Energy Oversight Committee

Richard Apostolik has led the world’s premiere association for risk professionals for 14 years. Previously with Bankers Trust’s (Deutsche Bank) strategic ventures group, Apostolik developed financial risk management initiatives designed to provide credit risk mitigation and management services to financial service companies. He also served as JPMorgan & Co.’s global head of energy brokerage activities and Chief Operating Officer of its global listed product businesses. He ran his own consulting firm and was responsible for the start-up of SG Warburg & Co.’s North American futures and options business. He was an attorney with the US Securities and Exchange Commission, practiced law with a private law firm in Chicago, and was the Chicago Mercantile Exchange’s house counsel. Apostolik holds a BSBA, MBA, and JD from the University of Dayton.

Ben Baglin is the Global Head of Market Risk at EDF Trading and a member of the GARP Energy Oversight Committee, curating the syllabus for the ERP® to ensure that the ERP remains a relevant and rigorous designation for global energy risk practitioners. He is a certified ERP, having taken the Exam in 2010. Ben has over 20 years’ experience in the energy markets in both senior trading and risk roles across the global energy complex. Beginning his career as a clerk on the NYMEX floor during summers, Baglin has worked for an oil major, a hedge fund, a bank, and a global utility, maintaining a focus on global oil and energy markets.

Earl Burns Jr. is principal for the BT Family Office. Prior to that, through March 2020 he was general manager, Global Risk, Pricing & Enterprise Risk Management, for Phillips 66. He has more than 30 years of experience in the energy sector serving in various operating, financial, trading and supply roles. Burns was previously manager, Americas Distillate Trading in the Commercial organization. Prior to that, he resided in London and held the role of manager, Crude Trading Europe, Africa and Russia for Phillips 66 Limited, where he was responsible for all crude trading and supply activities. He began his career with Mobil Oil Corporation in a variety of positions in the U.S., Africa and Latin America inclusive of financial trading, logistics and sales positions. Previously, Burns served as the crude trading manager for BP in Chicago as well as manager, Global Strategy and Commercial Development (Commercial Marine) at ConocoPhillips. Prior to his time at ConocoPhillips, Burns spent five years in the U.S. Naval Reserve, receiving an honorable discharge as Lieutenant. Earl is also a proud Member of the Executive Leadership Council.

Fiona Grandison joined Shell Trading & Supply as the Chief Risk Officer in March 2020, and is responsible for risk management across all of Shell’s trading and supply businesses globally. She was previously a managing director at Deutsche Bank AG in London, most recently serving as Head of Treasury Change, Regulation and Control. Prior to this, Grandison was the Chief Operating Officer for Group Operational Risk Management and held senior roles as the Head of Credit Risk Management and Head of Market Risk Management for the Commodities business globally. Previous credit risk management roles focused on commodities at Lehman Brothers, Goldman Sachs, Citigroup and BP.

Grandison holds a first class master’s degree in chemical engineering and chemical technology from Imperial College, London.

Glenn Labhart has more than 25 years of experience in the design and implementation of risk management processes and policies, and has been a leader in helping the industry define today’s risk environment and plan for the uncertainties of the future.

He is the first energy-industry chief risk officer to receive the GARP Financial Risk Manager of the Year Award. Glenn now serves as the Chair of the Energy Oversight Committee for the Energy Risk Professional certification.

In March 2004, Labhart formed Labhart Risk Advisors Inc., providing expertise in risk management for clients requiring proficiency in energy, complex modeling, and independent valuation. He is a frequent lecturer and speaker on a variety of legal matters and has provided subject matter expertise on industry practices to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, Securities and Exchange Commission, and Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.

Labhart’s career is supported by a bachelor’s in business administration from Abilene Christian University, and the Rice University Executive Management Program. He serves on the Advisory Council for the Master of Energy Business Program/University of Tulsa.

Alessandro Mauro is a commodity risk and financial derivatives professional. He has worked in the energy industry for the past 25 years. Until recently, he headed the risk management department of LITASCO (LUKOIL group). He has also worked for ENI, PwC, and Sorgenia, building and managing middle office functions, and shaping business processes for monitoring and analyzing trading activity. He currently heads the middle office function in MKS PAMP, a precious metals refining and trading company.

