Powering the Future Career-based learning for students entering the new energy economy
MONIK A WNUK
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n early 2013, three individuals met over dinner to celebrate a new investment partnership. Bert Valdman (WCAS ’84), at the time President of Edison Energy, had invested in Clean Power Finance, a solar energy financing company led by founder Gary Kremen (McC ’85) and CEO Nat Kreamer (C ’99). In conversation, they came to realize that they’d all graduated from Northwestern, at different times, each arriving in the energy sector by different, sometimes happenstance, paths. Wishing that more energy and sustainability curricula had been available to them as students, the three resolved to make their years of experience in the energy industry an asset to current Northwestern students. They envisioned a seminar where students from law, business, and technical backgrounds could discuss complex problems currently facing the energy industry, as introduced by the leaders at the cutting edge. “If we could go back to our time at Northwestern, and do it all over again, we’d seize the opportunity to learn from the people who are driving the industry, ” says Valdman, now president and CEO of Optimum Energy, a software company that specializes in enabling customers to reduce their energy and water use.
Initially funded by Edison International, the parent company of Edison Energy, the ISEN-run seminar, called Powering the Future, is now in its fifth year. Of the 100 students who have participated over that time, 60 percent have gone on directly to careers in sustainability or energy. Most others are completing their degrees. Kreamer, Kremen, and Valdman, drawing from their own extensive personal and professional networks, have delivered an all-star roster of speakers, including: David Crane, senior operating executive at Pegasus Capital Advisors and former president and CEO of NRG Energy; Jon Powers, co-founder of Clean Capital and federal chief sustainability officer in the Obama administration; and Doug Kirkpatrick, general partner at InnerProduct Partners, and former chief scientist at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency in the George W. Bush administration. “All the seminar speakers have spent considerable time in the business, and we wanted to bring that world, as it related to new energy technologies and policies, into the classroom,” Valdman says. The seminar also offers students a unique opportunity to understand the energy industry in its current state of transition. Over the seminar’s four years, it’s rare for a speaker
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Fall 2017: The Climate Issue
to have been invited twice, to ensure diverse and timely perspectives. “Powering the Future puts you in the same room as some of the key decision makers, so you can quickly get up to speed on current issues and build relationships that pay dividends for years,” says KJ Plank (KSM ’16), a former seminar student. THE RIGHT SPE AKERS AT THE RIGHT TIME In the fall of 2014, Jon Wellinghoff, former chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), was exactly where he wanted to be — in the chaotic middle of an energy transition. A year out of his role at the agency, he was co-chairing the energy team at Stoel Rives, a business law firm headquartered in Portland, Oregon, and building on the changes he implemented at FERC. These included, among others, the landmark Order 1000, which encouraged the integration of solar and wind installations into regional power transmission projects. Top of mind for him was the dichotomy between the traditional utility system and consumer adoption of new technologies, which posed both financial and stability challenges for the grid. Wellinghoff was also in the midst of reframing the future of energy power markets, conceptualizing the development of a robust 23