SPEAKERS
Join us for a celebration of the City of Houston's Climate Action Plan and progress on the 5th anniversary of Hurricane Harvey. Hear from the US Department of Energy and industry leaders on what makes a resilience and just transition for the energy capital of Houston.
Catherine Flowers
Co Founder, Energy Well Texas & Equity ConsultantCatherine Flowers has spent 20 years working at the nexus of civic engagement, community development, equity, and climate advocacy.
She Co-Founded Energy Well Texas, a new kind of electric company and serves as the finance chair for the Clean Energy Fund of Texas (the state’s first Green Bank).
Catherine lived in Louisiana for many years when Hurricane Katrina hit, and she subsequently moved her family to Houston. She was hired by the City of Houston to develop the Department of Neighborhoods, whose mission is to improve the quality of life in Houston through people-focused programs and strong community partnerships.
As a consultant, she’s managed national social campaigns, and partnered with elected officials, municipalities, and community organizations. She has held numerous roles on local boards & commissions and executive positions including VP of Capital One Bank where she expanded the affordable housing inventory and mentored Community Development Corporations.
As CEO of Bread of Life, she expanded its services to meet the diverse needs of Harris County and served over 100,000 families after Hurricane Harvey. She is also the founder of Altruistic Endeavors NGO, a disaster relief organization that responds to life disasters. The NGO also operates apiary and urban farms.
Catherine has studied at the University of St Thomas, William Carey, and recently enrolled in a Ph.D. program with a focus on community engagement.
Sonrisa Lucero
Special Advisor, US Department of EnergySonrisa Lucero is Special Advisor for Stakeholder Engagement in the Office of Economic Impact and Diversity.
Sonrisa Lucero was most recently the Equitable Buildings Decarbonization Manager at RMI where she led the efforts to integrate equity into carbon-free buildings policy and advocacy. Previously she worked to advance equitable sustainability and climate policy at the City and County of Denver in the Office of Climate Action, Sustainability and Resiliency.
A lifelong activist for social justice, Sonrisa is skilled at building coalitions and guiding diverse stakeholders to equitably advance sustainability and combat climate change.
Sonrisa was born and raised in Denver, CO and graduated from Stanford University with an Individually Designed Major, Environmental Systems Engineering.
Gretchen Watkins
President, Shell USA, Inc.As President of Shell USA, Inc., Gretchen Watkins oversees the strategic integration of all Shell businesses in the United States and leads the US Country Coordination Team. Since being named to this post in 2018, she has become the company’s leading voice across a wide range of energy-related policy and societal issues.
From May 2018-June 2021, Gretchen also served as Executive Vice President of Shell’s Global Shales business, overseeing the exploration, development, and production of Shell’s Upstream shale oil and gas portfolio, which included assets in the US, Canada, and Argentina.
Gretchen came to Shell because she admired the company’s forward-looking approach to the global energy transition. Over the last four years, she has advanced those efforts, promoting Shell’s Powering Progress strategy through investments in lower-carbon energy businesses while reducing the carbon intensity of the company’s US portfolio.
Before joining Shell, Gretchen served as the Chief Executive Officer of Maersk Oil. Under her leadership, the company delivered above-target operational and financial results, enabling a safe and successful enterprise sale of Maersk Oil to Total in 2017.
Gretchen began her career as a Facilities Engineer for Amoco in the Gulf of Mexico. She then worked as a Trading Manager for Amoco and BP before commencing an international career that has included a variety of senior executive roles at BP, Marathon Oil, and Maersk. She has led joint ventures and negotiated contracts with countries and companies across the upstream, midstream, and downstream businesses.
Gretchen is a passionate advocate for social and environmental justice. As co-Chair of the Greater Houston Partnership’s Racial Equity Committee, she helped craft a set of guiding principles enabling the region’s business community to address bias, strengthen underserved communities, promote inclusion and remove barriers to achievement.
Gretchen graduated from The Pennsylvania State University with a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering and has had executive education at Cambridge and Stanford Universities.
John Berger
CEO and Founder, Sunnova EnergyMr. Berger founded Sunnova in 2012 and has since then served as Chief Executive Officer, President, and Chairman of the Board. With more than two decades of experience in the electric power industry, Mr. Berger is an energy entrepreneur who has always supported free market competition, consumer choice, and the advancement of energy technology to power energy independence. Before Sunnova, Mr. Berger served as Founder and Chief Executive Officer at SunCap Financial, a residential solar service provider. He also founded Standard Renewable Energy, a provider, and installer of renewable energy and energy-efficient products and services. Mr. Berger received his Masters of Business Administration from Harvard Business School and graduated cum laude from Texas A&M University with a Bachelor of Science degree in civil engineering.
