Jim Mikel (President) Renew Energy Maintenance, LLC has over 12 years of wind industry experience and 25 years of combined wind and aircraft industry experience. Prior to founding Renew Energy Maintenance in 2009 Jim was the VP of Operations for Energy Maintenance Service; LLC (EMS). While at EMS Jim grew the organization from 15 technicians in 2002 to over 200 + technicians over all with revenues estimated at approximately 30 million. Responsibilities included overseeing the field operations, remanufacturing and engineering to include division budgets and preparation and review of contracts, agreements and bid proposals.

Prior to EMS he started his career in the industry with Zond / Enron and then GE Wind first as the Midwest service Rep responsible for Commissioning, trouble shooting and scheduling of man-hours to meet project deadlines for several wind projects in the Midwest. In 2000 Jim was promoted to Site Manager of the 107.25 Mw wind project at the Lake Benton I wind farm where his management helped maintain the site at an impressive 98% availability.

Prior to his career in the wind industry Jim spent 10 years as a project manager in the aviation industry as an A&P licensed mechanic. Jim has been active participant in various American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) working groups over the years.

Gary R. Fish is the Vice President and Chief Financial Officer for RENEW Energy Maintenance LLC and has over 30 years of energy and transportation industry experience with public and private companies.  Gary is one of the founding shareholders of RENEW Energy Maintenance, LLC that was founded in September 2009.

Gary served as the Vice President-Finance and Accounting for Energy Management Service LLC (EMS) from August 2008 to August 2009.  While at EMS, Gary focused on increasing EMS cash flow/profitability and integrating EMS into the public company of Broadwind Energy Inc. (BWEN). 

Prior to joining EMS, Gary was the Vice President-Treasurer of Cedar American Rail Holdings (CARH), the holding company of the largest regional railroad in North American.   As the #2 financial executive, Gary had broad financial responsibilities including a support role for the $2.4 billion sale of the Company to Canadian Pacific Railroad and the financing of the Company’s proposed $2.5 billion expansion into the coal fields of Wyoming.  Gary executed approximately $300 million of debt financings and $100 million of lease financings while employed with CARH. 

Prior to joining CARH, Gary held several executive positions with Black Hills Corporation (NYSE-BKH) including President and Chief Operating Officer of BKH’s independent energy subsidiary.  The independent energy business unit became BKH’s largest business unit under his leadership with over $1.1 billion of sales and net income of approximately $50 million in 2001. Gary also served in the positions of Vice President of Development and Corporate Controller in his career with BKH. 

Gary is a Certified Public Accountant and also practiced approximately five years with the national accounting firm of McGladrey & Pullen.  Gary is a graduate of the University of South Dakota.

Curt Eliason started in the wind industry working for Zond Energy Systems in the spring of 1998. He began as a field technician at the 107 MW Lake Benton Power Partners I wind turbine facility in SW Minnesota. Following the completion of commissioning, there were numerous retrofits, component upgrades, component failure studies and other turbine reliability exercises that Curt actively participated in. During this time, Curt developed tooling and written work instruction to implement numerous repairs and upgrades. During the 6 years Curt spent at this facility, he held positions of Safety Coordinator, Lead Technician, Technical Trainer and the last two years he served as Site Supervisor. During his time as Site Supervisor, Curt participated in many GE training seminars as well as 6 Sigma training and certification. Curt left GE Wind Energy in February 2004 to establish a gearbox repair service for EMS.  Curt served as Director of Remanufacturing overseeing repair facility operations as well as specialized field repair and inspection services.

Curt grew up farming and ranching in South Dakota. Prior to starting in the wind industry, he attended SDSU to pursue a degree in mechanical engineering.

Wade Wiechmann of Renew Energy Maintenance, LLC has over 10 years of wind industry experience.  Prior to joining Renew Energy Maintenance in 2009 Wade worked for Energy Maintenance Service, LLC (EMS) as Technical Director.  Wade joined the EMS team soon after inception and was responsible for control system design, programming and SCADA system development, retrofitting, and wind turbine performance optimization.  Wade also worked to develop and implement a service-tracking database that enables service history and turbine performance to be recorded and later analyzed for root cause analysis.

Prior to EMS Wade gained practical field experience while working on the construction of the145 Zond turbine Storm Lake I wind farm and later as a wind turbine technician at the142 turbine Lake Benton I wind farm first developed and owned by Zond, Enron and later GE Wind.  Wades duties included field service and operations; converter system troubleshooting and component repair, engineering change deployment and spare part inventory management. 

Wade attended the South Dakota School of Mines and Technology in the chemical engineering program where he had his first exposure to the math and modeling skills, process control and automation systems later used in his career.

Mike Sherman (Operations Manager) Renew Energy Maintenance, LLC began his career in the wind industry in July 2000. He most recently served as the Service Manager for Energy Maintenance Service, LLC (EMS) where his responsibilities included managing 70+ technicians, day to day operations and bid estimating. In addition Mike has also traveled North America performing various retrofits and maintaining and servicing all makes and models of turbines. He also has several years of experience as a Construction Foreman where he was responsible for the construction of megawatt size turbines such as the GE 1.5, NM 72, V82, N60, DeWind and new technology such as EWT and Goldwind.

Nick Siddens (Service Manager) Renew Energy Maintenance, LLC has over 10 years of wind industry experience. He joined the wind industry in 2000 with a focus on Construction Management where he participated in projects throughout North America both on technical and management level. Prior to joining Renew in 2009 Nick was the Operations Manager for Energy Maintenance Service, LLC (EMS) where he was responsible for the Operations & Maintenance contracts and asset management activities of over 500 Mw of wind projects.

Prior to joining the wind industry he worked as an aquatic ecology research technician with the Illinois Natural History Survey. Nick holds a BS in Natural Resource Environmental Science from the University of Illinois at Urban/Champaign