Contributors

AGL Energy

Australia’s leading private investor in renewable energy and operator of the largest portfolio of renewable and battery assets of any ASX-listed company.

Aleks joined AGL in 2013 and has over 10 years’ experience in the energy sector. At AGL, Aleks is responsible for the development and coordination of AGL’s public policy and advocacy positions on a diverse range of energy sector issues. Aleks’s policy experience and interest extends to a number of issues including electricity and gas market reform, climate change and renewables, carbon markets, networks and regulated infrastructure, hydrogen, distributed energy, and electric vehicles.

Caterina Cassar

AGL's Head of Commercial & Industrial Customers

BA (Economics and Politics), Dip. Management, Dip. Financial Markets (Dealing & Advisory)

Caterina Cassar has worked in the energy industry for over 13 years, commencing her career as a Regulatory Economist at a small energy retailer. She gained exposure across areas such as Regulation, Risk, Strategy, Sales and Pricing and commenced at AGL in 2007. Her current role is AGL's Head of Commercial & Industrial Customers, Commercial Operations.

Cathlin Thurbon

AGL's Senior Manager Sustainability

BEng (Civil & Environmental) (Hons)

Cathlin is responsible for the development, implementation and communication of AGL’s sustainability and corporate responsibility strategy, including the delivery of AGL's annual sustainability report. Cathlin also leads the team responsible for managing AGL’s compliance obligations under the National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting Act.

Christine Corbett

AGL's Chief Customer Officer

Christine is an accomplished and highly versatile senior executive with extensive experience in delivering strong financial and people outcomes in the retail, eCommerce, consumer services and logistics sectors.

She is an experienced professional with a successful track record in managing large and complex teams to drive a balance of commercial, customer and stakeholder results.

Con Hristodoulidis

AGL’s Senior Manager Regulatory Strategy

BEc (Hons), GradDip PA

Con is responsible for AGL’s corporate regulatory strategy, maintaining relationships with energy market regulators and relevant Government departments. With experience in both Government and Private sectors, he is comfortable in political and issue complex environments.

Damien Nicks

AGL's Chief Financial Officer

Damien joined AGL in 2013 and has held a number of senior executive finance roles across Retail Energy, Energy Markets and Group Commercial Finance before being appointed CFO in May 2019. He is also a Board member of ActewAGL, a joint venture that governs the electricity and gas retailer and distribution businesses in the ACT.

David Scrivener

Executive Director, Head of Infrastructure and Utilities, Westpac Institutional Bank

David is Westpac’s senior relationship executive with global responsibility for the Infrastructure and Utilities sectors, covering both thermal and renewable power generation. He has a long background in funding energy and infrastructure projects, both from a debt perspective as well as equity.

Dean Smith

AGL's Senior Manager Power Development

Dean joined AGL in 2017 as Manager Power Development leading AGL’s development of a portfolio energy storage options and has spent majority of his time over the last twelve months pursuing Pumped Hydro opportunities. Dean is involved in internal groups looking at hydrogen feasibility and is keenly involved in the Liddell Innovation Project. His experience spans over 15 years in the market developing renewable energy projects across Australia.

Eleanor McCracken-Hewson

AGL's Senior Commercial Manager

BA LLB (Hons), Mc-ENV

Eleanor is responsible for leading the development of fact base energy policy on a range of issues relevant to AGL’s operations, including the energy transition, integration of energy and climate policy, and social & economic inclusion. A core part of this is close engagement with external stakeholders, including consumer advocacy bodies and business groups.

Elizabeth Molyneux

AGL's General Manager Energy Markets Regulation

Liz has over 20 years' experience in the energy sector, managing retail, wholesale, network, pricing and non-pricing consumer protection regulation. She brings expertise in wholesale risk management and major project acquisition and integration, as well as energy forecasting and analysis.

Fiona Orton

TransGrid

BEng (Chemical) (Hons)

Fiona Orton is Future Grid Manager at TransGrid, responsible for long term electricity transmission planning for NSW. She has over 12 years’ experience working in Australia’s electricity, gas, climate change and sustainability sectors, focusing on the evolution of Australia’s energy markets. She has published several articles on energy policy, regulation and market design in response to changing technological, environmental and consumer requirements.

Gabby Sundstrom

Industry expert

Gabby has been working on policies and programs for vulnerable customers over the last 4 years and is passionate about creating shared value and social impact and inclusion. She loves collaboration and partnership and is excited about new solutions that can be built in the energy sector to ensure fair and equitable access to all.

