Dr. Balaraman Kannan, Director General, National Institute of Wind Energy (NIWE) under Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE),Government of India is an expert in RE integration. His expertise includes handling of very large systems like Indian and several other international grid systems and also complex industrial networks. His vast experience of more than 30years is spread across the gamut of Energy system and power system engineering right from planning to the real time operation.His international experience spans over 25 Countries and has carried out Grid Integration of RE with the portfolio of more than 35,000 MW of wind generation and 5000 MW of solar generation. He was involved in preparation of Wind Energy Grid code in India and also updating Java-Matura-Bali Grid code with Renewables as part of ICED project. As part of USAID SARI project, he was involved in Harmonization of Grid code for South Asian interconnection which has includes the Renewable Energy options.Recipient of National Award for e-Governance, 2018-19 (Gold) for Wind Power forecasting services for Tamil Nadu from Department of Administrative Reforms & Public Grievances, Govt. of IndiaHe is recipient of “Outstanding Engineer Award” by the IEEE Power and Energy Society in 2016 and also received “British Overseas Scholarship” in 1997.He has published over 50 research papers in National and international journals & conferences. He has guided one Ph.D and two M.Sc (engg), besides over 250 projects of Master degree and Bachelor degree students.

Akilur Rahman, CTO - Hitachi ABB Power Grids India, is leading technology, digitalization and innovation towards the market. Has more than 32 years of experience in research, R&D, technology management, engineering, business and product development in power and automation technologies.

With a master’s degree in Electrical Engineering from IIT Kharagpur, Akilur has held various international and global roles in India, Germany and Switzerland including head of global collaborative production management, engineering, and cyber security in process/industrial automation. Was responsible for building up ABB’s global automation software product and system R&D in India. Led ABB corporate research center and technology in India with focus on power, automation, robotics, analytics, AI-ML, Industry 4.0, Industrial IoT and digitalization. Previously held the role of CTO - ABB India.

In the current CTO role, Akilur has been leading core, automation and digital technologies for power, energy and asset performance management in utilities, industries, infrastructure, and transport sectors. Co-creating the concepts and applications of smart electric grid, energy internet, smart cities, sustainable electric mobility, smart factories, digital enterprise and carbon neutral future.

Akilur has been a speaker and panelist at various international and national conferences.

As Senior Vice President and Group Head Corporate Sector ratings, Sabyasachi Majumdar has been associated with ICRA for over two decades.He is responsible for ratings in the corporate and infrastructure sector, specialising in power, telecom, cement, sugar and engineering sectors. To his credit is the development of ICRA’s rating/grading methodology for solar energy system integrators, renewable energy companies and energy efficiency service companies (ESCOs). Sabyasachiis also responsible for carrying out the integrated rating of State owned Discoms on behalf of the Ministry of Power and PFC/REC.He is also part of the CII National Committee on Renewable Energy.As atheme presenter atthe ‘Windergy India 2017’,hespoke on the theme Parallel Session"Emerging Opportunities -Offshore & Competitive Bidding".He was also one of the panelists at‘PHD Chambers Conference on Roadmap to Achieve 175 GW renewable Energy by 2022’ held in January 2017His previous experience includes a short stint withHCL group. Sabyasachi is an MBA from IIM Lucknow and a B.E in Electronics and Communication Engineering from Delhi College of Engineering.

Manu Maudgal is working as Director-Clean Power Programme with Shakti Sustainable energy Foundation, New Delhi. A climate optimist and a specialist ‘Generalist’, he is at ease with crafting mandates for sectoral change. His key expertise is in activating clean energy transitions through Public-Private partnerships.

At Shakti, his role is to work alongside policy stakeholders to aid India’s clean energy transition.

Prior to this role, he was Programme Advisor with GIZ, working actively for the Bureau of Energy Efficiency / Energy Efficiency Services Ltd. Here he had a consistent track record for concept-to-execution of high impact national initiatives such as on Lighting, Smart meters and Electric vehicles of Govt of India. He also has a strong background in carbon markets.

He holds a B.Tech Chemical & Bio Engineering (National Institute of Technology-Jalandhar, India), Masters in Environment Management (SIES-IIEM, Mumbai, India) and MBA from Faculty of Management Studies, Delhi.

Nidhi Sarin has over 15 years of experience of working in energy, climate change and environment related project. She currently heads GIZ’s Access to Energy Programme and has worked on multi-million projects on areas including distributed and grid connected renewable energy, power sector reforms, climate change adaptation and mitigation, waste water treatment. Her experience includes working on support to government on policy development, formulating regulations and standards, private sector development through enhanced bilateral cooperation, primarily in India. She has an experience of working with bilateral, multilateral organizations, corporate sector and non-government organizations.

Ms Sarin has an expertise to support the central and state government departments on developing and implementing public support programmes on long term energy security, role of distributed renewable energy solutions to facilitate energy access and income enhancements and transition towards clean and renewable energy. Projects led by her also include innovative concepts like energy for health outcomes, disaster relief, increasing farmer incomes, livelihoods etc.

She has been actively working with the private sector to provide incubation support and implementing programmes on public private partnerships to improve overall sector environment. She has also carried out independent evaluations and action research for evidence creation in the offgrid energy sector

Previously, Ms Sarin has worked with the UK government on Energy and Climate. She was responsible for advising on electricity sector reforms and on climate change programmes pertaining to low carbon growth. She was responsible for developing and managing multi-million programmes for UK aid deployment in India. Ms Sarin was also responsible for strengthening UK-India relations on areas like Power sector, offshore wind energy development and also was leading on coordination activities with different donors. She was also affiliated to DFID’s climate and environment cadre and was responsible for integrating climate and environment aspects in different DFID programmes.

