The Climate Champions

Jane Chen, CEO & cofounder, StepWise, enabling people to control and profit from their energy use by making it easier, faster, and more affordable for homeowners to electrify, removing the barrier of costly and time consuming electric panel upgrades.

Charles Murray, CEO at Switch Source, discussing Phase-EQ capability to unlock hidden capacity in existing distribution systems, defer infrastructure upgrades, improve voltage stability, and create more flexibility during switching and restoration events.

Kaitlyn Albertoli, CEO & Co-Founder, Buzz Solutions and Tom Lenzen, Infrastructure Industry Team Specialist for Imagery and Remote Sensing, Esri, engage in an in-depth conversation on how to use asset management to drive resiliency across an aging grid.

Special DistribuTECH Episode, including 20% Discount Code, in all caps, D26CMTINV. Catch live episodes of The Climate Champions from the floor of DistribuTECH where I'll be interviewing Jane Chen & John McDonald in San Diego on February 3rd and 4th, 2026!

Rick Cutter, President of the non-profit August Palm Creative, leading the development of media projects that make a difference, focusing on climate change education. Look for his first film - The Grid Unplugged - in early 2026.

Dr. Mani Vadari, President, Modern Grid Solutions, is an IEEE Life Fellow and electric industry visionary delivering next gen solutions for 35+ years. He teaches future students @ multiple universities and published two popular books on the future grid.

Franklin Jones, CEO and Founder, B-Line Urban Delivery, solving the challenges of the “last mile” of a distribution network, reducing congestion, supporting local food producers, and developing green collar job opportunities.

Talieh Zargar, Co-founder & CTO, GridWrap: Resilient Grid Hardening Solutions for the Electric Grid. When it comes to electric infrastructure, she can rebuild it. She has the technology. She can make it better, stronger, and do it faster with no outage.

Richard McIndoe, Executive Chairman, Edge Zero. From coal to a net zero goal, enabling more solar, more EVs, and more reliability for customers.

Rinaldo Brutoco, Founding President, World Business Academy & Founding President & CEO of H2 Clipper, Co-Founder & Board, JUST Capital, and served with many non-profits including the Gorbachev Foundation, National Peace Academy, and the Chopra Foundation.

Maria Robinson, Inaugural Director of the United States Department of Energy Grid Deployment Office. Special annual "HOT SEAT" edition of The Climate Champions, recorded live in Washington DC at GridWise Alliance's gridCONNEXT Conference on December 10th.

Joshua Goldman, Senior Director of Sales, eMobility, ABM Industries. 25+ years experience in over 50 configurations of electric and hybrid heavy-duty buses, trucks and Vans. Proterra, Autocar Truck, Volta Trucks, and more!

April Bolduc, President of S Curve Strategies, helping states, counties, school districts and utilities across the U.S. go EV by developing regional transportation electrification strategies. The result: more EVs, cleaner freeways and neighborhoods.

Elizabeth Cook, Vice President of Technical Strategy at The Association of Edison Illuminating Companies and the host of the Grid Mod Pod, a podcast featuring conversations with electric power executives and experts about the future of the electric grid.

Gunars Valkirs, CEO of Maui Ku'ia Estate Chocolate. My #1 favorite chocolate of all time! And it's green! Will dark brown, but... powered by an off-grid microgrid supplying over 99% renewable energy.

Whit Fulton, CEO, ConnectDER. Focused on enabling anyone to connect solar panels or EV chargers to their home in minutes, at a fraction of the typical time and cost, with no electrical upgrade required. Recorded LIVE at DistribuTECH International.

Gene Rodrigues, Assistant Secretary of Energy at the U.S. Department of Energy, Leading the Office of Electricity for the United States of America. Recorded Live consuming Hot Ones level hot sauces at The GridWise Alliance's annual gridCONNEXT conference!

Congressman Mike Levin is serving his third term as California's 49th District representative. He's a member of both the House Committee on Natural Resources and Veterans’ Affairs, where he's Ranking Member on the Economic Opportunity Subcommittee.

Carolina Ortega, Vice President of Sustainability at Milestone Environmental Services, the largest independent energy waste sequestration company in the United States, helping customers sequester almost 3 million metric tons of CO2 since 2014.

Peak Load Management Association Webinar: Jenny Roehm, Sr. Manager, Utility Solutions, Schneider Electric; Michael Brown, Dir., Energy Services, NV Energy; Ross Malme, President & CEO, Malme Energy Consulting; Judy Knight, Chief Development Office, PLMA

Kim Getgen, Founder and CEO, Innovation Force, a serial entrepreneur delivering a SaaS platform that drives innovation by providing visibility through metrics, increased teamwork, and improved performance, while eliminating analysis/paralysis.

Mark Gabriel, President and CEO, United Power; Chair of the Board of Directors, GridWise Alliance; Award-winning author of Visions for a Sustainable Energy Future; Former CEO, WAPA; and led the EPRI Electricity Sector Framework for the Future effort.

Greg Hale, co-founder and principal, The Catskill Project. Also, Senior Advisor for Energy Efficiency Markets and Finance, NYSERDA. The Catskill Project is a carbon-neutral/ passive house community being developed in the Catskills, about 2 hours from NYC.

Kristian Hansen, Founder & CEO of SLO, is a on mission-driven journey to solve the climate crisis through eco-conscious capitalism, the power of consumerism, and data. His Slow Fashion movement is a call to action against exploiting humanity for profit.

Jesse Charfauros, Founder & CEO, RestorVault. 30+ years in the data storage industry at EMC & NetApp, founded restorWare in 2004 and restorVault in 2017 to reduce the cost, risk, and GHG emissions associated with the exponential growth of data storage.

