Laura S. Lovelace

Ms. Lovelace, as President of Wellford Energy Advisors, has nearly 15 years of experience in the government and business sectors including specific expertise in clean energy technology funding.

As an alternative energy lobbyist and consultant, she has combined her expertise in the financial sector, corporate affairs, and government affairs to help clients obtain federal funding and formulate sustainability strategies in the areas of climate change, renewable energy, and energy efficiency.

She has also assisted clients with regulatory issues, policy promotion and public/private partnerships by working at the nexus of Congress, the White House, Federal Agencies -- such as the Department of Energy -- and Wall Street.

Ms. Lovelace has represented a variety of clients ranging from nonprofit groups to clean energy technology start-ups to the world’s largest retailer. 

Prior to her government relations career, Ms. Lovelace served in the White House and Treasury Department.  During the President George W. Bush Administration, Ms. Lovelace served in the Office of Economic Policy at the U.S. Department of the Treasury.  While there she provided guidance to senior Treasury officials in support of the Department’s priorities affecting the U.S. economy.
 
She also worked with the White House, the Department of Energy, and the Department of Commerce on the National Energy Policy Interagency Task Force to formulate a comprehensive energy plan.

Ms. Lovelace had previously served in the White House Office of Policy Development under President George H.W. Bush. 

Her private sector experience includes nearly seven years on Wall Street in the areas of institutional sales, trading, and capital markets-- most recently with Goldman Sachs and Co. in their New York office.

While there, Ms. Lovelace developed a broad knowledge of market liquidity, public companies, and the issuance of short and long-term debt.

Ms. Lovelace gained political campaign experience on George W. Bush’s first Texas gubernatorial campaign in the early 1990’s.

She holds a degree in Government from Dartmouth College and a Masters Degree in Business Administration from the Tuck School at Dartmouth.

Sharon B. Heaton

Sharon B. Heaton is an attorney with 20 years of experience at the intersection of law, public policy and business, most recently serving as Senator Boxer’s Deputy Staff Director and General Counsel of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works.

In both the public and private sectors, Ms. Heaton has sought to develop and commercialize new technologies advancing energy efficiency, storage and energy generation from renewable and green sources (solar, wind, municipal waste, hydrokinetic and biofuel).

She has also worked on efforts to modernize the technology and regulatory structure of the transmission grid. 

Ms. Heaton served as Deputy Staff Director and General Counsel of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works. 

In more than 5 years of service in senior roles in the Senate, Ms. Heaton has worked on matters before the Energy, Environment, Finance, Banking, Commerce and Judiciary Committees. 

In the private sector, Ms. Heaton has served as general counsel, senior business executive, board member, principal investor and public policy advisor for publicly traded Fortune 500 companies as well as start-up and established privately held companies.

Over the course of her career, she has advised utilities, independent power producers, electric transmission companies, gas pipelines, electric and gas distribution entities on legal, financial and public policy issues.

She served as General Counsel of Trans-Elect, the first independent transmission company in the United States. 

Ms. Heaton served as Vice President and Deputy General Counsel of Columbia Energy Group, one of the nation’s largest integrated natural gas systems with assets in excess of $6 billion. While at Columbia, Ms. Heaton led the effort to obtain regulatory approval from over a dozen federal and state regulatory agencies required to complete a $12 billion merger of regulated utilities in record time. Ms. Heaton also directed teams in over 20 acquisitions or divestitures, advised the company and its board of directors on corporate governance and internal investigations, established compensation plans and developed policies and procedures to ensure compliance with Federal and state laws.

Sharon Heaton holds a Doctor of Law from the University of Chicago Law School and a B.A. magna cum laude in political science from Barnard College at Columbia University.

Upon graduation from law school, Ms. Heaton served as a Federal law clerk for a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.

She has been associated with the law firms of Skadden, Arps and Latham & Watkins. 

Ms. Heaton has been an author and speaker on a wide range of topics, including developments in the energy industry, the legislative process, legal ethics, lobbying reform and disclosure requirements, the banking and finance industries and issues confronting executive women.
                                                                       

Bret J. Logue

Mr. Logue has over twelve years of experience in the clean energy and high technology sectors. 

Prior to joining Wellford Energy, Mr. Logue was an attorney at Latham & Watkins Silicon Valley and Washington, DC offices where he focused primarily on clean technology companies.