Ms Sarin has experience of working on areas like Biodiversity conservation, community livelihoods, water resource management, and research projects on carbon sequestration and earthquake precursor studies.

He has rich and varied experience in public service for over forty years as a member of the Indian Administrative Service. He has served in the Government of India in key policy making positions in the areas of industry and energy. He has been Secretary, DIPP (Department of Industrial, Policy and Promotion) in the Government of India as well as Member Secretary, NMCC (National Manufacturing Competitiveness Council).

As Joint Secretary and then Additional Secretary in the Ministry of Power he played a key role in enactment of the Electricity Act, 2003, and Rules and policies under it. This created a new liberal framework for the development of the power sector and was one of the major pieces of reform legislation at that time. This is the first legislation in India, which mandates the regulator to reduce cross-subsidies, introduces competition in the sector, and stipulates explicit provision of subsidies by the state governments. He was also instrumental in promoting private sector participation in the Power Sector including the Ultra Mega Power Projects. He played a crucial role in the conceptualization and the launch of the national program for completing rural electrification which was launched in 2005 and under which over 1, 00,000 villages have been electrified.

He was also instrumental in promoting private sector participation in the Power Sector including the Ultra Mega Power Projects of 4,000 megawatts each, requiring investment of over $4bn each.

He was the Member Secretary of the Committees on Electricity Distribution, and Resources for the Power Sector for the 10th Plan.

He was closely associated with the design of the Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Mission.

Mr. Mitheel Mody, is a Senior Infrastructure and Corporate finance leader, having 19 years experience in infrastructure, project & corporate finance across financial institutions, investment banking & corporates.

He has handled appraisals, deal origination, structuring and syndications, spearheading multiple transactions across debt, equity and mezzanine products and also successfully closed M&A deals.

He has also contributed to policy papers related to infrastructure sector & is passionate about cleantech sector.

Mitheel currently leads the Business Origination and client coverage for Tata Cleantech Capital Ltd.

TCCL has funded more 200 plus projects across renewable and infrastructure sectors with more than 10 GW of projects being funded.

Mitheel was also instrumental in setting up the debt distribution function at TCCL in his previous role at TCCL. Mitheel is a Chartered Accountant from ICAI, MBA and Law Graduate.

Mr A K Saxena, Senior Fellow and Senior Director, Electricity and Fuels Division in TERI, has over 37 years of experience in the power sector in India. During the course of his career, he has worked with the Central Electricity Authority (CEA), Ministry of Power (MoP) and Central Electricity Regulatory Commission (CERC). He retired as Chief Engineer, CEA in 2016 and held important portfolios such as Chief (Engineering), CERC (2013-16), Director (Operation Monitoring) and Director (Transmission) in MoP (2005 to 2012).

At TERI, his profile includes managing the work on energy transitions in the Indian power sector to develop a roadmap for low-carbon pathways. This includes work on demand forecasting, studying economic feasibility of supply side options and technical challenges of grid integration of renewables. He also leads the work on power sector policy, reforms and regulations, demand side management action plans, smart grid, etc.

Mr Saxena has rich regulatory experience in tariff determination for Inter State Generating stations (Conventional and Renewable) and Inter-State Transmission Systems (ISTS), Point-of-Connection charges, IEGC, Deviation Settlement Mechanism, Open Access, Connectivity, Ancillary Services, regulatory approval for solar parks, power market, etc. He also headed a task force to provide inputs to the draft regulations for transmission planning.

Shri Chintan Shah, is the Director (Technical) of the Company. He holds a Bachelor of Engineering in Chemical Engineering from Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda. He has served as the President – SBD and Corporate Affairs with Suzlon Energy Limited and as Vice President – SBD with Suzlon Energy Limited and Suzlon Green Power Limited and has also previously worked with The Energy and Resource Institute (TERI). He has over 23 years of experience in renewable energy including various activities namely manufacturing of RE Systems/Products, project execution, project consultancy, project financing and policy planning.

He has a rich experience of over 30 years in commissioning of power plants, maintenance activities, procurement and planning. He has also overseen the development of the company's long-term Corporate Plans involving setting the annual targets, preparing and pushing through the various strategic and growth initiatives. He is an Electrical Engineer and has undergone Leadership training at Harvard Business School and S P Jain Institute in Singapore

Raghav Pachouri is Associate Fellow at the Electricity & Fuel Division in The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI). He joined TERI in May 2018. At TERI, Raghav has begun work on projects involving energy transition & associated risks and the outlook for the energy sector in India. His research interests include Indian Energy politics, geopolitics of energy and history.”

He was previously employed for over 5 years with Reliance Power and worked as a Manager at Sasan UMPP (4000 MW Thermal power station). In Reliance Power, He was responsible for the preparation of the Annual operating plan (including technical and financial planning) for Reliance Power. Before Reliance, He worked for around 2 years in the project management division for the installation of Thermal power plants. He has received a PGDC (Post Graduation Diploma) in Thermal Power Plant Engineering from the National Power Training Institute (NPTI) Neyveli and done his Bachelors in Mechanical Engineering from the Uttar Pradesh Technical University.

Udit Mathur has 16 years of experience of working on clean energy, climate change and environment. His expertise is in policy influencing, international affairs and program leadership.

He has strong thematic expertise on low carbon growth strategies, renewable energy financing, energy efficiency policies and incentives, electricity access (grid and off-grid), carbon finance and climate change adaptation. He also has strong experience in facilitating partnerships at Ministerial or senior bureaucratic levels and with the private sector. International experience covering most South Asian countries.