Dr. Surinder Singh, CEO & Co-founder, Relyion Energy is an entrepreneur, scientist, and visionary technical & business leader. Relyion is doubling lithium-ion battery life & performance by repurposing second-life EV batteries as stationary energy storage.

Graham Hill, Founder and CEO, The Carbonauts, Founder of TreeHugger.com, designer and creator of the ceramic version of the iconic New York paper cup and on a decades-long, multi-company mission to help humanity move into the bright green future.

Bridgette McAdoo, VP & Chief Sustainability Officer at Genesys, holistically optimizes the economic, social, and environmental impact of the organization. She's a founding member of Chief, a private network driving more women into positions of power.

Richard Argentieri, President of NextEra Analytics (NEA), an energy analytics and consulting firm leading the industry in advanced modeling, predictive analytics, data science, high-performance computing, and he's a Lean Six Sigma Master Black Belt.

Andy Klump, CEO & Founder, Clean Energy Associates, with developer, IPP, and EPC customers in 70+ countries,155+ GW of solar PV/15+ GWh of energy storage projects, leading 200+ professionals operating in 15 countries, with 135+ engineers and inspectors.

Peter Kelly Detwiler (PKD), Co-Founder, Northbridge Energy Partners, Author of "The Energy Switch: How Companies and Customers Are Transforming the Electrical Grid and the Future of Power." Energy Industry Thought Leader, Consultant, and Speaker.

Stephanie Krubsack, Founder and CEO of Purevant Living, Editor and Chief of Person & Planet Magazine, and Host of the Person & Planet podcast. Purevant Living stands for health, wellness, the environment, and giving back.

Andrew Boyd, writer, humorist, activist, CEO (Chief Existential Officer) of the Climate Clock, and author of the new book, I Want A Better Catastrophe: Navigating The Climate Crisis with Grief, Hope, and Gallows Humor - BetterCatastrophe.com

Sharon Vidal, Global Head of Corporate Social Responsibility & Sustainability, Illumina, improving human health by unlocking the power of the genome, over 25 years working on environmental, health, safety, sustainability & corporate social responsibility.

Zach Fox Devol, 11-year-old host of We The Children, a podcast about climate change and global warming solutions, interviews expert guests and tackles hard topics on caring for our planet in a less depressing way than I. Check out WeTheChildrenPodcast.com

James Clegern, CEO & President, KineticCore Solutions leads KineticCore Solutions developing the world's best short-duration and cost-effective Energy Storage System reducing CO2, NOx and SO2 pollution to preserve our environment for future generations.

David Elve, Executive Consultant, Vass Solutions, energy, utility, and IT executive with 30 years of experience at global positions based in Atlanta, Houston, Denver, Paris, Brussels, and London. Prior Board Member, EVP & Chief Marketing Officer, PayGo.

Rick Kornfeld, President & CEO at Kitu Systems, delivering a new generation of interconnection of solar PV, battery storage, electric vehicles, and other Distributed Energy Resources. Prior: VP Engineering Qualcomm, GM Wireless Chipsets Texas Instruments.

Hanna Grene, Worldwide Power & Utilities Leader, Microsoft, working alongside Microsoft's partners, customers, Fortune 500 executives, and policymakers to accelerate investment to enable a more resilient, decarbonized, secure, and affordable energy grid. 

Chris Black, CEO, GridX, previously a Principal Partner at Huck Capital, CTO & COO of Tendril where he led an aggressive strategy, acquiring five of the leading companies, that together with Tendril, form a new entity, Uplight, recently valued over $1.5b.

Congressperson Paul Tonko, representing New York’s 20th District, serves on the Energy and Commerce Committee, is serving his 7th term, and was elected by his peers in the 116th Congress to chair the Subcommittee on Environment and Climate Change.

Tanya Barham, CEO & Founder, Community Energy Labs, offering modern AI-powered clean building control solutions that make smart energy management and decarbonization accessible and affordable for community building owners to accelerate decarbonization.

Tim Barat, CEO & Co-Founder, Gridware, an ex-power pole field worker, named in Forbes’ 30 under 30 innovator list for developing a 24/7 monitoring system increasing visibility along power distribution lines - after getting his EECS degree at UC Berkeley.

Chris King, Senior Vice President, e-Mobility, Siemens is an entrepreneur that thrives on taking new technologies to market. A true decarbonization evangelist, he co-hosted the U.S. Congressional delegation at the UN Climate Summit in Copenhagen, Denmark.

Marzia Zafar, Deputy Director of Strategy & Decarbonization, Ofgem, Great Britain's Independent Energy Regulator, ensuring design of a multi-year clean and green environment strategy and roadmap protecting energy consumers, especially vulnerable people.

Suzanne Russo, Chief Executive Officer, Pecan Street, accelerating innovations in climate and conservation solutions, on the Board of the Texas Energy Poverty Research Institute, Member of the Forbes Technology Council and a Board Advisor for CleanTX.

Andrew Beebe, Managing Director, Obvious Ventures, a venture capital firm investing in early-stage, purpose-driven entrepreneurs reimagining trillion-dollar industries in three investment pillars: Sustainable Systems, Healthy Living, and People Power.

Katie Tweed, Senior Director of Content & Partnerships for Canary Media, an independent nonprofit journalism dedicated to chronicling the transition to a decarbonized economy. She manages relationships with partners and clients to tell meaningful stories.

Dr. Raj DasGupta, CEO, Electrovaya has been there for 10+ years and been involved in every aspect of the business: cell manufacturing, engineering, business development, a successful ceramic battery, and hopefully, a transformational solid-state battery.

Debbie Dekleva, CEO and Milkweed Maverick at Monarch Flyway and Founder of Sustainable Monarch. Monarch Flyway is the longest running milkweed business in history! She's a 2nd generation milkweed entrepreneur who apprenticed for her patent attorney father