Symposium Speakers
Michael C. MacCrackenChief Scientist for Climate Change Programs 
Michael C. MacCracken is Chief Scientist for Climate Change Programs with the Climate Institute, which is a non-partisan, non-governmental organization established in 1986 to heighten national and international awareness of climate change and to identify practical ways for responding. Dr. MacCracken recently completed a four-year term as president of the International Association of Meteorology and Atmospheric Sciences, during which he served on the executive committees of the International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics and Scientific Committee for Oceanic Research. He was a lead author of Confronting Climate Change: Avoiding the Unmanageable and Managing the Unavoidable, which was prepared for the UN's Commission on Sustainable Development. Previously, Dr. MacCracken was the leader of climate change research at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (1968-93), and executive director of the Office of the U.S. Global Change Research Program (1993-97) and of its National Assessment Coordination Office (1997-2001). Justice Stevens favorably cited his affidavit relating global climate change to impacts on particular regions in his April 2007 decision in Massachusetts et al. versus EPA. Governor C.L. "Butch" Otter
C.L. "Butch" Otter was elected Governor of Idaho on November 7, 2006. He previously served three terms in Congress representing Idaho's 1st District (2000-2006). Governor Otter is a father of four and grandfather of four. He is married to the former Lori Easley. They live on their ranch near Star. Governor Otter was born in Caldwell on May 3, 1942. He graduated from St. Teresa's Academy (now Bishop Kelly High School) in Boise, attended Boise Junior College (now Boise State University), and received a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science from the College of Idaho (now Albertson College of Idaho) in 1967. He served honorably in the Idaho Army National Guard's 116th Armored Cavalry from 1968 to 1973, and later was awarded honorary doctorates from Mindanao (MIN'-den-ow) State University in the Philippines and Albertson College of Idaho in Caldwell. Governor Otter's 30-year career in business included membership on the Board of Directors of the J.R. Simplot Company. He also served as Director of the Food Products Division, President of Simplot Livestock, and President of Simplot International. He retired in 1993. When he was elected to Congress, Governor Otter was serving his fourth term as Idaho's Lieutenant Governor. He served in that office longer than anyone in Idaho history. He previously represented the people of Canyon County in the Idaho House of Representatives for two terms (1973-1976), was on the Idaho Republican Party Central Committee and was Chairman of the Canyon County Republican Party. Governor Otter is a member of the Roman Catholic Church, the National Rifle Association, the Maple Grove State Grange, the Idaho Cowboys Association, the American Legion, Idaho 4-H Million Dollar Club, a Grand Slam member of Ducks Unlimited, and a lifetime member of Safari Club International. James A. HoltkampPartner & Manager of the Environmental Compliance Group 
Mr. Holtkamp is the Manager of the Environmental Compliance Group at Holland & Hart and resident in the Firm's Salt Lake City office. He has actively represented industry and government clients in various environmental, natural resources and energy project development issues throughout the United States and overseas. In particular, Mr. Holtkamp is extensively involved in climate change issues, including avoided deforestation sequestration in Central America; carbon credit trading in the United States, Canada, Latin America and Europe; corporate climate change policies in the energy sector, and development of governmental climate change programs. He has spoken and published widely on climate change in the United States, Canada and Europe. His energy work includes serving as air quality counsel for major electric generation project developers and representation of an independent transmission developer. He has also been general counsel to an electrical utility system and has represented various clients in utility regulatory proceedings. Mr. Holtkamp served on the staff of the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities (Watergate Committee) and as an attorney for the U.S. Department of the Interior before entering private practice. Mr. Holtkamp is an adjunct professor of law at the University of Utah, where he teaches the Law of Climate Change. He is licensed to practice in Utah, Colorado, the Federal District Court for the District of Utah, the District of Columbia Circuit Court of Appeals, and the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals. Michael J. WalshExecutive Vice President, Chicago Climate Exchange 
Michael J. Walsh is an Executive Vice President of Chicago Climate Exchange, the world's first and North America's only active, voluntary, legally binding integrated trading system to reduce emissions of all six greenhouse gases, with offset projects in North America and worldwide. CCX's affiliated companies European Climate Exchange and Chicago Climate Futures Exchange host markets for futures products based on European Union carbon dioxide emission allowances and U.S. sulfur dioxide emission allowances. Walsh also serves on the Board of Directors of the Montreal Climate Exchange. In his prior position with Environmental Financial Products (the predecessor company to CCX), Mr. Walsh arranged several international carbon credit transactions and served as liaison and lead writer for a series of five technical papers on international emissions trading prepared for the Government of Canada. As a consultant to the U.S. Agency for International Development, Mr. Walsh provided instructional seminars on emissions trading for industry and government officials from several eastern European countries. He has been a speaker at United