day management of the PMO including resource accountability, personnel development, and performance tracking. The ideal candidate for this role has 8+ years of progressive experience, an entrepreneurial mindset, high energy and is results oriented.
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Dan Shugar, founder and CEO of NEXTracker, is joining the The Solar Foundation's board of directors.
Joseph Matteo, formerly with Exelon, is now senior manager of acquisitions and strategic business development at SunPower.
From last week's column:
GE Current, GE's energy spinout, named Bruce Stewart as its new CMO, according to the Boston Business Journal. Previously, Stewart was CMO and senior VP at the Exelon-acquired Constellation Energy.
AutoGrid Systems named Jeffrey Norman as VP of industry solutions. Most recently, Norman was the VP of emerging technologies at Leidos Engineering (the former SAIC), where he led the practice that supported utilities’ grid modernization initiatives. Before Leidos, Jeff was an engagement manager with CapGemini North America’s Smart Energy Services group. AutoGrid's software for regulated utilities and deregulated energy companies is "designed to predict, optimize and control the millions of distributed energy resources (DERs) being deployed at the grid edge." AutoGrid’s total VC funding to date is over $40 million from investors including German utility E.ON, Envision Ventures, Energy Impact Partners, Foundation Capital and Voyager Capital.