Who We Are
Harcourt Brown & Carey (HB&C) is a national consulting
firm with unrivaled experience maneuvering the clean energy marketplace.
Harcourt Brown & Carey (HB&C) is a national consulting
firm with unrivaled experience maneuvering the clean energy marketplace.
Founder
Matthew has worked in the energy finance and policy field for more than 20 years, beginning his work with the accounting and consulting firm of KPMG in its New York City office. He subsequently worked with an environmental, energy and finance consulting firm conducting research on viability of clean coal companies in the late 1980s. He went on to work with the City of New York, where he was in charge of establishing public-private partnerships for the financing of natural gas fueling stations, among other related activities.
In 1994 he moved to Denver, Colorado, where he headed the National Conference of State Legislatures energy program for 11 years. In this role, he directed a program that provided non-partisan advice on a wide variety of state clean energy policies, including renewable energy standards, tax policy, and establishment of public benefit funds, among numerous other roles. During this time, he testified in more than 35 state legislatures, as well as in front of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.
In 2005, Matthew moved to Paris, France in order to begin consulting work with the International Energy Agency, focusing in particular on renewable energy and energy efficiency. Upon his return to Colorado, Matthew built upon his background in a combination of clean energy policy and finance to develop an extensive practice that involves assisting state governments, utilities, lenders, the U.S. Department of Energy, national associations and others in the area of clean energy finance.
Matthew has led HB&C’s engagement with the four California investor owned utilities to develop and implement energy efficiency financing programs as well as a similar engagement to develop a third party financing program with utility bill collections in for the Hawaii Public Utilities Commission. Additionally, he leads the firm’s engagement with Xcel Energy advising on financing. Matthew has worked extensively with a number of financial institutions to advise on deployment of capital through loans and leases for clean energy in the western United States as well as nationally. Finally, Matthew possesses unique expertise in advising governments that are looking to support financing program development. Matthew has developed multiple public-private partnerships between state governments and private capital providers and lenders.
Matthew graduated from Brown University in 1986 with a BA, and continued on to New York University, where he received an MBA.
Senior Associate
Jeremy is a Senior Associate with HB&C. He has worked to develop and launch financing programs in both the residential and commercial markets for utility, government and commercial clients. He has brought to market clean energy finance programs as wide-ranging as unsecured consumer loans, commercial PACE and home mortgage products.
Jeremy has significant experience in successful program deployment and contractor training, including launching and providing ongoing education and outreach to contractors for clean energy finance products. Most recently, he has helped develop and launch HBC Energy Capital, and managed the integration of HBC Energy Capital’s brokerage services with utility, contractor and government-based clients.
Jeremy comes to HB&C from the public sector where he designed and managed the contractor friendly Elevations Energy Loan. This successful program has made over $35 million in lending capital available for EE/RE projects to commercial and residential customers in Boulder and Denver Counties. He brings a strong background and formal training in policy, marketing, GHG accounting, and climate action planning.
He holds a BA in environmental policy and anthropology from the University of Colorado and an MA in environmental policy with a focus on climate policy and economics from the Evergreen State College.
Senior Associate
Heather Braithwaite is a Senior Associate with HB&C. She has worked in the energy finance and policy field for 9 years. She has worked across all sectors, including residential, commercial and government facilities. Heather has significant experience in developing on-bill finance programs and assessing statewide energy efficiency financing landscapes to enhance current or create new offerings.
Heather is responsible for assisting in the development and deployment of energy efficiency finance programs, assembling deals between private investors and private sector customers needing financing for energy efficiency projects, and consulting to city/state entities to help them support deployment of capital into various energy efficiency lending vehicles.
Recently she has expanded her role to a project finance manager for HBC Energy Capital, gathering information and providing customized pro-formas and other information to project developers to understand their financing and cash flow options.
Heather holds a degree in Environmental Studies with a focus in sustainability from the University of Colorado at Boulder and a MBA from Pinchot University, Seattle WA that focuses on sustainable systems.
