Advisory board

Federica Strumia-Michelini is Head of Market Risk Management at Neste, the Finnish Oil and Renewable Products refiner. She joined in 2009, to establish and develop the middle office and market risk management desk for oil trading and refinery activities. She now leads with passion a team in charge of quantifying and monitoring the market price risks of the company. Prior to Neste Federica has worked at Cargill International SA, Sempra Oil Trading and TXU Energy Europe. Of Italian origin, living in Switzerland since twenty years, she holds a PhD in particle physics and worked at CERN and University of Geneva before moving to the commodities world.

Ahmed Mehdi is Managing Director at Renaissance Energy Advisors, a leading energy advisory firm which works with trading houses, International Oil Companies (IOCs) and financial institutions across the energy value chain. He also serves as Principal at Benchmark Mineral Intelligence, the world’s leading pricing agency dedicated to li-ion battery metals. He previously worked as an advisor to BHP Petroleum and PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) in London. He also serves as a Visiting Fellow at the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies (OIES). He was educated at the University of Oxford (St Antonys College) and University College London (UCL). 

Israr Ahmed is one of the founding Directors of KWA Analytics a specialist boutique ETRM Consulting company that was started 6 years ago and now operates globally out of UK, US, Singapore and India. Israr initially worked in banking before moving into the commodity trading world and now has over 20 years of experience in the energy sector, in both Trading and also ETRM systems.

Israr holds a BSc in Mathematics from Sheffield University and a MSc in Mathematical Trading & Finance from City University of London.

Mike was appointed coordinator of the European Federation of Energy Traders (EFET) overall Covid-19 response, following the coronavirus pandemic. He is also secretary of the EFET Market Supervision Committee and coordinator of the training and education programmes. Mike worked previously for the Ministry of Affairs of Romania, the European Union Delegation to the United States and in the energy sector since 2014. He is a trained economist and political scientist and now is finalizing his PhD in European Energy Policies at the University of Maastricht. Mike is a native Romanian and speaks fluently English and French.

Jorge is a senior economist specialised in energy transitions. Currently, he works at BP and is research associate at Oxford Institute for Energy Studies in the UK. Previously, he worked both in the private and public sector. He holds a doctorate degree in Economics from the Universidad Complutense de Madrid. 

Joao Domingues is responsible for coordinating with the Board their review of the Trans Adriatic Pipeline cyber security programs and risks, while assisting them in the coordination of the relationship between cyber security programs, risk management policies, practices and company strategy.

David has been structuring, arranging and financing natural resources and energy projects for the past two decades throughout Australia, Asia, America, Africa and Europe.

David recently joined Lloyds Banking Group and has previously worked with ANZ & HBOS in Sydney and CBA in Sydney, Brisbane & London.

David holds qualifications from the University of Queensland & University of Oxford.