Over the last two decades, Mark has developed an international reputation for leading multi-stakeholder collaborations that build trust and holistically address complex energy sector challenges.

Mark’s rigorous and pragmatic approach is grounded in his Engineering, Business and Master of Enterprise qualifications and electrical-mechanical technology origins. As the global energy sector has faced accelerating change, his work at the intersection of strategic foresighting, systems engineering, and multi-stakeholder collaboration has become widely respected. Most recently this included delivery of the seminal, end-to-end Reference Architecture of Australia’s National Electricity Market (NEM). Previously, Mark served in design and leadership roles of the groundbreaking CSIRO Future Grid Forum and CSIRO/ENA Electricity Network Transformation Roadmap projects.

Internationally, Mark is a Fellow of the Pacific Energy Institute and an invited Associate of the US Department of Energy’s GridWise Architecture Council (GWAC). He is also a contributing author for the IEEE Power & Energy and an invited expert contributor to Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) grid resilience activities. Mark is formally trained in both the Systems Architecture and Grid Architecture methodologies developed respectively by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and the US Department of Energy’s Grid Modernisation Laboratory Consortia (GMLC).

Prof. Jose Pablo Chaves Avila is a researcher at the Institute for Research in Technology (IIT) and professor at the Engineering School (ICAI) of the Comillas Pontifical University.

Jose is engaged with several of the EU’s Horizon 2020-funded projects including OneNet and CoordiNet which are establishing future system architecture and coordination schemes between transmission system operators (TSOs), distribution system operators (DSOs) and consumers to contribute to the development of a smart, secure and more resilient energy system. He is also a member of the Expert Group on Demand Side Flexibility of the European Union Agency for the Cooperation of Energy Regulators.

Paul De Martini is a globally recognised expert on the business, policy, and technology dimensions of a more distributed power system. He works with utility, regulatory, and government clients on the practical application of architecture for industry transformation, including DER integration and utilization, integrated resilient system planning, and grid modernisation.

Over the past decade, Paul has advised 12 of the largest US electric utilities, over 30 US state regulatory commissions, and market operators in Australia, Canada, and the US in their transformation efforts. Paul is currently the technical lead for the US Department of Energy’s Transmission-Distribution-Customer Operational Coordination initiative and is a principal contributor to the US DOE’s Grid Architecture and Integrated Distribution System Planning programmes. He previously was the chief technology and strategy officer for Cisco’s energy Internet of Things business and vice president of grid and distributed technology at Southern California Edison.

Dr. Amro M. Farid is an MIT and University of Cambridge educated systems engineering expert in the fields of energy, infrastructure, defense, manufacturing, chemical, automotive, and semiconductor sectors.  

He leads the Laboratory for Intelligent Integrated Networks of Engineering Systems at Stevens Institute of Technology School of Systems & Enterprises where he holds his current position. The laboratory maintains an active research program in Smart Power Grids, Energy-Water Nexus, Energy-Transportation Nexus, Industrial Energy Management, and Interdependent Smart City Infrastructures. Dr. Farid is well known for his expertise in Complex Network Theory, Large-scale Computational Simulations and Operations Research. 

Prof. Lynne Kiesling is an international thought-leader focused on advanced electricity pricing models that use transaction cost economics to examine regulation, market design, and technology in the development of retail markets, products and services and the economics of smart grid technologies in the electricity industry.

Lynne has served as a member of the GridWise Architecture Council (GWAC) which seeks to articulate the guiding principles for an intelligent, transactive, energy system of the future, and to guide and promote measures to transform electricity systems into a more reliable, affordable, secure network in which users collaborate with suppliers in an information and value-rich market environment.

Dr Lorenzo Kristov is a globally recognised expert focusing on reforming the electric power system to integrate high levels of renewable generation and distribution-connected energy resources (DER). Lorenzo is currently advising the EPRI TSO-DSO Interface Project and engaging across numerous FERC 2222 matters relating to system-level integration of DER.

Based on 18 years as a Principal in market design and infrastructure policy at the California Independent System Operator (CAISO), his expertise includes: wholesale power market design; DER participation in wholesale markets; coordination of transmission & distribution operations, markets and planning; distribution system operator (DSO) models; distribution-level markets; energy resilience strategies and microgrids; and whole-system grid architecture.

Dr Karen Stenner specializes in understanding consumer behaviour and decision making relating to energy. She designs and empirically tests the efficacy of campaigns and subtle psychological ‘interventions’ in shifting behaviour around energy consumption, demand management, and uptake of new tariffs/technology. 

Karen was formerly Senior Research Scientist leading CSIRO’s Behavioural Economics and Psychological Insights Team (Grids and Energy Efficiency). She led major research projects improving uptake of renewables, technology, and pricing; effective utilisation of new tariffs; demand management/load control; and energy efficiency.

Karen is an internationally renowned scientist who taught policy evaluation, research design and quantitative methodology at Princeton for nearly a decade. She has published widely cited articles in peer-reviewed journals including Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews; Energy Policy; and Energy Research and Social Science.

Dr Jeffrey Taft was formerly the Chief Architect for Electric Grid Transformation at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) and is now a Fellow of the Pacific Energy Institute.  He has played a seminal role in the development of Grid Architecture methodologies through the US Department of Energy’s Grid Modernization Laboratory Consortium (GMLC).  He was also a co-lead for the US DOE’s Modern Distribution Grid (DSPx) initiative.

Jeff draws on his unique multi-disciplinary industry experience including electric power systems, software, communications, sensors and signal processing, network theory, and control systems, as well as extensive skills and experience as a system architect.  He also formerly held Chief Architect positions related to grid modernization at Cisco Systems, Accenture, and IBM, as well as various engineering positions at Westinghouse Electric Company.