Technical Advisory Committees

Blanka Zombori - Secretary

Blanka Zombori has ten years of financial consulting experience, focusing on international taxation. She has gravitated towards sustainability over the past five years, with a focus on water governance, including drinking water and sanitation. Her Master’s thesis analyzed quality drinking water and sanitation governance considering the case of Ghana, where she conducted research for four months to complete her thesis.

Blanka earned a Bachelor of Commerce & Finance degree from the Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto, and her MSc in Sustainability from Utrecht University in the Netherlands, with a specialization in environmental policy and governance.

Brice Soucy – Finance

Brice serves as Vice President in the Brookfield Infrastructure Group focused on originating and executing investment opportunities in the global water infrastructure sector.

Brice had previously served as Director of Business Development at Poseidon Water, a portfolio company of Brookfield Asset Management, where was responsible for originating water infrastructure development projects and acquisitions in North America. Brice coordinated Poseidon’s joint development efforts with partners and managed the pro forma for Poseidon’s $1 billion flagship development project, the Huntington Beach Desalination Plant. Brice supported the management team of Poseidon in raising commitments for over $50 million in corporate equity investment between 2013-2018.

Brice has a degree in Economics-Finance from Bentley University, where he graduated Summa Cum Laude. He serves on the Advisory Board for the Hughey Center for Financial Services at Bentley.

Christopher Fetters - Operations

Christopher Fetters has 22 years of experience as an environmental engineer and over 5 years specifically in infrastructure development of industrial facilities. Christopher has served as a project engineer, project manager and principal-in-charge on various water remediation and treatment systems throughout the United States and internationally.

Christopher has served as a field engineer, project engineer and eventually principal-in-charge for clients in the oil & gas, maritime, construction, and infrastructure sectors in the remediation of legacy industrial sites. He has utilized various treatment technologies and continues to develop advancements in the application of technologies to improve efficiency and cost effectiveness.

Christopher has also served as a researcher at the US Army Corps of Engineers – Engineering Research and Development Center in Vicksburg, Mississippi. During that time, his research focused on innovative technology development, specific to soil and groundwater remediation. Developing technologies such as electrokinetics, alternative filtration, waste minimization, reverse osmosis, biological waste lagoons and advanced oxidation processes, both in laboratory and field scale applications.

Christopher has served as a testifying expert in legacy oil and gas litigation in Louisiana and Texas. He served as a technical advisor on various Superfund projects and worked in cooperation with state and federal agencies to revise and update regulatory rules and code.

Claudette Lavallee - Advisor

Claudette Lavallee is the Founder and General Manager for PROWATER Consultores, a Mozambican consultancy that specializes in Water and Sanitation. She also serves as the embedded adviser for the National Directorate of Water and Sanitation of Mozambique and manages the Water portfolio for the SPEED+ project, which is financed by USAID.

Previously, Claudette was Team Leader for the Sustainable Water and Sanitation in Africa (SUWASA) program, which works to improve access to safe, reliable, affordable, and sustainable water/sanitation services for unserved and underserved urban populations in sub-Sahara Africa. She was also Program Manager for the Inhambane Rural Water Development Programme, where she led the planning efforts for a pilot implementation of Rural Water programme, and developed the management model for Demand Responsive Approach (DRA). This role was conceptualized through Claudette’s work with the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA), where she was responsible for building the new investment development program for all CIDA projects in the Health, Education, and Water sectors in Mozambique.

Claudette received her undergraduate (LLL) and post-graduate (DDN) degrees from the University of Montreal, Canada, and earned an MBA from De Montfort University in Maputo, Mozambique. Claudette serves as a Board Member for the Canada-Mozambique Chamber of Commerce and for Aguashare.

Daniel Pinault - Finance

Dan Pinault serves as a Project Advisor for Terra Firma. He has 10+ years of advisory and investing experience focused on companies with disruptive technologies and business models in the cleantech, agritech, energy and water sectors.

