Elias Hinckley focuses his practice on advising clients in the clean and renewable energy industries on business, policy, tax and regulatory issues.

Mr. Hinckley joined Venable from Deloitte & Touche LLP, where he was the Practice Leader for the Alternative and Renewable Energy Tax practice for the U.S. and was one of the co-architects of Deloitte’s global strategy on climate change. Throughout his career, he has advised clients from the full spectrum of alternative energy companies, including solar, wind, geo-thermal, biomass and advanced coal.

His strong grasp of federal energy policy and the business and tax issues associated with alternative energy and traditional power generators has enabled him to work on diverse matters ranging from individual project finance to the operations of energy markets, including carbon financing, and allowed him to act as a lead advisor on several energy projects.

Significant Matters

Mr. Hinckley has advised clients on alternative energy investment, development and project finance, as well as the development and operation of carbon and renewable energy certificate markets.

Some of Mr. Hinckley's recent significant matters include:

• Advising on structured tax equity investments for wind farms, photovoltaic and solar thermal facilities.
• Identifying and analyzing available sources incentive and regulatory support for wind and geothermal projects.
• Negotiating, drafting and amending power purchase and energy supply agreements.
• Supporting a developer's submission for state funding for an off-shore wind development.
• Advising a European utility on solar energy investment's in the U.S. market, including tax and renewable energy certificate financing.
• Performing a carbon regulation readiness review for a large U.S. utility.
• Advising several manufacturing companies on how policy developments would affect the market for renewable energy manufacturing investments.
• Developing analysis and reports of the risks, friction points and barriers to entry facing geothermal companies and designing a blueprint for a refined industry platform for the U.S. Department of Energy’s Geothermal Technologies Program.
• Working with several biofuel producers on tax, renewable fuel standards and carbon based financing issues.

In addition, he has worked with developers of several other technologies, including fuel cells, combined heat and power systems, gasification, and hydroelectric facilities.

Activities

Mr. Hinckley has spoken on renewable energy topics at numerous professional meetings and teaches a course on international energy policy at Georgetown University, where he is an adjunct professor.