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Founding Members: MIT Community Solarpower Project Team

Peter Cooper, Director of Utilities, MIT Department of Facilities
Mr. Cooper is Director of Utilities at MIT. MIT operates its own 20MW cogeneration plant and electric, steam and chilled water distribution systems.

Prior to joining MIT, he had a 27 year career as a power industry electrical consultant dealing with industrial power ranging from 100kW to 60MW, including issues of generation interconnection to utility grids. He has a BSEE from MIT, MSEE from Northeastern University and MBA from Boston College. He is a registered professional engineer in Massachusetts.

Laxmi Rao, Sr. Project Manager Utilities, MIT Department of Facilities
Ms. Rao has over 18 years of project management experience working with information systems and building utilities metering projects at MIT. She was also responsible for the accounting, allocation and distribution of Utilities costs to MIT buildings.

She has a keen interest in energy and water use conservation and the promotion of renewable energy use in the USA as well as in India.

Prior to working at MIT, Ms. Rao taught Project Feasibility Study Workshops at the World Bank in Washington D.C. She also worked at the National Bureau of Economic Research, Cambridge, MA on the collection and analysis transportation sector emissions data, to support MIT and Harvard Faculty at hearings on the US Clean Air Act.
Ms. Rao has also served as a Research Associate at the Harvard Business School, Boston MA. and helped prepared case studies about the Air Cargo industry.

Ms. Rao received her BS in Electrical Engineering in 1973 and an MBA in 1975.

Edward Kern, President, Irradiance, Inc.,
Dr. Kern has twenty-five years experience working with photovoltaic systems and their interconnection to electric power systems. Presently he serves as President of Irradiance, Inc. a firm supporting programs aimed at commercializing PV system installations. He also serves as a director and president of the Solar Energy Business Association of New England. Until April 2002 he was Director of Engineering for Schott Applied Power Corporation, formerly Ascension Technology.

Dr. Kern has participated in photovoltaic system research, development, and engineering projects across the United States and in Mexico, Costa Rica, Puerto Rico, Brazil, South Africa, the Philippines and India. At Irradiance, he is currently consulting with an electric utility in the Philippines and the International Finance Corporation regarding the installation of megawatt-scale PV systems to support clean electric power development in developing countries and with a construction company building an 150 kW+ advanced, thin film building integrated PV roof for New York City Transit.
As founder and president of Ascension Technology (1987-1999) he oversaw the installation of over 200 grid-connected systems, totaling over three megawatts. These projects range in size from a 350-watt residential ac module to 100-kW systems installed in Tamil Nadu, India and Washington, DC. The earliest of these installations were projects co-funded by the EPA, EPRI and electric utilities across the country to demonstrate the feasibility of grid-connected systems and to determine the air emission offsets derived from this clean power source. As part of the UPVG-Team UP program, Dr. Kern oversaw the installation of systems ranging from rural Massachusetts to the Pentagon. Prior to the sale of Ascension Technology to Applied Power Corporation, Ascension Technology introduced their SunSine AC module and launched a residential PV program with Massachusetts Electric Company. Similar programs were continued under Dr. Kern’s direction as a director and vice-president of Applied Power Corporation (1999-2001).

Stephen Cowell, Conservation Services Group, Chairman and CEO
Stephen Cowell is Chairman and CEO of Conservation Services Group (CSG), which recently merged with MASS SAVE, Inc., and acquired Planergy Field Services of Austin, Texas. CSG and its affiliated companies have completed energy assessments and improvements on also most one million facilities. He founded the Northeast Energy Efficiency Council and Sun Power Electric, the first solar utility to bring solar energy to the deregulated electric market

Mark Farber, Evergreen Solar, President and CEO
Mark Farber has 25 years of experience in the energy industry. He is President and Chief Executive Officer and a co?founder of Evergreen Solar, Inc., a manufacturer of crystalline silicon solar power products.

Prior to founding Evergreen Solar in 1994, Mr. Farber worked at Mobil Solar Energy Corporation, the solar division of Mobil Corporation, where he was responsible for marketing, sales and corporate partnering activities.
From 1976 to 1988, Mr. Farber was a consultant at Temple, Barker and Sloane, now Mercer Management Consulting, where he advised electric utilities, equipment manufacturers and government agencies on economic, business and policy issues related to energy.

Mr. Farber has a BS in industrial engineering and operations research from Cornell University, and a MS in management from M.I.T.’s Sloan School.