Dan had previously worked for Brookfield Infrastructure Partners, where he was Director of M&A for Brookfield's district energy platform (Enwave Energy Corporation). Dan drove acquisitions that doubled the number of assets under management in under four years and was responsible for identifying and evaluating strategic partnerships with technology companies.

Prior to Brookfield, Dan worked as a management consultant, where he advised private equity, venture funds, government agencies and companies with growth mandates in the cleantech, infrastructure and natural resource sectors.

Dan has a Mechanical Engineering degree from the University of Waterloo and completed his MBA at the Rotman School of Management (University of Toronto). Dan serves as advisor to several companies in the cleantech space.

Dr. Demilade Fayemiwo – Operations

Dr Demilade Fayemiwo is a Science Teacher at African Leadership Academy, a world-class pan-African boarding high school in Johannesburg, South Africa.

Demi obtained her BSc (Hons) degree in Microbiology from Stellenbosch University in 2011. She went on to study for a Master’s degree in Environmental Technology at the University of Pretoria and graduated with distinction in 2014. On completion of her Master’s degree, she worked as a lecturer at the University of the Witwatersrand where she lectured Environmental Process Engineering, after which she went on to work as a water and sanitation consultant, focusing specifically on research projects initiated by the Water Research Commission. This inspired her to pursue a PhD degree in water treatment, which she obtained from the University of Johannesburg.

Demi’s research has been published in journals and conference proceedings. For the positive impact of her research, she was awarded the L’Oréal-UNESCO “For Women in Science” fellowship in 2017. In 2018, she won the annual three-minute thesis competition at the University of Johannesburg and was the national runner-up for the South African Universities’ three-minute thesis competition in the same year.

Gordon Frost – Governance

Gordon Frost is the leader of Mercer's Career business in Canada and is a member of Mercer’s Canadian leadership team. He is responsible for a broad team of professionals that provide services across the spectrum of Mercer’s Career business. Gordon first joined Mercer in 2000 and has been based in both Canada and the US. He then spent over 2 years as the Vice President of Global Compensation for a Canadian multi-national organization before re-joining Mercer in his present leadership role in 2013.

Gordon consults across many aspects of the Career business, advising clients on how to strengthen the relationship between business strategy and talent strategy. He has extensive experience advising Boards of Directors and senior management on the design of executive compensation programs that align decision-making with shareholder value creation and are consistent with sound governance practices. He has deep knowledge of the strategy, design, and financial impact of incentive programs, including equity-based incentive plans and sales incentive plans. He has also led broader projects related to talent management and leadership development with a specific focus on the needs of a globally mobile workforce.

Gordon holds an MBA from the University of Western Ontario, and a Bachelors degree in Commerce with great distinction from McGill University.

Joshua Papernick – Urban Energy Systems

Joshua Papernick currently works for an energy development company facilitating the adoption of renewable options in emerging markets. After recognizing the large disconnect between engineers and city builders in the implementation of resilient water infrastructure, he has expanded his focus to the realm of urban planning, promoting solutions to the intensified stress being placed on our water systems due to climate change.

Josh began his career at the Ontario Ministry of the Environment’s Safe Drinking Water Branch looking at regulatory challenges surrounding municipal drinking water systems, as well as engaging in water quality issues relating to agricultural runoff and heavy metal contamination. During his MSc, Josh was inspired by the importance of fostering innovative water governance arrangements and practices to build adaptive management capacity. Following his studies, he conducted research at Ben-Gurion University’s Zuckerberg Institute for Water Research in Israel, where he explored the adverse impacts of the unregulated electronic waste industry on sources of water and local food production.

Josh holds a BSc (Honours) from Queen’s University in Earth System Science, a MSc from McGill University in Integrated Water Resource Management and is currently a MPl candidate at Ryerson University in Urban Development.