Nations climate conferences at Geneva, Kyoto, Buenos Aires, Bonn and The Hague, and has been a keynote speaker at industry conferences and educational workshops around the world, including events in Budapest, Moscow, Rio de Janeiro and Sydney. Mr. Walsh also previously served as a Senior Economist with the Chicago Board of Trade where he directed the Chicago Board of Trade's efforts to develop exchange-based environmental markets. Walsh designed and managed annual auctions of sulfur dioxide emission allowances conducted as part of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency acid rain reduction program. Mr. Walsh has delivered Congressional testimony and provided dozens of presentations to state public utility commissions, national regulatory conferences and industry seminars. As the lead CBOT energy market analyst, he covered electricity market deregulation and evaluated the feasibility of electricity futures contracts. Mr. Walsh also directed, in conjunction with a team of industry and public sector leaders, establishment of the CBOT Recyclable Materials Exchange, an electronic marketplace backed by product standards, grading procedures and dispute resolution services. Walsh represented the CBOT in matters involving several U.S. government agencies including the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the Internal Revenue Service and the Environmental Protection Agency. Prior to his position with the Chicago Board of Trade, Mr. Walsh was a Financial Economist in the Office of Tax Policy in the U.S. Department of the Treasury. In that position he conducted industry studies of economic depreciation rates and co-authored a comprehensive review of the history of tax depreciation policy. Walsh has also served as a consultant to the Michigan Treasury Department and the West Virginia Tax Study Commission. Mr. Walsh served as a gubernatorial appointee to the Florida Air Emissions Trading Commission, and served on the Executive Board of the Southern Research Institute's Environmental Technology Verification initiative. He has written extensively on the economics of energy efficiency and the implementation of efficiency programs, and has published articles in the National Tax Journal, Energy Economics, The Journal of Futures Markets, Derivatives Quarterly, Analyse' Financier, and Environmental Quality Management. He has been an occasional referee for several scholarly journals including the Journal of Public Economics. Mr. Walsh has been on the faculties of the University of Notre Dame and the Illinois Institute of Technology, and has lectured at Princeton, Northwestern, Colorado, Illinois and Johns Hopkins (Bologna). Walsh holds Bachelor of Science degrees in Economics and Political Science from Illinois State University, and M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Economics from Michigan State University. Ralph CavanaghDirector, Energy Program, Natural Resources Defense Council 
Ralph Cavanagh directs the Energy Program of the Natural Resources Defense Council, a nonprofit environment-advocacy organization that he joined in 1979. He has held appointments as a visiting professor at the Stanford and Boalt Hall Law Schools, and as a lecturer on law at the Harvard Law School. His courses address a wide range of energy and environmental issues. He is a past member of the US Secretary of Energy's Advisory Board, the Energy Engineering Board of the National Academy of Sciences and the Advisory Council of the Electric Power Research Institute. His awards include the Heinz Award for Public Policy and the Bonneville Power Administration's Award for Exceptional Public Service. Cavanagh currently is a member of the National Commission on Energy Policy, an initiative of the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, and he is vice chair of the Portland-based Bonneville Environmental Foundation and the Sacramento-based Center for Energy Efficiency and Renewable Technologies. He also serves on the board of the Electricity Innovation Institute, which manages long-term research and development projects in the energy sector. He has worked extensively with the Commission for Environmental Cooperation of North America, most recently as a member of its Electricity and Environment Advisory Board. He received his undergraduate and law degrees from Yale University. He is married to Deborah Rhode, the MacFarland Professor of Law at Stanford University and past president of the American Association of Law School. John R. "Ric" GaleVice President of Regulatory Affairs 
Ric Gale assumed the position of Idaho Power Vice President of Regulatory Affairs in March 2001. Gale has been with Idaho Power since 1983. Gale is responsible for development of jurisdictional revenue requirements and customer class cost-of-service studies, preparation of rate design analyses and administration of tariffs and customer contracts. His duties include administration of the Power Cost Adjustment tariff, regulatory policy development, guidance on restructuring activities and resource planning for the company's Integrated Resource Plan. Gale holds a bachelor of Business Administration degree in Marketing and a master of Business Administration degree from Boise State University. In addition, he has completed the Edison Electric Institute's Advanced Rate Course and University of Idaho's Public Utility Executive Course. Pete McGrailLaboratory Fellow 
