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SEPA Membership Elects New Directors to Board

Washington, D.C. – The Solar Electric Power Association (SEPA) has announced the results of the nonprofit organization’s annual elections for its Board of Directors. Four incumbents and three new members were elected to the board.

Returning board members include:

  • Cris Eugster, Executive Vice President, Chief Generation and Strategy Officer; CPS Energy
  • Jay Herrmann, Vice President, Marketing and Corporate Communications; Xcel Energy
  • Mark Nielson, Vice President, Staff Services; Delaware Electric Cooperative
  • Tom Starrs, Vice President, Market Strategy and Policy, SunPower Corporation.

The newly elected directors are:

  • Stacey Kusters, Vice President, Renewable Energy and Origination; NV Energy
  • Paul Lau, Assistant General Manager, Sacramento Municipal Utility District
  • Pascal Storck, Global Manager of Energy Services, Vaisala.

“Our board leadership represents the vibrant and growing diversity of the market sector focused on utility adoption and integration of solar energy,” said Julia Hamm, SEPA President and CEO. “Having a broad range of industry stakeholders at the table, finding new ways to collaborate, is a key part of SEPA’s vision for deploying the new technology and business models that are critical to moving the utility sector forward.”

The 20-member SEPA Board of Directors, all elected by the association’s membership, guides the organization’s work, providing research, thought leadership and education and networking opportunities to stakeholders across the utility and solar energy sectors. Its members represent a wide spectrum of the industry, from firms that finance and develop solar energy projects to investor-owned, public power and electric cooperative utilities across the country.

About SEPA: SEPA is an educational nonprofit organization based in Washington, DC, dedicated to helping utilities integrate solar power into their energy portfolios. SEPA is a founder and on-going co-organizer of Solar Power International. It provides a range of reports, educational events, networking opportunities and advisory consulting services to its members.

Media contact: K Kaufmann, 202-379-1637 or kkaufmann@solarelectric power.org.

Incumbent and new directors elected to the SEPA Board of Directors: Individual profiles

Cris Eugster, CPS Energy (Incumbent)
Cris Eugster is Executive Vice President, Chief Generation and Strategy Officer at CPS Energy of San Antonio, one of the nation’s largest municipally owned electric and gas utilities. Positions Cris held prior to joining CPS include first chief officer for sustainable growth for the city of Houston and partner with McKinsey and Company, an international management consulting firm. He has a bachelor of science degree in electrical engineering from Texas A&M, and a master of science and doctorate degree in electrical engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Jay Herrmann, Xcel Energy (Incumbent)
Jay Herrmann is Vice President of Marketing and Corporate Communications at XCel Energy in Denver. Since 2001, he has served Xcel in a variety of leadership positions at the operations and corporate levels. In addition to his board position with SEPA, Herrmann also sits on the Board of Directors for the Denver Chapter of the American Red Cross and the Advisory Board for the University of Colorado, Denver’s Business School Energy Program. He holds a bachelor of science degree in mathematics from the University of Vermont and a master’s degree in global energy management from the University of Colorado, Denver.

Stacey Kusters, NV Energy (New)
Stacey Kusters is Vice President of Renewable Energy and Origination at NV Energy, a company also owned by Berkshire Hathaway Energy. Stacey began her career at British Columbia Hydro in the company’s Power Smart division, moving to PacifiCorp in 2001. Between 2001 and 2014, her role at PacifiCorp included integrated resource planning for six states, market fundamentals, market contracts, structuring, pricing, and modeling and origination. She is a political science graduate of Simon Fraser University in Vancouver.

Paul Lau, Sacramento Municipal Utility District (New)
Paul Lau is Assistant General Manager of Power Supply and Grid Operations for the Sacramento Municipal Utility District (SMUD). He is an executive board member and commissioner of the Transmission Agency of Northern California and Balancing Authority of Northern California. He also serves as SMUD’s management representative to Western Electric Coordinating Council and an advisory member for Peak Reliability Corp. Lau also serves as a delegate with the United States Energy Association, assisting in electrification, operations and demand side management in countries such as Bangladesh, India and Jordan. He is a registered professional electrical engineer in the State of California and received his bachelor’s degree in electrical power engineering from the California State University, Sacramento. Lau is also a Senior Fellow of the American Leadership Forum.

Mark Nielson, Delaware Electric Cooperative (Incumbent)
Mark Nielson has over 30 years experience with Delaware Electric Cooperative, a distribution electric cooperative, serving almost 87,000 members in the state of Delaware. He is currently vice president for staff services. He serves on the Governor’s Energy Advisory Council, the Delaware Renewable Energy Taskforce, Delaware Energy Efficiency Resource Standard Workgroup, Rural Electric Management Development Council, and the Delmarva Peninsula Planning Committee.

Tom Starrs, SunPower Corporation (Incumbent)
Tom Starrs serves as SunPower’s Vice President for Market Strategy and Policy, responsible for the company’s global market assessment, market strategy and public policy initiatives. Prior to his current position, he held senior management positions with Iberdrola Renewables, PPM Energy and Schott Solar. He serves on the boards of the California Foundation on the Environment and the Economy, the Center for Energy Efficiency and Renewable Technologies, and the Solar Energy Industries Association. Tom holds a doctorate degree from the University of California, Berkeley’s Energy and Resources Program, and a law degree from the University of California Berkeley’s School of Law.

Pascal Storck, Vaisala/3TIER (New)
Pascal Storck is a co-founder of 3TIER – which was acquired by Vaisala, a global leader in environmental and industrial measurement, in 2013 – and led many of its business and functional groups throughout his tenure. He is an internationally recognized expert on the topics of renewable energy assessment, forecasting, and integration. His background in systems analysis, optimization, and hydrologic sciences played an integral role in the development and implementation of 3TIER’s unique range of wind, solar and hydro products. He has performed hundreds of renewable energy resource assessments and has been the main supervisor on each of 3TIER’s renewable energy integration studies. Pascal holds a Bachelor’s degree with distinction in Environmental Engineering from Cornell University, a Master’s degree in Civil and Environmental Engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and a Ph.D. in Civil and Environmental Engineering from the University of Washington, where he was also named a NASA Earth Systems Fellow.

 

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