Raising the bar for the Renewable Energy Directive

Claire Waysand is an expert on European and international economic issues and maintains a strong commitment to carbon neutrality and the development of renewable hydrogen solutions. Prior to her current role as Secretary General and Executive Vice President at ENGIE, Waysand has held several positions within the organization, including corporate secretary and acting chief executive officer. Waysand previously served the French government as the deputy director general of the Treasury and chief of staff of the Minister of Finance. She has also worked at the European level as a member of the European Economic and Financial Committee (EFC) and as the former director of the European Investment Bank (EIB).

Claude Turmes has been the Minister for Energy of Luxembourg since 2018. Within his role, he leads a pilot study that aims to determine the ecological transition of Luxembourg and achieve a zero-carbon cross-border country by 2050. Prior to joining government, Turmes was a long-standing member of the European Parliament, where he vice-chaired the parliamentary group of the Green Party. He was also the rapporteur of the directive on renewable energies, the second directive on the liberalisation of the energy market and the energy efficiency directive.

In his current role, Patrick ten Brink is responsible for the EEB’s EU Policy Unit and several horizontal dossiers, including better regulation, EU budget, fiscal reform, the environmental action programmes (EAPs) and oversight on the European Green Deal. He serves on the Management Committee of Seas at Risks and Executive Committee of the Environmental Coalition on Standards (ECOS), and is also a member of the Fit for Future Platform Stakeholder group. Prior to joining the EEB, ten Brink was director and head of green economy programme at the Institute for European Environmental Policy (IEEP), where he contributed to passenger cars and CO2 regulation, as well as the industrial emissions directive.

Prior to joining Friends of Europe, Dharmendra Kanani was director of policy at the European Foundation Centre (EFC). He was the England director at the Big Lottery Fund, the largest independent funder in the UK and fourth largest in the world. Dharmendra has held senior positions in the public and voluntary sectors and advisor to numerous ministerial policy initiatives across the UK.