In January, Dr. Pete McGrail will mark his 25th year as a staff member at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL). He holds the position of Laboratory Fellow, the highest level of scientific achievement at PNNL. He is the Chief Scientist for the FutureGen project, a billion dollar presidential initiative to site the world's first near-zero emission coal-fueled power plant. Dr. McGrail is the principal investigator on a field pilot study in the Columbia River flood basalts being performed under the Big Sky Regional Carbon Partnership. He also manages the Zero Emission Research & Technology project at PNNL, which is conducting basic science studies related to geological sequestration. All of these projects cover a very wide range of subject matter from the hydrodynamics and physical chemistry of supercritical CO2-brine mixtures to modeling multiphase flow and reactive chemical transport processes in geologic storage reservoirs. In his spare time, Dr. McGrail also directs projects on enhanced production from gas hydrate reservoirs using CO2 and is studying new methods of oil production from oil shale deposits using geothermic fuel cells. Dr. McGrail has over 170 publications and presentations at international conferences. J. W. Rogers, Jr., Ph.D.Associate Laboratory Director 
As Associate Laboratory Director for Energy and Environment S&T at the Idaho National Laboratory (INL), Dr. Rogers oversees the basic research and applied engineering efforts of three major R&D Divisions: Energy Systems and Technologies, Environmental and Natural Resource Management, and Science and Engineering. The programs and initiatives associated with these divisions contribute significantly to INL's multi-program national laboratory status. Prior to his INL experience, Dr. Rogers was the Chief Research Officer at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL); Director of William R. Wiley Environmental Molecular Sciences Laboratory (EMSL), a national scientific user facility; and, Associate Laboratory Director for Fundamental Science (1999 - 2004). He also served as Chair and Professor of Chemical Engineering at the University of Washington, as well as Adjunct Professor of Materials Science & Engineering from (1990-1999), and a member of the technical staff and supervisor of the Ceramic Development Division at Sandia National Laboratories, performing basic and applied research from (1979 - 1990). Dr. Rogers received his Ph.D. in Physical Chemistry (1979) and Bachelor of Science in Chemistry (1975) from the University of Texas. Steven E. Aumeier, Ph.D.Director, Energy Systems and Technologies 
In his position as Director, Energy Systems and Technologies Dr. Aumeier is responsible for organizational management, strategic and business development for the Laboratories fossil and renewable energy, energy efficiency and industrial competitiveness, energy resource recovery, and energy storage and advanced vehicles groups. The primary focus of the Division is to develop options for clean, smart, and secure energy futures. Dr. Aumeier was named to his current post in 2007 after serving as Director of the Energy Security Initiative at the INL. This Initiative is focused on developing Laboratory capability and novel approaches to combine fossil, biomass, and renewable energy resources to provide the right energy, in the right place, at the right time. A major focus of the Initiative is enabling the development of high value-added, low environmental impact energy business in the Intermountain West. From 2005 through 2006, Dr. Aumeier served as the manager and then Director, Nuclear Nonproliferation at Idaho National Laboratory. Prior to this, Dr. Aumeier served for 10 years with Argonne National Laboratory. During this time, he held positions of increasing responsibility in energy and national security research and management including Deputy Associate Laboratory Director for Engineering Research. In these roles Dr. Aumeier provided organizational and technical leadership for advanced energy, national security, and educational programs. Dr. Aumeier also served as an assignee (2002-2003) to the National Nuclear Security Administration as a technical advisor on counterterrorism issues. His technical background includes energy systems modeling and integral data analyses, stochastic systems modeling and analyses, expert systems / artificial intelligence applications, and design of radiation detection and measurement systems. Dr. Aumeier serves on a number of university advisory boards and is a member of the American Nuclear Society Special Committee on Nuclear Nonproliferation. Dr. Aumeier received a B.S. in Engineering (with High Honors) from Idaho State University in 1990, an M.S. and Ph.D. in Nuclear Engineering from The University of Michigan in 1992 and 1994, respectively, and an M.B.A. (with Honors) from the University of Chicago in 2002. Dr. Aumeier lives in Idaho Falls, Idaho with his wife and 3 children. Anthony D. Cortese, ScDPresident 
Anthony D. Cortese, ScD is President of Second Nature, a nonprofit organization with a mission to catalyze a worldwide effort to make healthy, just, and sustainable action a foundation of all learning and practice in higher education. He is also a co-director of the American College & University Presidents Climate Commitment and co-founder of the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education and the Higher Education Association Sustainability Consortium and a consultant to industry, government and non-profit organizations. Dr. Cortese is a frequent presenter and consultant. Among his efforts, he is currently very active with organizations like the National Association of College and University Business Officers, the Society for College and University Planning, the Association of Higher Education Facilities Officers and the National Association of Educational Buyers to promote sustainable design, planning and purchasing in higher education. He also consults frequently with colleges and universities. Dr. Cortese was formerly the Commissioner of the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection. He was the first dean of environmental programs at Tufts University and spear-headed the award-winning Tufts Environmental Literacy Institute in 1989 which helped integrate environmental and sustainability perspectives in over 175 courses and the internationally acclaimed Talloires Declaration of University Leaders for a Sustainable Future in 1990. Dr. Cortese has B.S. and M.S. Degrees from Tufts University in civil and environmental engineering and a Doctor of Science in Environmental Health from the Harvard School of Public Health. |