In the 1990s, Mauro pioneered the application of modern risk measurement techniques, Value-at-Risk, to energy markets and companies. He has published several papers and articles and one book where he analyzed features related to energy, commodities and risk. He has trained top executives of companies such as SOMO, PetroVietnam, Petrol, Lukoil, and SK Energy. He is a visiting professor at the University of Geneva, teaching the Hedging Tools course in the Master of Science in Commodity Trading program. He is a member of the GARP Energy Oversight Committee and director of the Geneva GARP chapter.

A certified FRM, Mauro has a degree in political economy from Luigi Bocconi University in Milan, and holds a master’s in energy economics and management.

Phil North is Vice President of Global Risk Management at AES, reporting to the Chief Financial Officer. A leader with substantial commercial and finance experience in the US, Latin America, and Europe, he manages the risk management function across AES' Global platform. North has been with AES in various commercial and risk roles since 2015.

Prior to joining AES, he was a member of the leadership team for Duke Energy's Midwest Commercial Generation business unit as the Strategy and Business Performance Director, directing the strategy for 6,000MW of thermal power plants in PJM.

North holds a bachelor's degree in economics, a master's in business economics from Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, and has completed executive business and leadership programs at Georgetown University and the Center for Creative Leadership.

Peter O’Neill is currently Director of Risk and Analytics for Archer Daniels Midland where he oversees risk for the assets and trading of the biofuels and grains businesses. He has been involved in energy markets and risk management for almost twenty years, having worked and held various senior-level risk roles for several multinational energy firms. 

John Parsons is a financial economist working in financial risk management, corporate finance, investments, and valuation. He has applied these tools to an array of different industries, with the most experience in the energy industry and on environmental problems — most currently, focusing on options to address climate change.

Parsons is a senior lecturer at MIT’s Sloan School of Management and a member of its Finance Group. He is a research affiliate of the Center for Energy and Environmental Policy Research, where he served as Executive Director for a number of years — his first work in the Center dating back to the 1980s. The Center is co-sponsored by the MIT Economics Department and the Sloan School of Management.

As a co-director of the MIT’s Low Carbon Energy Center, focused on Advanced Nuclear Energy Systems, his role is economic and policy analysis.

Laurent Pommier is the Chief Risk Officer for Public Service Enterprise Group, one of the ten largest electric companies in the US. As Vice President Risk Management and Chief Risk Officer, he is responsible for implementing the enterprise risk management program across all PSEG businesses and for leading the financial risk management functions. Before assuming this role in 2014, Pommier was Director - Quantitative Analysis for PSEG Power Finance. He left PSEG in 2006 to serve as Director - Market Strategist for North American gas and power markets at Société Générale and returned in 2007. Pommier holds an MBA in finance from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, a computer science degree from the Institut National des Sciences Appliquées of Lyon, and a general engineering degree from the Ecole Catholique d’Arts et Métiers of Lyon. A certified ERP®, he serves on the GARP Energy Oversight Committee.

Jonathan Stein is Vice President, Chief Risk Officer for Hess Corporation, responsible for enterprise risk management as well as risk controls for Hess’ marketing and hedging business activities. The ERM program includes project-level risk assessments for capital decisions and a corporate-wide risk assessment process that prioritizes and integrates risks across categories and ensures ownership of risk mitigation activities. He is responsible for market risk, credit risk, compliance controls, and trade operations for Hess’ marketing and hedging activities.

Until Hess’ exit from the marketing and refining business in 2015, Stein was responsible for a global team providing risk controls for marketing and trading businesses that engaged in proprietary trading, dynamic hedging of sales to 22,000 commercial and industrial customers. He was also responsible for the corporate-wide Dodd-Frank implementation and was actively involved in lobbying efforts during both legislative and regulatory stages.

Prior to joining Hess, Stein worked for over 10 years in energy and financial services at Ernst & Young, Merrill Lynch and Goldman Sachs. He is a member of the GARP Board of Trustees and a member of the Energy Oversight Committee.

Stein holds a bachelor’s degree in engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and a master’s in business administration from Columbia Business School.

Dr. Chris Strickland is CEO and co-founder of Lacima — a specialist provider of valuation, optimization, and risk management software to the global energy and commodities markets. He has worked extensively with senior executives consulting on energy risk management and complex derivative valuation issues for over 20 years, and is a recognized expert for expert witness testimonials.  

Strickland has co-authored the books “Energy Derivatives Pricing and Risk Management” and “Implementing Derivatives Models” and co-edited the book “Exotic Options: The State of the Art.” He was named in the Energy Risk Hall of Fame in 2005, and in 2009 he was honored by Energy Risk Magazine as a pioneering quantitative analyst for outstanding contribution to energy trading.