Participant Bios (S–Z)

Bryan Sams
Bryan Sams is Vice President of Government and Regulatory Affairs at Calpine, where he has worked since 2019 and has held his current role since March 2022, based in Texas. He brings over two decades of experience in energy regulation and government affairs, including prior roles as Director of Government and Regulatory Affairs at Calpine, Director of Regulatory Affairs at Lone Star Transmission, and a 14-year tenure at NRG Energy in progressively senior regulatory and government affairs positions. Earlier in his career, he served as an analyst at American Electric Power. Bryan holds a Master of Science in Energy Policy and Finance from The University of Texas at Austin and a Bachelor of Arts in Geology/Earth Science from Ohio Wesleyan University.

Som Shrestha
Dr. Som Shrestha is a Senior R&D Staff Scientist and Group Leader of the Building Envelope Materials Research Group at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. His current research focuses on weatherization of natural gas infrastructure; development of high-performance thermal insulation materials, low-cost vacuum insulation panels, and novel active building envelopes; and thermal energy storage systems to enhance energy efficiency, demand flexibility, and building resilience. He is an ASHRAE Fellow and serves as an ORNL Graduate Advisor at the University of Tennessee’s Bredesen Center.

Barry Thomas Smitherman
Barry currently teaches Texas Energy Law at UT Law School. He is also Chairman of the Texas Geothermal Energy Alliance. In his spare time, he invests in selected publicly traded energy companies. He previously served on the Board of Directors of Centerpoint Energy and NRG Energy; before that he was Chairman of both the Texas Railroad Commission and the PUCT. Over the last two decades, he has served on the board of ERCOT, the DOE Electricity Advisory Committee, the SPP Regional State Committee, and other energy related nonprofits. Prior to public service, Barry spent 16 years on Wall St. with several investment banks. He holds degrees from Harvard, UT Law School, and Texas A&M.

Paul Smolen
Paul has over forty years of experience in regulatory compliance and infrastructure development. In 1978, he was employed as an Economist at the Public Utility Commission of Texas (PUCT). Paul also served as the Commission’s representative to State and Federal agencies. Paul participated in regulatory changes in telecommunications and cable television as an advisor and employee of local governments. Paul was a founding member of The Energy Professionals Association (TEPA) and served as the Chair of the Legislative and Regulatory Committee of TEPA that provided testimony to the PUCT and the Texas legislature.

David Spence
Professor David Spence holds the Rex G. Baker Centennial Chair in Natural Resources Law and specializes in energy law, administrative law, environmental law, and oil and gas. His research focuses on the law and politics of energy regulation, broadly defined. Professor Spence is co-author of the leading energy law casebook “Energy, Economics and the Environment” and has published numerous scholarly articles on subjects relating to energy policy, regulation, and the regulatory process. In addition to teaching at Texas Law, he is a professor of Business Government & Society at the McCombs School of Business.

Emily Stipe
Emily Stipe is Director of Federal and Political Affairs at Vistra Corp, a Fortune 500 integrated retail electricity and power generation company. She leads Vistra’s policy and advocacy strategy in Washington, D.C., focusing on issues such as grid reliability, tax policy, and energy innovation. Outside of work, Mrs. Stipe sits on the Board of Directors of Calvary Women’s Services, a Washington, DC-based non-profit offering comprehensive services to empower women to end their homelessness and achieve financial independence. Emily holds a Master of Public Policy from Georgetown University and dual Bachelor’s degrees in Political Science and Economics from the University of Pittsburgh.

Maren Taylor
Maren Taylor is SEIA’s Director of Regulatory Affairs. She represents SEIA regarding environmental and public lands issues of importance to the solar industry before federal executive agencies and Congress. Before joining SEIA, Maren was an Attorney Adviser at FERC, and before that, worked with businesses to drive support for U.S climate goals at Environmental Defense Fund. Maren holds a B.S. in biology and a B.A. in history from the University of Texas at Austin. She also holds a M.A. in Global Environmental Policy from the LBJ School of Affairs and a J.D. from American University Washington College of Law. She is licensed to practice law in the District of Columba and lives in Frederick, Maryland with her husband.

Venkat Tirupati
Venkat Tirupati is Vice President and Chief Technology Officer at the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), reporting to the CEO. He leads enterprise technology, data, and AI strategy, and oversees the Grid Research, Innovation, and Transformation (GRIT) initiative to address the increasing complexity of a rapidly transforming electric power grid. Prior to joining ERCOT in 2020, Mr. Tirupati held leadership roles at the Lower Colorado River Authority (LCRA), the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC), and Siemens Energy. Mr. Tirupati holds an M.S. in Electrical Engineering (Power Systems) from Illinois Tech and an M.B.A. from MIT.

Dr Dave Tuttle
Dr. David Tuttle teaches Electricity Markets & Systems at UT-Austin & is Chair of the Electric Utility Commission overseeing Austin Energy. He is a former IBM & Sun Microsystems executive with a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering & MBA from UT-Austin. His diverse R&D career includes Vehicle-Grid Integration research, design of IBM’s POWER-1 CPU, leading the Apple/IBM/Motorola alliance team that designed the CPU that launched the Apple PowerMac, leading the POWER2-SC CPU design used in the 1997 IBM Deep Blue Supercomputer that beat World Chess Champion Garry Kasparov, creating Sun’s Austin power-efficient CPU team, & team manager for the 2007 UT DARPA Urban Challenge Autonomous vehicle team.

