Major energy projects do not fail simply because of weak contractors, poor controls, or the wrong contract structure. They fail when owners misunderstand their role.

In this episode of Green Giants: Titans of Renewable Energy, Wes Ashworth, President of Lee Group Search, sits down with Gary Fischer, Executive Director of the Project Production Institute and a longtime capital projects leader who spent more than 40 years at Chevron.

Gary brings a rare perspective shaped by work across engineering, construction, operations, benchmarking, major project leadership, and enterprise project-system design. After helping architect Chevron’s project management system, he came to a difficult conclusion: even sophisticated project frameworks can produce disappointing results when they ignore how work actually flows through a production system.

The conversation centers on one critical idea: capital projects are not products an owner can simply buy. They are production systems that must be actively designed, led, and integrated.

Wes and Gary explore the difference between owners who behave like buyers and owners who behave like builders, along with the responsibilities that cannot be outsourced. These include defining the business outcome, setting requirements, managing stakeholders, making timely decisions, shaping the contracting strategy, and retaining accountability for the final result.

They also examine why lump-sum EPC contracts do not eliminate owner risk, how traditional metrics can reward excessive work in process, and why adding more people to a delayed project can sometimes make performance worse.

Gary shares lessons from major LNG, refinery, offshore, and supply chain environments, including how production control improved collaboration, reduced manpower, accelerated delivery, and helped teams complete more work with fewer resources.

The discussion also applies directly to renewable energy, battery storage, hydrogen, transmission, data centers, and other rapidly scaling infrastructure sectors. As companies deploy capital into new technologies and unfamiliar project environments, owner capability may become one of the most important competitive advantages.

In this episode:

• Why project failure is often misdiagnosed
• What separates a capable owner from a passive buyer
• Why contractors cannot own the business outcome
• How contracts can obscure risk without truly transferring it
• Why production science changes project decision-making
• How excessive work in process delays completion
• Why supply chains should be managed as connected production systems
• How rigid stage gates can encourage the wrong behavior
• What leaders should evaluate before approving major capital
• The first steps organizations can take to strengthen owner capability

This episode is essential listening for CEOs, project sponsors, investors, developers, EPC leaders, and anyone responsible for delivering complex energy and infrastructure projects.

Gary Fischer is Executive Director of the Project Production Institute and previously held senior project leadership roles at Chevron, including responsibility for Chevron’s project management system and capital project capability.

Links:
Project Production Institute Website & Resources
Gary Fischer on LinkedIn

Wes Ashworth: https://www.linkedin.com/in/weslgs/

• Email: wes@leegroupsearch.com
• https://leegroupsearch.com/green-giants-podcast/
• https://leegroupsearch.com/

America’s energy system has entered a new phase.

After years of relatively flat electricity demand, the country is now facing sustained growth driven by data centers, industrial expansion, electrification, reshoring, aging infrastructure, and rising resilience needs. The challenge is no longer just how quickly the U.S. can decarbonize. It is how quickly the country can build enough power while protecting reliability, affordability, and long-term emissions progress.

In this episode of Green Giants: Titans of Renewable Energy, Wes Ashworth, President of Lee Group Search, welcomes back Lisa Jacobson, President of the Business Council for Sustainable Energy, to unpack the findings of the 2026 Sustainable Energy in America Factbook.

Lisa explains why this moment is different from previous periods of load growth, how urgency could help break years of infrastructure inertia, and why no single technology can meet the challenge alone. She makes the case for a broad portfolio that includes renewable energy, storage, natural gas, nuclear, energy efficiency, demand flexibility, sustainable transportation, and smarter use of existing grid assets.

The conversation also examines the growing impact of large electricity users. Data centers are an important part of the demand story, but the episode goes far beyond AI. Wes and Lisa explore what rising load means for utilities, regulators, communities, manufacturers, households, and businesses across the country.

A central question runs throughout the episode: Who pays for the infrastructure required to power America’s next era?

