Board of Directors

Kali Taylor is a sustainable development professional, with a keen interest in systems thinking, social change, and youth engagement. Kali currently works with the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD) in Geneva coordinating action on the implementation of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Kali is also a member of the newly created UNOG SDG Lab team, representing the NGO viewpoint and providing expertise on systems change and innovation best practice.

Kali is a co-founder and the former Executive Director of Student Energy. She ran the organization for 3 years through its formative years and initial growth stage before taking on the Board Chair position. She has also completed an internship with the Green Growth Knowledge Platform – a joint initiative between the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), the World Bank and the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI) for advancing the green economy.

In her early career, Kali held numerous positions in the energy industry and independent consulting assignments in areas including business development, project management, CO2 management and triple bottom line performance and innovation improvement. She holds a Bachelor of Commerce degree from the University of Calgary specialized in Energy Management and a Graduate Diploma in Social Innovation from the University of Waterloo.

Kali has received numerous awards for her contributions to the community including the Premier’s Citizenship award, the Queen Elizabeth II Citizenship medal. She was named one of Canada’s Top 25 Environmentalists under 25 in 2011, one of Calgary’s Top 40 Under 40 in 2013, GLOBE’s Next Gen Entrepreneur in 2014, an AB Top Young Innovator in 2016, and one of Canada’s Top 35 Under 35 Energy Leaders in 2016.

Mrinalini currently serves as a researcher and Manager at the Environmental Law Center at the University of Cologne in Germany. She is a lawyer by training, with an M.Sc. in environmental sciences, and works at the interface between law and environmental science. Her main areas of interest are international environmental and climate change law; carbon taxes and carbon pricing; and environmental crime, in which she is also conducting her doctoral research.

Her previous role was as a Legal Affairs Fellow at the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) secretariat in Bonn, working in intergovernmental matters, treaty implementation and capacity-building on climate change law. She specializes in in capacity-building and outreach projects, and has conducted trainings for parliamentarians, policymakers, civil society and students. She will also be teaching International Environmental Law at the Faculty of Law at the University of Cologne in 2021.

In India, she previously litigated cases in environmental law, appearing as an Advocate before the National Green Tribunal, and has advised the climate media non-profit, ‘Climate Tracker Inc.’ as a Policy Associate.

Santiago is a co-founder and CEO of Toroto, one of México’s fastest-growing environmental startups. He has a background in renewable energy engineering and was the chairman of the 2017 Student Energy Summit.

Santiago leads a highly technical team capable of developing emissions inventories, designing mitigation strategies for small and large companies, and executing field operations with objectives such as carbon or water capture.

Since 2014, he has been actively engaging with Student Energy through different roles at our international programs, and he is extremely involved in the Latin American climate change ecosystem.

Ivy recently joined Canfor to support the implementation of Canfor’s sustainability vision and strategy. Ivy is responsible for shaping Canfor’s sustainability and ESG disclosures and working with subject matter experts to build out the data and processes necessary for accurate disclosure.

Prior to that, Ivy was a Manager in KPMG’s Sustainability Services practice delivering on a range of sustainability-related services including impact measurement and reporting, ESG strategy and climate risk identification. Through her experience on a range of clients, Ivy has become an expert on sustainability and ESG impact metrics, reporting and related disclosures. She is also a Chartered Professional Accountant.

Outside of work, Ivy is a Scout Leader. She loves going camping and sharing her love for the outdoors with the Scouting youth while developing their leadership skills. Ivy was part of the organizing team for the Student Energy summit back in 2011 and excited to be part of the movement again!

Janice is a green energy enthusiast committed to helping build the world’s sustainable energy economy. She was an original Co-Founder for Student Energy and a Co-Chair for the 2009 International Student Energy Summit. Janice is currently an Investment Associate at Generate Capital, where she works to identify and underwrite investment opportunities in the renewable energy and waste-to-value sectors.

Prior to Generate Capital, Janice worked at NRG, America’s largest independent power producer, where she focused on building the company’s renewable microgrids business. She has also worked with the United Nation’s Department of Economic and Social Affairs on designing integrated water, energy and food approaches for government policies in the Middle East and North Africa region.

Janice has a Masters of Science in Sustainability Management from the Earth Institute at Columbia University and a Bachelors of Commerce degree from the University of Calgary. Janice is also a licensed Chartered Professional Accountant in Canada.

Dan is focused on the decarbonization of the energy system. He is the Co-Founder and Chief Development Officer of Kanin Energy, a clean energy company focused on transforming industrial waste heat into emission-free baseload power. Dan leads business development efforts and provides strategic leadership navigating electricity markets, commercial agreements, regulatory approvals and energy policy development.

Prior to Kanin, he spent a decade between the Alberta Electric System Operator (AESO) and Alberta Energy. At the AESO, Dan held various roles including ancillary services procurement, energy storage and distributed energy resource integration, and generation forecasting. At Alberta Energy, Dan was seconded to provide technical and regulatory expertise in market design restructuring, agency regulatory governance, and was a member of the Indigenous Electricity Technical Working Group.

