Practice Areas
- Corporate (General Counsel) & Securities
- Energy Storage
- Project Development
- Project Finance
Education
- Cornell University, B.A. (Magna cum laude)
- University of Chicago Law School, J.D.
Admissions
- Wisconsin
Experience
Michael Allen is Of Counsel and the Director of Cleantech Law Partners’ energy storage practice group. He is a published author and speaker on business and legal issues relating to energy storage. His quarter century of experience representing utilities is particularly valuable not only to utilities seeking to incorporate energy storage into their asset portfolios, but also to third party energy storage providers seeking to serve utilities as customers and to commercial and industrial businesses seeking to maximize value from their own energy storage facilities.
Mr. Allen has broad and deep renewable energy development experience that includes representing utilities (including a publicly traded utility’s first wind farm and community solar project), local governments, developers, and equipment and service providers in solar, wind, biomass and biofuels resource transactions. He has also broad and deep experience in energy efficiency transactions including serving as legal counsel for:
- the development, construction and ongoing operations of a large cogeneration plant;
- a non-profit organization that administers energy efficiency incentive programs;
- and a truck idling elimination equipment startup company that had a successful exit at many times its initial valuation. He was also the first angel investor in this company.
His prior experience includes serving as a law firm managing partner and as a City attorney. He has also served as officer and director to several non-profits including renewable energy policy and education organizations, a library foundation and the Badger-Hawkeye Region of the Blood Services Division of the American Red Cross. His latest non-profit venture has been to found and serve as president of a 501(c) (3) tax-exempt corporation that provides support for clean energy development in Sub-Saharan Africa.
Publications & Speaking Engagements
Mr. Allen has taught and been a guest lecturer at various institutions and for various organizations, including the Midwest Renewable Energy Association, Arizona State University and the University of Wisconsin Law School. His latest publications and speaking engagements are:
- “Energy Storage: The Emerging Legal Framework (And Why It Makes a Difference), Natural Resources & Environment, Volume 30, Number 4, Spring 2016.
- “Utility Scale Grid Storage: Business Opportunities & Legal Challenges”, a presentation at the Wisconsin Public Utility Institute’s Grid Storage: Rapidly Reframing Wholesale Markets Seminar, November 14, 2016.