Kyle Chew – Finance

Kyle Chew serves as Vice President at Magris Resources, a private equity firm focused on pursuing acquisitions in the mining space. At Magris, Kyle has worked on a number of large M&A transactions including the successful purchase of a niobium mine, Niobec. Kyle oversees operations at Niobec, including the management of major capital projects, financial budgets and forecasts, and other strategic initiatives.

Prior to joining Magris, Kyle worked as an analyst in HSBC’s diversified global banking team and previously worked for several years as an engineer for Hydro One.

Kyle holds a Mechanical Engineering degree from Queen’s University and completed his MBA at Rotman School of Management (University of Toronto).

Marco Di Girolamo – Technical Advisory Board Chair

Marco Di Girolamo serves as a Senior Vice President at Brookfield Asset Management, a global alternative asset manager with $350 billion AUM, focused on investing on long-life assets and businesses across real estate, infrastructure, renewable power, and private equity in 30 countries. Marco manages select institutional, financial service, and family office partner relationships (LPs) across Canada for Brookfield.

Prior to joining Brookfield, Marco advised family offices as a Portfolio Manager / Director at UBS. In this role, he managed discretionary client portfolios on an absolute return basis and led business development activities. Prior to this role, Marco consulted technology companies in Silicon Valley with Gartner.

In 2006, Marco co-founded Terra Firma, a registered Canadian charity, which partnered with Operation Water to build water infrastructure projects in developing communities in emerging economies. Marco completed his MBA with distinction at the Richard Ivey School of Business at Western University in Ontario, Canada.

Mikael Jansen – Business Development

Mikael Jansen serves as Business Developer at JGH Marine A/S and has over 20 years of business development and project management experience across Africa, Latin America, and the Caribbean.

Before joining JGH Marine, Mikael was the Business Development Manager for Haldor Topsoe for over 10 years, contracting large-scale fertilizer projects from corporate headquarters in Denmark and overseas offices in Argentina, Brazil, and South Africa. In this capacity, he met with political and business leaders to develop strategic projects that aimed to alleviate food shortages in developing nations.

Prior to Haldor Topsoe, Mikael served as a Sales Project Manager at Burmeister & Waine Scandanavian Contractors, structuring turnkey power plant projects in undeveloped regions. He also previously worked with environmental technology firms, Oreco and FLS Airtech, overseeing the financing of air pollution control and oil spill control projects in close cooperation with export credit agencies and other funders.

Mikael began his career as a Sales Manager at Maersk Industry. He graduated with a BS in Production Engineering from the Technical College of Odense.

Mohamad Ghosn - Operations

Mohamad Ghosn has over 23 years of experience as a microbiologist and 20 years as an engineering coordinator, designer, water and wastewater project manager for various municipalities, leachate, industries and communities throughout Canada and internationally.

A trilingual senior engineer, Mr. Ghosn has developed technical expertise in the design, management, start-up, operation and troubleshooting of biological process and mechanical problems for water and wastewater treatment systems for municipal and industrial installations. He has mastered multiple treatment technologies related to his field such as: conventional treatment system, Reverse Osmosis, activated sludge, aerated lagoons, sequencing batch reactor (SBR), membrane bioreactor (MBR), moving bed bioreactor (MBBR), disinfection, Aeration and mixing systems. Mr. Ghosn has also served as an expert witness on warranty, liability/litigation, energy and water audits. He has acted as a process engineer and product manager for suppliers of wastewater treatment equipment.

Mr. Ghosn participated on designing most of the leachate facilities existing in Quebec. Over the years, he has developed a new conceptual approach to treat the leachate from either domestic or composting sites. Mr. Ghosn has developed a new process narrative adapted to the age and the hydraulic flow fluctuation of the leachate.

Nyananso Gabriel Ekanem – Operations

Nyananso Gabriel Ekanem is the Founder and Managing Consultant at Weircapacity Ltd, an infrastructure and management consultancy that provides advisory services for the Water, Environment, and Infrastructure sectors.

