Jeff Jenner, CEO of Potentia Renewables Inc.

Jeff Jenner founded, built and successfully sold or merged three renewable energy development companies prior to becoming CEO of Potentia Renewables Inc. in 2016. From 2009 to 2013 Jeff founded and was the CEO and Director of Renewable Energy Developers Inc. until its merger with Capstone Infrastructure. From 2007 to 2009 Jeff was Senior VP and Canadian Country Senior Officer for the largest IPP in the world, and prior to 2007, he was the co-founder, CFO and Secretary of Ventus Energy Inc. before its sale to GDF Suez.

Jeff has an Honours Bachelor of Mathematics degree from the University of Waterloo and obtained the Chartered Accountant designation in 1985 and the Chartered Business Valuator designation in 1990.

He has been on the executive committee for the Canadian Wind Energy Association (CanWEA) for three years ended 2014, serving as Vice Chair and Treasurer. He rejoined the CanWEA Board in January 2019 as a non-voting member and was re-elected to the Board as a voting member in September 2019.

Getting into renewables by accident

Jeff got into the renewable energy industry back in 2001, immediately after 9/11. As a business valuator and chartered accountant by training, he’d been working on energy industry consolidations. However, after 9/11 the companies he was working with pulled in their capital to wait and see what happened to the economy, and suddenly he found himself with nothing to do.

A Waterloo business valuator friend of his thought that renewable energy in Canada could be an interesting opportunity. “These were really early days in the wind business, when no one had ever really heard of a request for proposal (RFP) for wind. There was just one demonstration turbine in existence, and a couple of turbines in Pincher Creek, Alberta,” Jeff recalls.

Starting in 2001, Jeff founded or co-founded several renewable energy businesses, growing them rapidly to the point where they'd outgrow their shareholders' ability to fund them. The business would then be sold to a larger utility looking to capitalize on the growth. Jeff would stay on for a bit and then start over again building a new business, growing it and selling it.

Providing strategy and direction as CEO of Potentia Renewables

Jeff started with Potentia in 2015 as a consultant. At that time Potentia only did rooftop solar projects, but Power Corporation, which owned a large part of Potentia, asked him to create a wind business and liked what he was able to achieve. When Power Corporation became sole owner of Potentia in 2016 it tapped Jeff as CEO, and he’s been in that role for four years now. In that time Jeff has successfully brought Potentia from 50 MW of operating assets to 250 MW, with another 650 MW under contract including 210 MW currently under construction and the balance to be finished by 2022.

Potentia has operations in Canada, the US and the Dominican Republic. It has solar projects in Ontario, wind projects in Alberta, Saskatchewan and Nova Scotia and is looking to build a wind project in New Brunswick. It also has a community solar project in Minnesota, a wind project in Montana, and just completed a 32 MW solar project in the Dominican Republic. The Montana wind project is more of a traditional PPA, which Potentia bought so its team could gain wind operational experience in preparation for the 650 MW of wind projects it’s building in Western and Maritime Canada.

Jeff says as CEO his main duty is to provide strategy and direction. He spends a lot of time thinking about what's next, drawing on a good line of sight into the things that are going to shape the renewable energy industry. Potentia utilized that foresight, for example, to position itself well in Western Canada, where it won 60% of recent tenders.

Potentia is now looking to redouble its growth and Jeff has set a new target of 2500 MW by 2025. His team is thinking through their strategy from a capital perspective and in terms of where they're going to operate, but they plan to grow their current 50 MW in the US to over 1000 MW.

Coronavirus is impacting renewable energy supply chains

Jeff says the most immediate industry challenge today is the coronavirus outbreak (COVID-19), which is disrupting the components supply chain and having other negative impacts on various economies. Jeff thinks COVID-19 could make 2020 an “interesting, competitive, and angst-filled year,” especially in the US where it’s the last full year of the Production Tax Credit (PTC) for wind energy. If US wind developers don't reach commercial operation by year-end, they miss PTC eligibility and face significantly reduced cash flows.

Looking ahead to the CanWEA – CanSIA merger

Jeff is on the board of the Canadian Wind Energy Association (CanWEA), which is currently preparing to merge with the Canadian Solar Industries Association (CanSIA) to become a wind, solar and storage association starting July 1, 2020. The new association name will be announced in April, but the association is excited to be able to speak with a louder voice, a single voice, within a rapidly growing industry that's also a high-profile part of tackling climate change.

Hiring for hard and soft skills, and a good attitude

Asked what advice he has for people wanting to enter the renewable energy industry, Jeff is encouraging. He says today's market is the most exciting he’s seen in his twenty years in the business. In earlier years he used to hear people deride renewable electricity, saying 'Oh it needs a government subsidy to be viable'. But through technology improvements and economies of scale the industry has silenced that criticism and become the low-cost, carbon-free technology available right now to help in the fight against climate change. “It’s an industry you can be proud to be a part of,” he says.

Jeff also points out it’s a technology-heavy industry. When hiring he’s looking for people with a variety of hard and soft skills: in environmental sciences to handle permitting, with financial analysis skills, with mechanical engineering backgrounds, with operations skills like wind turbine and solar technicians, and with stakeholder relations skills. Above all, though, he hires for good attitude.

Recognizing talent in all its forms

Jeff sees the renewable energy industry as an even playing field for talented men, women, and people from around the world if they’re given the opportunity to participate. Since becoming CEO at Potentia, he’s increased the number of women on its eight-person executive team from zero to three from 2016 to 2018. He’s also increased women directors and vice presidents from five to eight, and grown the total number of women at Potentia to 46% during this time frame. Potentia's team of 67 employees is also very multicultural, with over 40 foreign-trained professionals from 30 different countries on staff. When WiRE co-founder Joanna Osawe asked Jeff if Potentia would sponsor WiRE, he immediately committed. “I was her easiest sale,” Jeff laughs.

Diversity and inclusion have also motivated Jeff’s charitable work. A few years ago, his spouse Adarsh Mehta and he set up a charity, My 100 Percent, and created a five-year program to sponsor the education costs for 100 girls age 10 to 15 in rural Nepal with the primary goal of curbing a 50% dropout rate that occurs by the time girls reach grade 10.

Jeff and Adarsh are also passionate about supporting talented STEM students to advance their studies, and have established two scholarships at their alma mater, the University of Waterloo for foreign-trained women postdoctoral students in applied mathematics studying climate change issues.