EnBW North America Welcomes New Team Members Ahead of Lease Auction in the New York Bight

Brian Lefebvre, Marine Affairs Manager

Brian oversees all maritime activities for EnBW North America’s offshore wind projects where he brings a cooperative approach to policy development, resource management, and marine safety. Having previously worked amidst the Gulf Coast’s vast oil and gas industry, Brian joined EnBW to help lead development of America’s burgeoning offshore wind industry.

Prior to joining EnBW, Brian served coastal communities and marine stakeholders for over two decades in the US Coast Guard. His experience ranges from leading Coast Guard crews during six years at sea, driving resource and legislative goals as liaison to the US Senate, and managing all operations and crews in Northern New England.

Meghan Castellano, Energy Systems Engineer

As EnBW North America’s Energy Systems Engineer, Meghan’s responsibilities include supporting all stages of offshore wind project development through a focus of strategic generation and transmission market evaluation, while ensuring compliance with power market open access tariff requirements and their cross functional alignment with activities associated with EnBW’s offshore wind projects.

Having started her career in 2014, she participated in ERCOT’s year-long Engineer Development Program before moving back to the Northeast to join NYISO’s Installed Capacity Market Operations team, which is responsible for facilitating New York’s $2.5 billion wholesale capacity market. For the next six years, she evolved into a subject matter expert for all things related to the diverse portfolio of New York’s generation resources, while supporting the administration and execution of the various ICAP market auctions.

Mahdiyeh Khodaparastan, Interconnection Engineer

Mahdiyeh joined EnBW North America’s technical team in 2021 focusing on offshore wind transmission and grid interconnection. She is passionate about problem-solving and challenges related to renewable energy. EnBW’s mission and experience in developing, building, and operating large-scale offshore wind projects motivated her to join the team.

Before joining EnBW, Mahdiyeh was an energy storage project specialist at ConEdison, New York, focusing on energy storage interconnection into the distribution grid. Mahdiyeh holds a PhD in Electrical Engineering and worked on the recuperation of regenerative braking energy using wayside energy storage at New York City’s electric rail transit system during her program. Her work was founded by NYSERDA, ConEdison, and MTA.

Joan Dunham, Operations Coordinator

Joan has been a member of EnBW AG for over twenty years working as a cross functional Human Resources professional. Previously, she was responsible for programs that offered former apprentices the opportunity to gain work experience as they entered the workforce, as well as assisting employees in finding new career opportunities within EnBW focusing on permanent placement. Most recently, she was a Consultant at EnBW Diversity responsible for the international expatriation of employees.

Joan’s new role as Operations Coordinator at EnBW North America places her in a management support role concentrating on human resources administration and office management. Her key responsibilities will focus on bringing together staffing and onboarding processes, as well as synchronization of external HR consultants.