Lisa discusses the need to protect households and small businesses from unfair cost allocation, the role large customers can play in funding grid upgrades or bringing new power resources, and how regulators can evaluate projects based on local capacity, flexibility, community benefit, and long-term risk.

The episode also covers the technologies being deployed now. Solar and battery storage continue to lead new capacity additions because they can often move quickly and compete economically. At the same time, firm resources, existing nuclear assets, natural gas, long-duration storage, efficiency, virtual power plants, microgrids, and demand response all have distinct roles to play.

Wes and Lisa also examine:

• Why energy efficiency should be treated as infrastructure
• How smart meters and flexible demand can reduce grid strain
• What utilities and regulators should ask before approving major new loads
• Why storage is becoming more important to grid operations
• How corporate clean energy procurement is reshaping the market
• What policy uncertainty means for real projects and investment decisions
• Which technologies emerged stronger from recent tax and policy changes
• Why speed, cost, reliability, and sustainability must be solved together

Lisa closes with a practical message for governors, regulators, and policymakers: align economic development with reliable, affordable, and clean energy, then give the private sector the market signals needed to build.

This episode is a clear-eyed look at the next chapter of the U.S. power system and what it will take to meet rising demand without losing sight of consumers, communities, or climate goals.

Links:
2026 Sustainable Energy in America Factbook
Lisa Jacobson on LinkedIn
BCSE's Website

Wes Ashworth: https://www.linkedin.com/in/weslgs/

• Email: wes@leegroupsearch.com
• https://leegroupsearch.com/green-giants-podcast/
• https://leegroupsearch.com/

Renewable energy has scaled rapidly. Now the industry faces a more demanding question: can solar, wind, and storage operate with the discipline, security, and reliability expected of critical infrastructure?

In this episode of Green Giants: Titans of Renewable Energy, Wes Ashworth, President of Lee Group Search, speaks with Kellie Macpherson, COO of Compliance + Security at Radian Generation and a board member at SEIA (Solar Energy Industries Association).

Kellie brings deep experience across NERC compliance, cybersecurity, commissioning, audits, control centers, and renewable asset operations. Her perspective is shaped by a career spent bridging the gap between traditional grid operations and the fast-moving renewable energy sector.

The conversation explores why compliance is not simply paperwork, how reliability affects real communities, and why the industry’s long-term credibility depends on operating assets as well as it builds them.

Wes and Kellie also break down the significance of NERC Category 2 registration for inverter-based resources. They discuss which solar, wind, storage, and hybrid assets may now fall under increased oversight, why registration alone is not the same as being audit-ready, and what owner-operators should prioritize if they are behind.

Cybersecurity is another central theme. Modern renewable plants rely heavily on remote access, third-party vendors, software, connected devices, and operational technology. That creates efficiency, but also expands the attack surface. Kellie explains why commissioning is one of the most vulnerable stages of a project and why access management, patching, physical security, and documented controls need to be built in before commercial operation.

The episode also examines the leadership side of compliance. Mature programs require executive attention, clear accountability, employee training, operational evidence, and a company culture that understands the financial, reputational, and reliability risks of getting it wrong.

In this episode:

• Why grid reliability became personal for Kellie early in life
• How renewable energy became central to bulk power system reliability
• What NERC Category 2 means for solar, wind, storage, and hybrid assets
• The difference between registration and true audit readiness
• Why cybersecurity should be treated as an operational priority now
• The most common security risks during commissioning
• Warning signs that a project may face future compliance problems
• Why inverter settings, access controls, patching, and evidence matter
• How executives and boards should think about compliance risk
• What trusted renewable operators will do differently over the next three years

As electricity demand grows and renewable assets become more essential to the grid, the companies that earn long-term trust will be the ones that combine speed with discipline, growth with resilience, and innovation with operational accountability.

Links:
Kellie Macpherson on LinkedIn
Radian Generation's Website
Kellie's Power Play Newsletter

Wes Ashworth: https://www.linkedin.com/in/weslgs/

• Email: wes@leegroupsearch.com
• https://leegroupsearch.com/green-giants-podcast/
• https://leegroupsearch.com/