About

I help electricity sector organizations prepare for and take advantage of the Energy Transition.

My Story

I have led electricity sector change for more than 10 years, starting with implementation of Ontario’s Green Energy Act and Feed in Tariff Program. In the early days there were many challenges that needed to be overcome throughout the electricity and government sector. I was responsible for managing many of them, I helped bring together organizations to deliver thousands of megawatts of new generation, including more than 500 MW of new generation capacity as Manager of the OPA/IESO’s Renewable Generation Procurements.

As Ontario began to transition away from Feed In Tariff programs, I realized the need to increase focus on integrating and increasing the value of existing distribution connected generation while preparing for a far more multi-stakeholder and multi-lateral electricity system. One where distributed energy resources (generation, storage, EVs and load management) are fully integrated into grid operations and jointly coordinate their activities to meet their own and broader system needs for energy, capacity, reliability and resiliency. This future state requires changes to how wholesale markets, distribution operators, suppliers and load customers interact including how the electricity system in monetized.

To achieve these outcomes I helped to establish and chair the IESO’s Grid-LDC Interoperability Standing Committee that is focused on developing operational integration for DERs in Ontario. I helped write an internal DER strategy for the IESO, created the framework for a new IESO fund to support DER-grid integration initiatives and helped develop a concept and won funding from NRCan to demonstrate Canada’s first Distribution Non-Wires Alternative Capacity Market.

In 2018, I left the IESO to take some much needed time with my family and to start EnerStrat. EnerStrat Canada Inc., is the platform for me to accelerate the integration of distributed energy resources into wholesale electricity markets and operations and to transform the electricity distribution sector into a multi-lateral marketplace that integrates all available resources for the benefit of customers.

Major Successes

• Represented the Community Generation Working Group in the Alberta Utility Commission’s Distribution System Inquiry
• Created concept and acquired funding for Canada’s first Distribution Non-Wires Alternative Market, secured partnership with Alectra
• Developed draft framework for IESO’s Renewable Distributed Generation Integration Fund
• Chaired IESO’s Grid-LDC Interoperability Standing Committee, developed interoperability workplan
• Closed 3 rounds of Ontario’s Feed-in-Tariff Program, contracting 500+ MWs of new distributed generation
• Wrote North of Dryden Regional Plan – identified network reinforcements to support mining and community growth
• Negotiated renewable biomass generation facility agreement with an Ontario First Nation