Dan holds a Masters in Environmental Management from Royal Roads University and an undergraduate degree in Political Science and Economics from the University of Calgary.
Dan has been an active volunteer with Student Energy since 2008 and was a key member of the inaugural 2009 Summit. He holds a master’s degree in Environment and Management from Royal Roads University and an undergraduate degree from the University of Calgary in Political Science and Economics.

Jochen Cremer is Co-Director of the TU Delft AI Energy Lab and Assistant Professor at Technical University Delft. He leads scientific research of an ambitious, diverse scientific team carrying out cutting-edge international projects. These projects investigate the key technology of artificial intelligence for highly renewable energy system management from a technical, societal and economic viewpoint. Before he was Research Associate at Imperial College London and studied at RWTH Aachen University, CMU, and MIT US after having worked in the chemical and energy industry. Jochen chaired the 2019 International Student Energy Summit and joins the Student Energy board of directors. To the board, he adds an academic perspective sharing the vision of enabling our next generation of energy leaders for accelerating the energy transition.

Kakembo Galabuzi Brian is the founder and Executive Director of the Waste to Energy YouthProject and WEYE Clean Energy, a social enterprise that uses waste to energy business as a tool to empower youth and women to break the endless cycle of poverty. He holds a Bachelor of Commerce degree and is currently pursuing an MBA in Energy and Sustainability.

His waste to energy youth project has trained over 800 youth and women, empowering them with skills and equipment to start and run both briquette production units and plastic waste recycling businesses. It is also providing waste to energy cooking and heating solutions to 10 schools, 2 large scale poultry farms and 2 medium-scale industries saving over 1080 trees annually that would have been cut for wood fuel.

His innovative social business models have received both domestic and international recognition, including:

iF Social Impact Prize in 2017 by iF Design Foundation in Germany

Greenprenuers Achievement Award 2018 by the Global Green Growth Institute in South Korea

1st Prize in the African Energy Innovation Competition 2019 by the Nigeria Energy Forum in Lagos.

Commonwealth Young Person of the Year 2020 and Africa & Europe winner for the Commonwealth Youth Award.

Forbes Africa 30 under 30 list.

Kristen King is a strategic communications professional with a decade of experience working with nonprofits, foundations and corporations on issue advocacy. She specializes in climate change communications and advocacy and is the Deputy Director of Campaigns and Communications at the We Mean Business Coalition.

Kristen leverages the voice of business to influence international and national climate policy, and to help accelerate the pace toward a net-zero future. She works with some of the world’s largest companies that are reducing emissions in line with the 1.5°C goal of the Paris Agreement. Kristen was a lead strategist for the Coalition’s most successful advocacy campaign – an open letter to President Biden signed by 408 companies calling for the U.S. to halve its emissions by 2030. Kristen provides communications support across numerous climate change initiatives such as America Is All In, the Business Ambition for 1.5°C campaign, the Climate Pledge and the SME Climate Hub.

Prior to joining the We Mean Business Coalition, Kristen was an Account Director at Fenton, a U.S.-based social change communications agency. She led and supported campaigns that integrated messaging, advertising, media relations, events and digital content – with a focus on climate change, sustainable finance, clean energy, environmental justice and conservation. Some of Kristen’s clients included the National Park Foundation, the Wallace Global Fund, Divest Invest Philanthropy, the U.S. Green Building Council and 350.org.

Kristen has a Bachelor of Science in public relations from the University of Florida. She lives in Brooklyn, New York, with her husband William Smith, and enjoys cooking, traveling, nature and the performing and fine arts.

Shayan is an English Law qualified solicitor who advises clients on a range of commercial projects and financings – he is currently an Associate in the finance and projects team at a US-headquartered law firm, working in their Dubai office. In this role he represents lenders, sponsors and borrowers on syndicated and bilateral conventional and Shari’a compliant financings, including general lending, project finance, ECA and real estate finance. In addition, Shayan has been involved with several prominent restructurings in the region.

Recognised as the energy hub of Canada, completing his undergraduate education in Calgary exposed Shayan to a realm of energy-industry related endeavours. What continuously stood out was the role of law, the crux of policy, energy, economics and society, and how it is instrumental in business, bridging together key components vital for operations in the energy sector.

Shayan has been involved with Student Energy initiatives in the past, having attended the international summit in Trondheim, including (i) assisting with initial planning of Regional Summits and (ii) the Global Energy Literacy Research Programme, looking at defining energy literacy, players in the energy literacy area and regional differences, in collaboration with an international analytics organisation.

Having lived in Canada, Europe, the Middle East and Asia, Shayan understands the complexities associated with multi-jurisdictional transactions and engaging with global stakeholders, and is looking forward to working with Student Energy and the team, positively working towards youth empowerment in the world of energy.