The Regional Directors, (RD's), work with Investor Owned Utilities, Municipal Utilities and Rural Electric Cooperatives, as well as Generation and Transmission companies.
The RDs support utilities by facilitating the development and implementation of solutions for utilities through information services. The RDs work in a business-to-business format, and focus on facilitating technical assessment, networking, and evaluation of best practices, and strive to provide quick informational responses to utility staff.
The RDs focus on positioning SEPA as an unbiased expert resource in regional, national and international solar forums and develop regional or subregional utility advisory groups to steer the development of activities that will benefit utilities throughout the region.
Sandra BurtonMs. Burton serves as SEPA's regional director for the Eastern US. Ms. Burton is a Certified Energy Manager (CEM) with over 15 years experience in the development, implementation and management of energy efficiency and renewable energy programs both in the U.S. and abroad. Her background stretches from Sandia National Laboratory and the U.S. Department of Energy to the electric utility industry. Most recently, Sandra was the Managing Director of Utility Programs at SunEdison where she led the team that developed solar energy solutions for U.S. electric utilities. Before joining the SunEdison team, Ms. Burton served as the Principal Deputy Assistant with the Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control, where she developed and launched Delaware's award winning Energy An$wers program. Ms. Burton has a B.S. in economics from the University of Utah, attended graduate school in applied economics at American University, Washington, D.C., and has an MBA from the University of Delaware.
Kim KienerMs. Kiener serves as SEPA's regional director for the Western US. She brings over 25 years experience in the electric utility industry in the areas of renewable resource portfolios, short and long term strategic planning, green house gas regulation, integrated resource planning, resource adequacy, FERC open access polices, and transmission planning, siting and certificate approval. Her focus has been on state and federal energy regulatory and policy implementation, and legislative issues for both public power and investor owned sectors. She has worked for both public power and investor owned utilities as well as doing stints with both a consumer advocate agency and a public service board.
Tom Nicholas, Regional Director (Central US), 202.559.2029
Tom serves as SEPA’s Regional Director for the Central U.S., covering 19 states, working with Investor Owned Utility’s, Municipal, and Rural cooperative electric utilities. Tom has over 25 years of Engineering and Operations along with Executive level Marketing and Sales Management in the electric utility industry with PSI Energy and NIPSCO. He worked for the Electric Power Research Institute, (EPRI), as the Regional Operations Manager for the Central Region of the United States. In that position he was responsible for planning and coordinating the day to day business activities through the EPRI regional reps and their electric utility customers. Tom currently leads the Program Management Interest Group at SEPA, served as an alternate on the Board of NABCEP (North American Board of Certified Energy Practitioners), and served on the International Energy Agency’s Photovoltaic Power Systems Task 1 Group. Tom has a Bachelor of Science, Electrical Engineering Technology degree from Purdue University and completed the Executive Management Program from Indiana University School of Business.