Prior to founding Weircapacity, Nyananso was responsible for PPP contract management for the Federal Government of Nigeria Regulatory Agency for Public Private Partnerships. As an independent consultant, he worked on a number of Government and Civil Society partnership projects, including a European Union supported Water and Sanitation sector reform programme; this comprised Policy and Legal Reform, Institutional Reform, Financial Sustainability, Technical Capacity Assessment, Community Water Management, and Monitoring and Evaluation.

Nyananso earned a Masters Degree in Water and Environmental Management from the Water, Engineering, and Development Centre at Loughborough University in England.

Peter Macy – Operations

Peter Macy has 40 years of experience in all aspects of water supply, sanitation, and wastewater engineering, and is the Founder, President, and CEO of ROCKBlue. ROCKBlue is a social enterprise that partners with public utilities to collaboratively solve the management and institutional challenges of providing reliable and high-quality potable water and sewerage to urban customers.

Prior to founding ROCKBlue, Peter served in multiple capacities with CDM Smith, and oversaw their management of over $2 billion in infrastructure operations across Africa. He has also worked within and for numerous public utilities, including utilities in Mozambique, Tanzania, Zimbabwe and Lesotho.

Peter has lived most of his life in Africa and started his career as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Togo and the Central African Republic. He earned a BS in Industrial Engineering and Operations Research (IEOR) from Syracuse University.

René LeBlanc – Health & Safety

René has a BSc in Chemistry and a MSc in Environmental Health. He became certified Safety Professional (CRSP) in 2006 and Industrial Hygienist (ROH) in 2008.

Previously, René managed the Industrial Hygiene Department and the Air Group (GreenHouse Gas, Noise, Modeling, Permitting) at GHD Consulting Ltd. He also provided consulting services and training for Industrial, Commercial, and Governmental Clients.

René is President-elect of the International Occupational Hygiene Association and was 2017-2018 President of the Canadian Registration Board of Occupational Hygiene (CRBOH). He is also actively involved with Workplace Health Without Borders. René serves as a volunteer for Commonwealth Games Canada and at various sports events.

Robert Sinclair - Operations

Robert has spent over 20 years co-creating executive level strategic relationships and solutions with corporations (private & public), pension funds, private equity, development firms, hedge funds, family offices, NGO’s and business partners. He is currently the Chief Investment Officer with the mandate to create a Private Firm/Single Family office, Senior Advisor to the CEO of Louisiana 23 Development Company (LA23), and an Advisor to CrowdSmart - a pioneer in the application of prediction science for a Startup investing, combining world-class artificial intelligence (AI) and a global community of Member Evaluators to democratize the seed-investing ecosystem and deliver better outcomes for investors and entrepreneurs alike.

Robert began his career providing risk management consultancy at a boutique firm in Australia. After moving to Canada, Robert headed up the creation of the risk management division at RiskCheck Inc, a leading Canadian advisory firm. After leaving the firm, he created his own advisory firm which eventually merged with GHD, which is one of the world's leading professional services companies operating in the global market sectors of water, energy and resources, environment, property and buildings, and transportation.

Robert received a Bachelor of Applied Science from Western Sydney University.

Satish Menon - Operations

Satish Menon is the Founding Partner of Atethemis Inc, an international development consultancy that provides program planning, design, implementation, and management support for global development projects. Atethemis has a track record of successfully executing development projects that deliver sustainable water & sanitation service, with a focus on environmental integration, and social and gender inclusion. Satish also serves as a board member for ROCKBlue, and is a director and film producer.

Satish has extensive experience in leading projects in water treatment and distribution, wastewater collection and treatment, and storm water collection and detention. He also has experience in master planning and feasibility studies, and conducting risk assessment and mitigation exercises.

Satish earned a BA in Civil Engineering as well as a Master of Science in Environmental Engineering from Michigan State University.