Dr. Edgar Virgüez
Edgar Virgüez, Research Engineer, advances low-carbon energy systems at the Department of Energy Science & Engineering at Stanford University, modeling resources, assessing environmental impacts, and expanding energy access. He has 40+ publications with 900+ citations. He directs EARNEST, a $23M consortium led by Stanford and funded by the U.S. Department of Energy uniting 21 institutions to modernize U.S. electricity. He also advises the Earthshot Prize. Honors include a 2025 award from the American Geophysical Union. He earned his Ph.D. at Duke University.

Romany Webb
Romany Webb is Deputy Director of the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law. Romany also holds appointments as a Research Scholar at Columbia Law School and Adjunct Associate Professor of Climate at the Columbia Climate School. Romany’s research focuses on two primary areas: (1) energy and (2) negative emissions technologies. Romany’s energy-related research explores how legal and policy tools can be used to minimize the climate impacts of energy development as well the impacts of climate change on energy infrastructure. Romany also researches legal issues associated with the development and deployment of negative emissions technologies.

Michael Webber
Dr. Michael E. Webber is the Sid Richardson Chair in the LBJ School of Public Affairs and the Cockrell Family Chair #16 in engineering at the University of Texas at Austin. In addition to his role as a faculty member, Webber served three years (2021—2024) as CTO of Energy Impact Partners (a $5 billion venture fund) and for three years prior to that (2018—2021) in Paris, France as the Chief Science & Technology Officer at ENGIE, one of the world’s largest energy companies.

Shelley Welton
Shelley Welton is the Presidential Distinguished Professor of Law and Energy Policy at the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School where she holds an affiliation with the Kleinman Center for Energy Policy. At the Law School, Welton teaches environmental law, energy law, and a climate change law seminar. Her research focuses on how climate change is transforming energy governance and creating new challenges for public utility regulation.

Dahvi Wilson
Dahvi is the president of Siting Clean, a small consultancy that advises clean energy companies on strategies for integrating public acceptance risk assessment into their businesses and building out new community engagement functions within their teams. She currently co-leads an initiative called the Siting Clean Collaborative, helping to advise and connect members of the non-profit, academic, renewables industry, and philanthropic sectors who are working to tackle the local challenges associated with siting and permitting clean energy infrastructure. Prior to founding Siting Clean, Dahvi served as the Vice President of Public Affairs for Apex Clean Energy.

Elizabeth Wilson
Dr. Elizabeth J. Wilson is a Professor of Environmental Studies and was the founding Director of the Arthur L. Irving Institute for Energy and Society (2017-2022). She studies how energy systems innovate and evolve in the face of new technologies, new societal pressures and new risks. One current research project focuses on Offshore Wind and examines the gaps between policy goals and practice in the U.S. and internationally. She studies how federal, state, and local institutions are evolving to support and thwart Offshore Wind development within the context of energy system transitions.

Ryan Wiser
Ryan Wiser is a Senior Scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. Ryan helps lead a 60-person department that seeks to inform public and private decision making within the U.S. electricity sector through research on electric system planning, reliability and regulation. Ryan has published over 100 peer-reviewed journal articles, 20 book chapters, and 400 other conference papers, magazine articles and research reports. He regularly advises public and private entities on issues related to the power sector. Ryan holds a B.S. in Civil Engineering from Stanford University and an M.S. and Ph.D. in Energy and Resources from the University of California, Berkeley.

Frank A. Wolak
Frank A. Wolak is the Holbrook Working Professor of Commodity Price Studies in the Economics Department at Stanford University. His research and teaching focuses on design, performance, and monitoring of retail and wholesale energy and environmental markets. From April 1998 to April 2011, he was Chair of the Market Surveillance Committee (MSC) of the California Independent System Operator (CAISO). In this capacity, he has testified numerous times at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), and at various Committees of the US Senate and House of Representatives on issues relating to retail and wholesale electricity market design and performance.

Kyle Zagon
Kyle Zagon is a third year law student interested in making energy market regulation work to accomplish our nation’s economic, environmental, and security goals. He is currently a research assistant for Professor David Spence, and will be joining the energy regulatory practice at Baker Botts after graduation.

Jay Zarnikau
Until he semi-retired at the end of 2025, Jay Zarnikau taught graduate-level courses in applied statistics, research methods, and energy economics at The University of Texas at Austin. Formerly, Jay was the president of Frontier Associates LLC, a consulting firm, which was later acquired by The Gas Technology Institute. He also served as the Director of Electric Utility Regulation at the Public Utility Commission of Texas. Jay has authored or co-authored over 120 articles appearing in academic and trade journals.

Danielle Zigon
Danielle (“Dani”) Zigon is a nuclear engineer and business strategy professional based in Austin, Texas. She is Program Director of Strategic Initiatives for The University of Texas at Austin’s Nuclear and Radiation Engineering Program and recently led Texas’s nuclear workforce development strategy and statewide report. Previously, she supported Public Utility Commission of Texas Commissioner Glotfelty via the Texas Advanced Nuclear Working Group, helping enable major state funding for advanced nuclear. She holds a Masters in Public Policy (LBJ School of Public Affairs) and a B.S. in Nuclear Engineering (Purdue University).