Solarplaza Summit | The Netherlands

Hans de Heer is a Principal Consultant in DNV’s Energy Advisory practice and business development manager Energy Markets & Strategy North-West Europe, with focus on demand side flexibility and grid congestion. He has over 20 years of expertise as an advisor in the energy sector, and gained extensive experience in energy markets and regulations, focusing on (societal) cost-benefit analyses, market design, energy transition, market analysis and electricity infrastructure.

Prof. Dr. Ir. Jan Rotmans is a renowned international authority on transitions and sustainability. As a pioneer of transition science in the Netherlands and creator of the integrated climate model globally, Professor Rotmans offers insightful solutions to the chaos and crises affecting governments, businesses, and individuals alike. His lectures and masterclasses span 11 defined transitions in areas such as energy, resources, agriculture, food, circularity, finance, and more. He simplifies complex subjects, tailoring his presentations to the specific needs of his audience and encouraging not just new thinking, but new actions.

Jakoba van der Mei works as an Investment Director at StartGreen Capital. StartGreen Capital has over €400 million in assets under management and provides both entrepreneurs and project owners financing for the energy transition and the circular economy. Her personal focus is on wind energy, solar, battery storage systems and energy infrastructure. Previously she held roles within investment banking in London and projectfinance at SMBC where she financed 1.9 GW of offshore and onshore wind. Jakoba is responsible for the acquisition, deal execution, and portfolio management of the new StartGreen Transition fund.

Joris Besseling is heading the market design and european market integration teams at TenneT TSO. He has been working with tennet on market design project for the last seven years, and worked previously at an energy transition consultancy and with the utility Vattenfall.

Wilko is a lawyer and has ample experience in regulated markets and competition law. His main focus is the energy sector. He works in cases relating to the energy transition, grid congestion, and tariff regulation. Prior to joining the ACM, he worked as an attorney in Stek’s regulatory team. Wilko holds LLM’s in both European law and law & economics.

Arja Even has over 20 years experience in societal transitions of which 15 years in the energy transition. She works at RVO, the ‘Rijksdienst voor Ondernemend Nederland’, eg the Netherlands Enterprise Agency. RVO is known for financial subsidy schemes and programs directed to other necessary conditions. She is program coordinator, for a program focusing on flexibility, storage and grid congestion for both renawable energy plants and enterprises.

Daniel Vig is a Senior Policy Officer at the European Association for Storage of Energy (EASE), where he leads advocacy efforts on energy storage policy and represents the interests of EASE members. His work focuses on key issues such as grid fees for energy storage, tariff structures, and regulatory barriers to integrating energy storage into Europe’s energy system.

Maaike Beenes coordinates the work of Holland Solar on cyber security, responsible business conduct, and other supply chain issues. Holland Solar represents the Dutch solar-PV market in The Hague and Brussels. Maaike has a background in international relations. For Holland Solar, she focusses on supporting the solar sector to increase cyber security performance, including by improving regulatory conditions and setting up a cyber risk information sharing network.

Nold Jaeger leads the Holland Solar policy and public affairs team. Holland Solar represents the Dutch solar-PV market in The Hague and Brussels. He has been involved in the policy-making field for solar PV for the past five years. With a background in EU energy and climate policy, for the last five years, he has focussed on improving the development conditions for large-scale solar PV on land, rooftops, and water and residential PV.

Wouter Schram is policy advisory in the Customer & Markets - Market Design team of TenneT. His work is mostly focused on congestion management and the impact of policies aiming to alleviate congestion on the functioning of markets. Before working at TenneT, Wouter was a researcher at Utrecht University and University of Twente, focusing on integration of Photovoltaics in the energy system.

Soe van Dijk is an innovation analyst specializing in cyber resilience at Energy Innovation NL (Topsector Energie), a platform driving knowledge and innovations needed for the transition to a more affordable, reliable, safe, and sustainable energy system. She has a multidisciplinary background and a keen research interest at the intersection of the energy transition, innovation, and cybersecurity. As part of the programme on digitalisation, she coordinated several projects, including an exploration of cybersecurity collaboration within the solar energy sector (TNO 2023) and a study on cybersecurity threats and mitigation strategies for solar power installations (Secura 2024).

Lianne has 8 years of experience in renewables. She has worked on the contracting side of the innovative offshore wind Two Towers project (19 MW, the Netherlands, 2021) and is currently involved in the contracting and financing of various solar projects (including PPA and storage aspects) in the Netherlands. Before joining Green Giraffe, Lianne worked as a lawyer at Allen & Overy in the Dutch project finance team. Amongst others, she advised on the financing of the Krammer onshore wind farm (100 MW, the Netherlands, 2016) and solar park Sunport Delfzijl (31 MW, the Netherlands, 2016). Lianne holds an LLM in European energy and climate law from the University of Groningen.

Ivan Das has 25+ years of experience in the corporate, leasing, real estate and project finance banking environment. Since 2007 he has been actively involved in a in a large number of renewable projects in the Netherlands, including numerous PV solar projects and several heat networks, geothermal energy and renewable biomass and waste-to-energy related projects. Within Rabobank Project Finance he is responsible for originating, structuring, negotiating and executing those renewable energy transactions. Recently he worked on several larger solar PV projects based on a combination of subsidy schemes, corporate PPAs and merchant revenues. Rabobank was one of the first financiers in the offshore wind sector and has built up a strong portfolio in renewable energy, giving a distinctive advantage in terms of knowledge and experience for our clients and for new projects.

Edwin founded Solarplaza company in 2004. He is a senior PV expert and started in the photovoltaic solar energy business in 1994. He has experience as a solar energy consultant and project developer in more than 200 PV projects. Edwin holds a Master’s degree in Chemical engineering and previously worked in the Chemical industry before starting his first consultancy company in PV in 1994.