Jeff Wolfe, co-founder of national solar installer groSolar, has joined Just Energy Group as senior VP of business strategy. Just Energy is a retail energy provider focused on electricity, natural gas, solar and green energy, offering "long-term fixed-price, variable-price, and flat-bill programs, smart thermostats, and residential solar" to its approximately 2 million residential and commercial customers. Just Energy Group is the parent company of Amigo Energy, Commerce Energy, Green Star Energy, Hudson Energy, JE Solar, Tara Energy and TerraPass.
Sasan Aminpour, until recently SVP of operations at SunEdison, is now the COO of SunEdison Frontier Power (helmed by Cathy Zoi). Kevin Christy has been moved from GM of global services to battery energy storage development at SunEdison.
Lucid Chairman Will Coleman is joining the building optimization software firm as CEO. Coleman is a former partner at Mohr Davidow Ventures. Current CEO Vladi Shunturov will move to the role of president. To date in 2015, Lucid has added more than 6,000 buildings to its BuildingOS platform, according to the company.
Minh Le is now the "Departing Director of the SunShot Initiative" at the Solar Energy Technologies Office of the U.S. Department of Energy. Le notes, "I am moving on to spend time as a senior advisor at the Office of Management and Budget at the White House, focusing primarily on developing and advancing clean water technologies." He adds, "It is with the hubris of having seen first-hand that government can accomplish big things through innovation, technology, and partnerships with academia, industry, national laboratories, and state and local governments that I take a small bite at this big challenge. Instead of 'grid parity,' I will be focused on 'pipe parity.' With innovation, we may be able to reduce the energy [requirements], carbon-intensity, and cost of fresh water production and purification."
Aaron Halimi has joined Gardner Capital as senior VP of solar development. Prior to joining Gardner Capital, Halimi worked at Borrego Solar, "where he led the origination and development efforts of 43 megawatts of solar, across nine separate transactions, representing $100 million in solar project finance."
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8minutenergy Renewables named Pablo Otin, formerly country manager for Gestamp Solar in North America, as VP of emerging markets. Otin has developed more than 2 gigawatts' worth of renewable projects in Europe and the U.S. and has developed solar PV projects in Mexico, Puerto Rico, Brazil and Panama. In a release, 8minutenergy CEO Martin Hermann said, “We plan to develop over 2,000 megawatts of solar PV projects in Latin America over the next five years."
Desktop Metal, a 3-D printing startup that works with carbon fiber, raised $14 million in VC funding from NEA, KPCB and Lux Capital. According to Xconomy, the A round included "3-D printing giant Stratasys, Boston hardware investor and prototype shop Bolt, Founder Collective, Data Collective, and angel investors." The firm was founded by Ric Fulop, also the founder of lithium-ion battery maker A123 Systems.
PV Nano Cell, a producer of "single-crystal" conductive inks, named Zvika Lifschitz, most recently CFO of Valens Semiconductor, as CFO. PV Nano Cell is developing silver and copper conductive inks for use in solar PV and printed electronics.
SolarCity now has more than 14,000 employees in the U.S., and has been adding, on average, more than 500 new people per month in 2015.
PV module manufacturer ReneSola "accepted the resignation" of its CFO, Daniel Lee, according to PVTech.
Algenol lost its CEO, Paul Woods, changed its strategy and cut staff, according to reports. Woods is resigning for personal reasons, according to a release. Algenol has long aspired to make ethanol in bioreactors using cyanobacteria.
From last week's jobs column:
Advanced Microgrid Solutions, which uses energy storage systems for electric utility grid support, named Kelly Warner as president. Already on the AMS board of directors, Warner most recently was CEO at Deerpath Energy, a micro-wind energy company that he founded. He also previously served as CEO of XENERGY and KEMA.