HOST
Katie Mehnert, CEO & Founder, ALLY Energy
- US Department of Energy Ambassador: Equity in Energy
- National Petroleum Council Representative to the US Department of Energy
- Fellow, Energy Institute
- Advisor, Clean Energy for America
- Founder, Lean In Energy
- Published author: Grow with the Flow & Everyday Superheroes: Women in Energy Careers
- Contributor, Scientific American, Forbes, The Hill, CNBC, CNN, NASDAQ, Newsweek
- Appeared in Hot Money, a documentary produced by Academy Award-winning actor, Jeff Bridges
- Bachelor of Arts, Louisiana State University and Rice University's Executive Energy Program
- Four-time World Major Marathoner
Katie Mehnert
Katie Mehnert is a builder and connector. She's a futurist, speaker, and author with deep expertise in energy, oil and gas, and sustainability.
She founded Pink Petro™ in 2014, the first global community for women in oil and gas, and later launched ALLY Energy in 2020 to foster talent and culture for the energy transition. In 2021, ALLY expanded by acquiring Clean Energy Social, marking its influence on clean energy. ALLY has collaborated with the oil and gas and renewable industries for a decade to innovate the future energy workforce and workplace, impacting millions. In 2025, ALLY, a stealth authentic intelligence company helping businesses and boards align leadership, culture, and strategy through a new lens: human intelligence as the core metric of organizational health and future performance.
Her influence extends to energy strategy and policy. She served as an Ambassador to the U.S. Department of Energy under both the Trump and Biden Administrations and as an appointed member of the National Petroleum Council.
Katie is an acclaimed speaker and author of Grow with the Flow, a guide on navigating work-life evolution, and co-author of the children's book Everyday Superheroes: Women in Energy Careers. In 2025, she will release her third book, The Ask. She frequently contributes as a thought leader on platforms like NASDAQ, CNN, FOX, and Newsweek. She also hosted the first-ever Human Capital Markets Day on Wall Street and led the ringing of the Closing Bell at the New York Stock Exchange.
Katie has contributed to impactful documentaries like Hot Money (2021), produced by Academy Award-winner Jeff Bridges and retired NATO General Wesley Clark, The Rational Middle's Just Transition (2022), and Dirty Nasty People (2023), which highlights the evolution of the energy workforce. She is a graduate of Louisiana State University and has completed advanced studies at Rice University and the University of Texas.
A founder of initiatives such as Allies in Energy and Houston Energy and Climate Week, and co-founder of Houston AI, Katie is dedicated to advancing energy literacy, workforce development, and artificial intelligence integration across sectors. She advises large corporations, private equity, and early-stage startups that champion innovation in energy and technology.
Katie is a marathon runner, having completed London, Chicago, New York, and Berlin. She and her husband Mark, along with their 14-year-old daughter, Ally, live in Houston's Energy Corridor.
Christopher J Skinner
Christopher Skinner is a pioneer in decoding how organizations think. Blending abstract mathematics, AI architecture, and language psychology, he has created a new system for measuring and predicting the subconscious drivers of company behavior, giving leaders and investors a way to see what traditional metrics miss. Christopher was mentored by Clayton Christensen, the father of disruptive innovation.
At Oreck, he helped transform $100M into $400M. At Performics, he added his technology to an existing platform, turning a third-place marketing software company into a $750M sale to Google. At Centro, he expanded a baseline of 50 customers to 2,500, converting $50M in sales into more than $600M. At Raise, he transformed $30M in sales into $ 400 M.
At Vodafone, he expanded their online media into an eighteen-country network. At Mokrynski, he transformed the econometrics of a broken business model into a profitable sale for the founder, enabling him to retire. As CEO of SpiderOak, he revitalized a dying company, turning it into National Security.
Grounded in complex systems theory, he began his work by mapping hidden patterns in chaotic environments. This evolved into a search for signal vs. noise in human systems—specifically, how vision, agility, focus, and purpose interact to drive (or stall) performance. His breakthrough came when he combined psycholinguistics with AI-powered language modeling, building a platform that analyzes executive communication, investor calls, internal docs, and cultural signals to surface invisible tensions within a company’s DNA.
His system quantifies traits like strategic cohesion, defensiveness, clarity, and adaptability, making it possible to predict how an organization will respond to pressure, change, or innovation before the outcomes show up on a spreadsheet. Through Stealth Dog Labs, Christopher helps businesses and boards replace intuition with precision. His work empowers decision-makers to align leadership, culture, and strategy through a new lens: human intelligence as the core metric of organizational health and future performance.
Dr. Paul Stoltz, PhD
Dr. Stoltz is a world-renowned thought leader on resilience, adversity, and human performance. He has authored several bestselling books, including Adversity Quotient: Turning Obstacles into Opportunities and Grit: The New Science of What it Takes to Persevere, Flourish, Succeed. He has worked with top organizations such as Microsoft, Google, and the US Air Force.