Senior Advisor
Jim has over 40 years of experience in the energy efficiency, energy finance, utility services, IT & electronics technology industries. He has been a pioneer in the development of energy efficiency finance initiatives through his work with finance institutions, state & federal agencies and utilities.
Prior to joining HB&C, Jim served over 20 years as CEO of Volt Viewtech, which was re-organized as Viewtech Financial Services when Jim acquired the company from its Fortune 500 parent in 2005. Jim sold the company in 2013 to Kilowatt Financial, with a follow-on agreement to serve as a Managing Director through 2015.
Over the course of 20 years, Jim worked with Fannie Mae to develop and improve its Energy Loan program with utilities and agencies nation-wide, establishing Viewtech as Fannie Mae’s oldest and most experienced Lender and Servicer of the Energy Loan portfolio. During his time at Viewtech, the company originated over $400 million in EE loans and serviced portfolios up to $250 million. The company also serviced outsourced utility rebate programs, automatic meter reading (”AMR”) installations and conducted over a million residential energy audits.
Prior to Viewtech, Jim worked in software development for the telephony and defense industries and as a Project Manager developing Energy Management and Control Systems (“EMCS”) deployed on military installations.
Jim holds a Juris Doctor Degree from California Southern Law School, a BS in Business Administration from the University of Redlands, a BS in Law from the Citrus Belt Law School and certifications in Aviation Electronics from the U.S. Air University. Jim served in the U.S. Air Force from 1974 to 1980.
Senior Advisor
Martin has over 20 years of experience representing and advising players in the domestic and international energy industry, including utilities, project developers/owners, lenders, equity participants and large energy consumers. His practice focuses on complex commercial transactions, particularly those at the intersection of regulation and commerce, in energy (with a particular focus on renewables and efficiency), environmental commodities/carbon credits, and infrastructure development and finance areas. He has also represented utilities, project developers, and lenders in regulatory proceedings before the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and state utility regulators. Martin is a frequent speaker on the global carbon and renewable energy markets.
Since joining HB&C in 2011, among other things, Martin has played a key role in advising the Government of Puerto Rico on its renewable energy incentive programs, ran a successful RFP to construct a 5 MW distributed carport-based solar PV installation at the Puerto Rico Convention Center and was instrumental in designing a residential solar incentive program that would have deployed solar photovoltaic systems on 20,000 homes in the Commonwealth for homeowners with FICO scores as low as 640, selling power at a low fixed rate for 20 years. Recently, he co-authored with Matthew H. Brown a detailed report on energy efficiency financing for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts Department of Energy Resources, in which HB&C recommended implementation of a commercial PACE program and drafted the enabling legislation, which is currently under consideration by the Massachusetts state legislature.
Up until June of 2011, Martin was Managing Director, Carbon Credits and Renewable Energy USA for Noble Group, a Fortune Global 250 commodities firm and, prior to that Chief Legal Officer of AgCert, PLC, a pioneer developer of greenhouse gas emissions reduction offsets under the Kyoto Protocol. Earlier in his career, he was a Partner in the Denver office of Baker & Hostetler, LLP and was associated with Holland & Hart, LLP, also in Denver.
Martin is a graduate of the Harvard Law School (JD 1991), the Harvard Kennedy School (MPP 1991) and the University of California, Berkeley (A.B. 1985). He is admitted to practice law in Colorado, California, Connecticut and the District of Columbia.
HARCOURT BROWN & CAREY
We would love to hear about your clean energy project goals. Let us know what type of project you want to pursue with us, and we will get right back to you. For inquiries and information about our brokerage services, please visit us at www.hbcenergycapital.com
Harcourt Brown & Carey (HB&C) is a national consulting firm with unrivaled experience maneuvering the clean energy marketplace. We deliver energy efficiency finance solutions that work in the real world.