Jenessa Rabone

AGL's Senior Manager Wholesale Energy Policy

With over 10 years’ experience in energy policy and regulation, Jenessa joined AGL in mid-2018 as a Manager in the Wholesale Markets Regulation team. At AGL, Jenessa is responsible for providing specialist regulatory advice to the wholesale business and driving reform in energy markets.

Jessica Esler

AGL's Senior Communications Manager, CM and FB&T

Jess joined AGL in 2018 as a Communications Manager, and currently looks after our Customer Markets and Future Business & Technology portfolios.

Jess brings experience in strategic communications and writing for digital media across the emergency management, community, and infrastructure sectors. She is passionate about diversity and inclusion, and bringing the stories of our people to life right across the business.

Jess holds a Bachelor of Commerce/Arts and a Masters of Global Media Communication from the University of Melbourne.

Kurt Winter

AGL's Manager, Policy & Markets Regulation

LLM , LLB, BA (Honours), GDLP

Kurt Winter manages AGL’s regulatory strategy on new energy and customer markets. He is passionate about Australia’s energy market transformation, that is being driven by climate change and innovation to support customers’ changing preferences and expectations. Kurt has experience spanning government, private legal practice, industry and the charitable sector both in Australia and the United Kingdom.

Luke Menzel

Chief Executive Officer, Energy Efficiency Council

Luke Menzel is CEO of the Energy Efficiency Council, Australia's peak body for energy efficiency, energy management and demand response. Luke leads the Council’s work to make sensible, cost effective energy efficiency measures standard practice across the Australian economy.

Luke sits on a number of government and independent advisory committees, and is Vice President of the Australian Sustainable Built Environment Council (ASBEC).

Matthew Warren

Industry expert

Matthew Warren is a former chief executive of the Australian Energy Council, Energy Supply Association of Australia and the Clean Energy Council. Over the years he has also worked as a journalist, most recently as the environment writer for The Australian newspaper.

Matthew holds a Bachelor of Economics with Honours from the University of Adelaide.

Nicole Lyons

AGL's Head of Communications

Nicole joined AGL in 2013 and is a senior marketing and communications professional with over 20 years of experience in developing brand and communications strategy to drive awareness, engagement and positive business outcomes. Her experience spans multiple industries, including energy, wine and publishing.

Nigel Browne

AGL's General Manager, Loy Yang

With an Instrument and Controls background and over 40 years’ experience in Maintenance, Engineering, Project management and Leadership, Nigel’s focus is ensuring safe, reliable and efficient operation of the Loy Yang assets with the Loy Yang team to deliver reliable energy into the NEM.

Theo Comino

AGL's Manager, Carbon Analysis & Reporting

BEng (Photovoltaics & Solar Energy) (Hons), LLB

With eight years’ experience in renewable energy and energy efficiency engineering, and over four years in climate change and sustainability reporting, Theo Comino has a passion for sustainability and in addressing climate change from a practical perspective. His role at AGL as Manager, Carbon Analysis & Reporting involves the management of climate change reporting from both a regulatory and non-regulatory perspective along with broader sustainability reporting, climate change policy and associated strategy development.

Tim Jordan

Clean Energy Finance Corporation

Tim Jordan is head of investment research at the CEFC. He joined the CEFC after five years at Deutsche Bank. Before that, Tim was senior adviser to the first Australian Government minister for climate change, Senator the Hon Penny Wong. He began his career at the Department of the Treasury in Canberra. Tim has degrees in political science and law from the University of Queensland and an MPhil in philosophy from University College London, where he was a Commonwealth scholar, and a Master of Economics from the University of Sydney.

Tim Nelson

AEMC Executive General Manager Economic Analysis

Assoc Prof (Griffith Uni), PhD Econ, BEc (Hons), AGIA, ACIS, GAICD

Executive General Manager Economic Analysis at AEMC, Tim was previously Chief Economist at AGL, leading the company's public policy advocacy and sustainability and ESG strategy. In 2015/16, Tim led the development AGL's Affordability Initiative, revised Greenhouse Gas Policy and Strategy and the Powering Australian Renewables Fund (PARF) concept. He is a Director of PARF and a member of the Westpac Stakeholder Advisory Council and the Grattan Institute Energy Reference Group.

Tony Wood

AM

Tony Wood has led the Grattan Institute’s Energy Program since mid-2011. Since then he and his team have delivered sixteen major reports on energy and climate change and he has developed a strong profile with governments and industry, and is a regular contributor in major media on key energy issues.

Contributing authors