He worked on the initial public offering of Codexis, a major biofuels company, and provided investor-side representation for Goldman Sachs in connection with a late-stage private placement for a major thin-film solar company.

He drafted power purchase agreements for solar companies, was closely involved in an early stage project of the Hawaiian Electric Company developing carbon offsets from reforestation, and worked on analyzing electric utility mergers under the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.

Prior to law school, Mr. Logue was a Senior Consultant at Bevilacqua-Knight, Inc., where he managed the commercialization activities of a $5.2 million California Energy Commission project that funded the development of energy efficiency products both at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and at private firms. He served as the primary liaison between entrepreneurs, engineers, utility companies, and government agencies.

Before joining Bevilacqua-Knight, he provided business development and strategy consulting to clean technology start-ups, worked with the Solar Economy Institute on developing a broad strategy for driving the adoption of technological solutions to the climate crisis, held dialogues with the California state legislature during the California energy crisis, and consulted with the City of Oakland to analyze the potential of solar energy and wind energy projects within the city limits.

He also authored a number of papers on market obstacles to the adoption of innovative energy technologies.

Before getting involved in clean energy, Mr. Logue founded an Internet company that developed online procurement software for more than one hundred clients, including Charles Schwab, Banc of America Securities, and The Los Angeles Times.

For the past ten years, he has also served on the board of the Center for Community Benefit Organizations, which provides management assistance to nonprofits in the East Bay area of Northern California.

He graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Stanford University and received his Juris Doctorate from Stanford Law School where he served as President of the Law Students Association.
                                                                       
Cathy Calhoun

Ms. Calhoun has over 25 years of experience specializing in energy consulting activities with the Department of Defense and international business management.

Ms. Calhoun founded Viridis Renew Navitas (VRN) Inc, a woman-, military veteran-owned, HubZone-certified small business to provide solar and other renewable energy support services to both government and commercial accounts. VRN, Inc. was awarded a $2.6M contract for twenty-five solar-powered, mobile water pumping and purification systems for the Department of the Army, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 1st Armored Division in Iraq.
She supported the development team on a $65M ethanol facility in Louisiana, USA, has developed a $45M shrimp processing facility in Central America which utilizes both aquacultured and native shrimp, and also established a perishable agriculture product export business from Central America to Japanese and US markets. She also designed, developed and operates a closed system, re-circulating aquaculture facility in the US that produces over 60,000 pounds of live fish for food consumption per year.

Ms Calhoun has provided a range of consulting services in the areas of major project/program strategic planning and management, IT business planning and implementation, business process reengineering, business performance improvement, change management performance measurement, risk management, acquisition contract dispute resolution and cost estimating and has provided direct program management of major system integration efforts within the financial and logistic functional areas within the Department of Defense, USAID and World Bank sponsored projects.

Her clients have included donor organizations such US Agency for International Development (USAID), World Bank and Asian Development Bank (ADB), Department of Defense (DoD) and International Commercial and Ministerial entities.

Prior to establishing VRN, Inc, Ms Calhoun was a Managing Director with Bearingpoint, Inc. (formerly KMPG Consulting) and practiced in both the Public Services and Emerging Markets Sector. She also served as an Active Duty Naval Officer for ten years in the U.S. Navy Civil Engineer Corps.

Ms. Calhoun is a graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy and received a Bachelor Science Degree in Ocean Engineering in 1982 and earned a Master of Science degree in Ocean Engineering from the University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, Scotland in 1984. She is a certified Project Management Institute (PMI) Project Management Professional.

Alexandra O'Brien brings a background in energy and environmental advocacy and policy to her work at Wellford Energy.  Prior to joining WEA, Ms. O'Brien worked in government affairs for the Pew Environment Group, the conservation arm of The Pew Charitable Trusts. There she provided policy research and assistance for the Group's numerous campaigns.  While at Pew, Ms. O'Brien played a key role on the Global Warming campaign, providing important research, writing and coordination. 

Ms. O’Brien has also worked as a research assistant for the State of California at the California Energy Commission in the Public Interest and Energy Research division where she conducted research on streetlight energy technologies and efficiency.  

Alexandra graduated cum laude from the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University with a degree in international politics and minors in economics, Latin American Studies and Spanish.

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