Opening Plenary Panel: Advancing Thermal Networks - CampusEnergy2026

Casey Collins serves as the Director of Utility & Energy Services for Duke University. His 65-person team is responsible for the safe, reliable, and efficient operation of district energy and water utilities for a 22 million square feet campus supporting over 40,000 people every day. This organization identifies and implements a broad portfolio of technologies and organizational solutions to help the University meet its facility performance, cost management, and greenhouse gas neutrality commitments. Prior to his work at Duke, Casey served industrial, institutional, and architectural clients with a variety of energy, engineering and project management services. He is an alumnus of North Carolina State University, a licensed Professional Engineer and Certified Energy Manager, and a lover of life with his family and community.

Tess McNamara, AIA, LEED AP is the Sustainable Buildings and Infrastructure Lead at the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey and serves on the faculty at the Yale School of Architecture.

An architect and sustainability leader, Tess advances decarbonization and climate action across complex building and infrastructure portfolios. At the Port Authority, she leads decarbonization strategy for airports, transit facilities, and other mission-critical assets, including district energy systems. Previously, Tess worked as a Senior Consultant at Arup, advising public and private clients on climate-responsive design, adaptive reuse, and retrofit of existing buildings. Tess’s research and writing explore the intersection of architecture, policy, urbanism, and climate, with a particular focus on reuse as a pathway to decarbonization. Her work has been featured by The New York Times, The New Yorker, and Architectural Digest. She holds a Master of Architecture from the Yale School of Architecture, a Master of Environmental Management from the Yale School of the Environment, and a Bachelor of Arts in Architecture from Princeton University. Tess has spent five years on the faculty at Yale, where she teaches the course “Bad Buildings: Decarbonization through Reuse, Retrofit, and Proposition.”

Christopher Potter is the Executive Director of Utilities and Power Plant Operations at the Architect of the Capitol in Washington, D.C. and is responsible for the management of the district energy system serving the buildings on and around Capitol Hill. Chris has been with the AOC since 2005. Prior to that, he worked at the General Services Administration district energy system also in Washington DC. Chris has a Master's degree in Public Administration from American University, a Master’s degree in Engineering Management from Catholic University, and a Bachelor's degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Maryland.

Mary is the Associate Vice-President, Facilities Management at Brock University, a higher education institution in Ontario, Canada. In this role, Mary provides leadership to a team of nearly 150 people who maintain and operate over $1.6B in assets. Mary has helped embed sustainability across the whole portfolio, which includes: Capital projects, project management, utilities, maintenance, vehicles and compliance.
For over 15 years, Mary has worked in the university sector, holding roles of Director, Asset Management & Utilities and Director, Sustainability & Asset Management, Energy & Carbon Manager and Environmental Project Coordinator. Via these roles, Mary has developed and advanced environmental, sustainability and utilities’ goals. She has been an active participant in the fight against climate change, implementing numerous energy efficiency and carbon management projects that have saved over 10 million dollars while reducing organizations’ carbon footprints.
Mary’s professional experience includes several years working on research and development, specializing on image processing and automation to assist medical personnel in the early detection of cancer. She also has experience in the consulting field, where she worked with small and medium enterprises in developing competitiveness strategies based on technology management and innovation.
Mary also believes in the power of collaboration; for over a decade she has been involved with OAPPA (Ontario Association of Physical Plant Administrators), a professional group of leaders in the facilities management sector. She has been particularly involved with the Energy sub-committee, of which she became the chair in 2024.
In terms of education, Mary holds a bachelor’s degree in Electronics and Telecommunications Engineering and a Masters degree (Technology management) from the Tecnologico de Monterrey. In addition, she holds a Masters of Environment and Sustainability from Western University and is both a Certified Energy Manager and a Certified Measurement & Verification Professional by the Association of Energy Engineers.

Mansi Talwar leads George Washington University’s portfolio of energy strategy, environmental and energy compliance, sustainability, and utilities, where she focuses on advancing decarbonization, improving campus energy performance, and aligning infrastructure investments with long-term sustainability and resilience goals. She has been with GW for five years and previously managed commercial and institutional energy programs for Washington, DC through the DC Sustainable Energy Utility, bringing more than a decade of experience developing and implementing large-scale energy and utility initiatives. Mansi serves on the DC Green Building Advisory Council and the DC Sustainable Energy Advisory Board, contributing an owner’s and operator’s perspective to policy and regulatory discussions while helping drive practical, high-performance building and clean energy solutions.

As Director of Utilities for Notre Dame’s Facilities Design and Operations division, Curt Wade heads up the operation and maintenance of Notre Dame’s utility generation and distribution systems. Wade leads a team of power plant operators, maintenance, and instrument and control technicians guiding efficiency, reliability, resiliency, dispatch, and generation capacity planning of the campus’s electrical and thermal generation, as well as potable and stormwater systems.

David Woodson is the Executive Director of Campus, Energy, Utilities, and Operations at the University of Washington where he is leading the effort to decarbonize the district heating system at the flagship Seattle campus. David previously had as similar role at the University of British Columbia (UBC) and now is enjoying the opportunity to apply the lessons learned from UBC at UW. David is a UW Alum (Aero and Astro ‘91) and has his MBA ‘06 from UBC. David is presently the Vice-Chair of the International District Energy Association (IDEA).