Claire Gotham utilizes her deep experience in the energy industry to bring a unique 360 degree view of the marketplace to her seminars. After starting her career as a futures broker, Claire work for Pacific Gas & Electric, the country's largest investor-owned utility, marketing their many transportation, storage, and hub services. This experience, followed by a position as natural gas portfolio manager at Sempra Energy Services, allowed Claire to combine her knowledge of the financial energy markets with in-depth knowledge of the physical markets. After having worked with a wide range of companies, from utilities, to marketers, to co-generation operators, Claire is able to analyze the natural gas marketplace from many unique perspectives. This enables her to make her seminars applicable and highly relevant to all market participants, including producers, marketers, and users.
Claire Gotham is President of GSC Energy, Inc., a company that specializes in providing training, consulting, and brokerage services to commercial energy hedger. Immediately prior to her work at GSC, Claire was a senior consultant for Deloitte and Touche's Audit and Enterprise Risk Services Practice.
The law firm of HaedickeHoyt specializes in trading documentation, with the primary focus on the Master Agreement and Credit Support Annex of the International Swaps and Derivatives Association (“ISDA”). The named partners are Mark Haedicke and Mont Hoyt, each of whom has extensive experience with the ISDA, all as described in greater detail below.
Professional Experience:
Mr. Haedicke has worked in the energy business for more than 25 years. He has worked with gas and power distribution companies, gas pipelines, commodity trading and marketing companies and in power plant development. He also was the only non-Wall Street representative on the Board of Directors of the International Swap and Derivatives Association for six years. Since 1990, Mr. Haedicke has focused on energy trading and marketing. During such time, he has led the development of master contracts for the energy industry. Mr. Haedicke brought financial documentation technology to both physical and financial energy trading contracts.
Education & Certifications:
Mr. Haedicke received his undergraduate degree in Business Administration from the Honors College at Michigan State University and his law degree from Wayne State University.
Professional Associations & Affiliations:
Mr. Haedicke has written numerous articles on energy trading and documentation including: Gas Commodity Markets in Energy Law & Transactions, Competitive-Based Contracts for the New Power Business in the Energy Law Journal, and Gas Trading in 2005 and the NAESB Contract in the Rocky Mountain Mineral Law Journal. Mr. Haedicke is also the author of numerous training materials for courses on energy trading used by Energy Seminars, Inc.
Ashmead Pringle is president of Grain Service Corporation and GSC Energy, its energy hedging division. GSC specializes in providing training, consulting, and brokerage services to commercial energy hedgers. Ash has a BS in mechanical engineering from Duke University and an MBA from Harvard Business School. He's conducted hundreds of seminars on risk management, and attendees consistently give him high marks for his effective presentation, knowledge of the subject, and ability to simplify complex concepts. In bringing energy managers this practical hands-on workshop, GSC draws on many years of experience in teaching and in working every day with energy hedgers.
Steve Stanley is president of L.E.A.D., Leadership Enrichment And Development, a division of Steve Stanley Associates, a leadership development and consulting company. Steve is a conference leader and speaker, a lecturer in college and graduate programs, and a writer on leadership issues with experience in both the corporate and non-profit sectors. He is a certified Birkman Consultant with Birkman International, a Baylor graduate, and holder of a masters degree, with an emphasis in human relations, organizational dynamics, leadership, team development, coaching, and communication.
INSTRUCTOR Robert deR. Stein Principal / Co-Founder
Signal Hill Consulting Group LLC
Robert Stein's over 30 years in the utility business both as a senior executive at an investor-owned utility and as a consultant to developers of unregulated generation projects gives him a unique and valuable perspective on the rapidly changing electric energy field. In addition he has been intimately involved in the establishment in 1996 of the ISO in New England, including development of its latest market rules. In addition to teaching E101 he currently represents market participants in the Northeast, advocating their interests in the trading rules and assuring their access to the transmission system. He has worked on proposals to create Regional Transmission Organizations (RTOs ).
Mr. Stein is a principal and co-founder of Signal Hill Consulting Group LLC, with offices throughout New England. Signal Hill's focus is to assist a wide range of utility and electric consumer clients in capturing the value that will result from the developing competitive power market.
Prior to his consulting career he held positions of increasing responsibility at a power pool, investor-owned utilities, and a municipal power agency in the areas of transmission and resource planning, finance, and wholesale power marketing.
Education: Mr. Stein holds a B.S. in electrical engineering from Worchester Polytechnic Institute and an MBA from Western New England College. He also attended the Harvard Advanced Management Program.
INSTRUCTOR Valerie K. Wood President
Energy Solutions, Inc.
1 - Managing your Natural Gas Costs
Ms. Wood is president of Energy Solutions, Inc., a consulting firm that specializes in helping commercial and industrial businesses establish and implement natural gas risk management plans. Valerie has more than 20 years of experience in the energy industry. Her experience includes gas supply and marketing positions at three regulated Midwest utilities and two non-regulated marketing companies. Valerie's diverse background allows her to communicate to businesses the importance of a successful balance of cost-effective prices and reliable service. In addition, her diverse background, combined with her experience in working directly with businesses to develop cost effective, reliable energy portfolios, makes her uniquely qualified to educate others.