Dr. Stoltz brings his expertise in high-performance mindset development to the energy industry. Dr. Stoltz's pioneering Adversity Quotient (AQ), GRIT frameworks, have been proven to help over 5M individuals and organizations thrive in challenging environments and achieve their goals.
Ariel Jenkins
Ariel Jenkins is a dynamic educational leader with extensive experience in professional development, instructional coaching, and school administration. Her career is defined by a deep commitment to enhancing learning and development strategies, equipping educators with tools to drive success at every level.
Ariel excels in managing large-scale events, creating engaging and impactful training materials, and leveraging data analytics to address learning gaps. Her forward-thinking approach and ability to foster positive environments have consistently delivered meaningful results in educational settings.
Recognized for her expertise in leadership and her focus on continuous improvement, Ariel’s passion for empowering others has made her a trusted voice in education and professional growth.
Usha Menon, JD, MBA
Usha Menon, JD, MBA is Special Counsel to ALLY Energy with a focus on IP. Her legal practice focuses on domestic and foreign patent prosecution, patent portfolio management, and intellectual property counseling for clients in the energy, chemical, medical devices, financial, manufacturing, and information technology industries. She has also filed and prosecuted both U.S. and foreign trademark applications, drafted validity and infringement opinions, and performed due diligence investigations of intellectual property assets. Before attending law school, Usha specialized in managing the configuration, design, and implementation of SAP security-related products and applications for various Fortune 500 companies.
Education
- J.D., University of Houston Law Center (2005)
- M.B.A, Baruch College, N.Y. (1992)
- B.S. in Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of Bombay (1989)
Admitted to practice
- State of Texas
- United States Patent and Trademark Office
Jo Madriaga
Surbhi Bhatnagar
Over the past 15 years, Surbhi has had the privilege of honing her expertise in the dynamic world of accounting and finance. As a Chartered accountant, she understands the critical role that accurate financial records play in decision-making, compliance, and overall business success. Her extensive experience spans various industries and business sizes
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Juliana Garaizar
Candice Michalowicz
Ms. Michalowicz is an Advisor of ALLY Energy. She leads EDPR NA Distributed Generation (“EDPR NA DG”) project development and operations, in addition to, engaging key business partners in North America. Prior to EDPR NA DG, she co-founded and co-led C2 Energy Capital (“C2”), building an award-winning solar portfolio of over 300 MW spanning eighteen states. Ms. Michalowicz led efforts that resulted in diversifying C2’s customer base to include businesses, municipalities, healthcare, and educational institutions as well as capturing a growing number of corporate and retail market entries. At EDPR NA DG, she continues to focus on providing a stronger customer-centric approach to the development, construction, and operation of safe and clean distributed generation.
Ms. Michalowicz previously served as Vice President of Development at Healthy Planet Partners where she oversaw the development of the firm’s solar photovoltaic projects. She also served as Vice President of Development at Adamas Energy Investments where she led due diligence on over 1 GW of power generation opportunities.
She holds a BA Summa Cum Laude from George Washington University.
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Claire Broido Johnson
Claire Broido Johnson is a senior operations and finance executive who runs the University System of Maryland Momentum Fund. (MMF) She has a proven track record in creating and managing successful businesses and driving operations (including as founder of SunEdison). She also guided the deployment of $11 billion in economic stimulus funds in 2009-2010 at the Department of Energy (DOE).
Prior to MMF and after DOE, she ran CBJ Energy where she developed a energy efficiency financing product for Serious Energy, launched new products and new states for Next Step Living, and managed energy projects and research for Katerra. She is on the Board of BlocPower.io, the National Sierra Club Foundation, Living Classrooms, and serves as an Advisor for several companies. She lives with her husband and 2 kids in Baltimore.
Adam Quinton
Adam Quinton has invested in and advised several early-stage companies with a focus on diverse founding teams, proudly being one of the first investors in The Muse. He has also served as Chair of the North American Jury for the Cartier Women's Initiative for the past two years.
He is Board member and Treasurer at Holy Cross Energy based in Glenwood Spring, CO as well as Walking Mountains Science Center based in Avon, CO. Adam is a Board member at International House in New York where he has Chaired the Development Committee and been a member of the Executive Committee. He also currently serves on the Finance and Programs Committees of the House.
Previously Adam taught as an Adjunct Professor at Columbia University School of International and Public Affairs in New York City for seven years and was a Managing Director at Bank of America Merrill Lynch. His last role at BofA was Head of Global Macro Research where he led a team of 175 professionals in 12 countries across the globe. Prior to that, he was a sell-side equity research manager in the USA, Latin America, and Asia was a top-ranked sell-side equity research analyst in all of Europe, Asia, the USA, and globally for telecommunications services.
Adam holds a BA and MA degree in Natural Sciences from Cambridge University, England, and an MBA degree from the Bayes (formerly Cass) Business School at City University, London.