Board Member – Jill Cliburn

Jill Cliburn (Cliburn and Associates) has spent her career focused on best practices and innovation for utilities and the communities they serve. This includes renewables on every scale, storage, load flexibility and energy efficiency. Recent work has focused on siting solutions for community solar and large-scale solar and storage, promoting a broad, new narrative about solar energy and its role in serving today’s community needs. Jill also continues as a technical advisor and coach for the National Community Solar Partnership. For example, through NCSP she served as a facilitator during the final, collaborative development of New Mexico’s community solar program. 

A decade earlier, Jill was one of the first to advance community solar business models nationwide, working with public power and electric co-ops, gaining industry and federal support. That work drew on other early experiences with demand-side management and integrated resource planning, enabling her to advance some of the first solar-plus-storage and solar/load flexibility programs in the US.

A longtime proponent of silo-busting and networking through associations, Jill has provided professional and volunteer support to organizations ranging from the Association of Energy Services Professionals (AESP) to the Smart Electric Power Alliance (SEPA) to Southwest Energy Efficiency Project (SWEEP), various associations for electric co-ops and public power, Sierra Club, Santa Fe Green Chamber, etc. In the early 2000s, she represented the New Mexico Conference of Churches in a coalition that launched the state’s first greenhouse gas inventory and programs. Jill has been on the boards of American Solar Energy Society (ASES), Solar Energy International (SEI), and the Santa Fe Botanical Garden.

She recently moved to Illinois, but continues to nourish roots in New Mexico, with plans for a bit of land she and her husband still have outside Santa Fe. 

Board Member – Marchez Coriz

Marchez Coriz is an experienced utility professional who leverages his engineering background and customer‑focused mindset to support some of New Mexico’s most influential organizations. As a Senior Strategic Account Manager at PNM, he builds and nurtures partnerships with major businesses, government entities, and institutional customers across the state. Marchez excels at helping complex customers navigate their evolving energy needs, turning technical, regulatory, and operational challenges into clear strategies that support long‑term success.

He brings six years of experience in the utility industry, beginning his career as a distribution engineer designing electrical infrastructure for commercial and residential developments, along with system‑reliability projects statewide. This engineering foundation strengthened his technical problem‑solving skills, deepened his understanding of grid operations, and built his confidence in delivering exceptional customer service.

Marchez continues to draw on that engineering background today, bridging conversations between technical experts, decision makers, and cross‑functional teams to ensure customer needs are understood and strategically supported. Whether he is interpreting rate design, advising on complex interconnections, or helping organizations plan for the future, he is committed to ensuring customers are prepared for both immediate demands and emerging opportunities.

What drives Marchez most is trust. He takes the time to understand customers at every level, advocates for their goals within PNM, and delivers solutions that create meaningful value for their business and the wider community. As a new board member of the New Mexico Solar Energy Association, he is excited to bring that same commitment, energy, and leadership to advancing clean‑energy education and helping shape a stronger, more resilient energy future for New Mexico.

Vice President – Greg Crabtree

Greg has an associate’s degree in electronics, (1986), and worked 12 years in the TV & radio broadcast world, and 2 years in avionics, all in his home state of Virginia. He also worked 8 years as a high school teacher, teaching video production and media literacy.

In 2004 Greg left Virginia, moving to New Mexico to take a second associate’s degree in Renewable Energy Systems Design at San Juan College in Farmington. This degree covered a wide range of topics, including photovoltaics, wind turbines, small hydro-electric systems, solar hot water systems, and passive solar building design and thermal modeling. Since graduating in 2006, he’s worked in the solar industry in a variety of roles in New Mexico.

Greg has worked full-time for solar equipment distributors, grid-tie PV installers, and solar equipment manufacturers. As a freelancer, he installed solar hot water systems, performed building thermal analysis for certain architects (analyzing the performance of passive solar buildings), and installed small off-grid PV systems for friends.

Greg has been a participant in various NMSEA events since 2004.

 President – Robert E. Foster

Robert is an international renewable energy development specialist who has worked in 46 countries over the past 40 years implementing thousands of projects utilizing solar, wind, geothermal, and micro-hydro. He has conducted cutting edge research and development on solar water purification (8 patents), solar chilling, and solar mini-grids. Robert joined NMSEA in 1988 while attending the Peter Van Dresser workshop at Ghost Ranch and is a NMSEA life member. Robert served as Chairman of the Texas Solar Energy Society from 1999-2001, as well as President of the El Paso Solar Energy Association from 1991-95. Robert has been an ASES member since 1990 and is now rolling off the ASES Board after six years in December. He served as ASES Chairman from foe three years, and has helped write successful proposals for ASES to bring in significant grant funding for solar projects, especially with EPA for Native Americans in the Dakotas.

Treasurer – Walter Gerstle

Walter Gerstle is Professor Emeritus of civil engineering at the University of New Mexico with an emphasis in structural engineering and structural mechanics. Gerstle has been active in researching the computational modeling of fracture of composite structures. He is a licensed professional engineer. He has worked for many years as a structural consultant, and has spent summers and sabbaticals performing research at NASA, Sandia National Laboratories, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, National Institute of Standards and Technology, and Oak Ridge National Laboratories. He is the Engineer of Record on many UniRAC, Inc. and Array Technologies, Inc. facilities and products and has provided engineering expertise for both companies in the early development of their now successful business models for the solar energy sector. Gerstle is past president of the New Mexico Section of ASCE, past president of NMSPE, and he is currently Secretary of the NM Board of Licensure for Professional Engineers and Professional Surveyors.

Board Member – Joaquin Karcher

 Over the past 35 years, my work has been driven by a deep commitment to sustainable design. I have been part of its evolution through multiple phases—from earth architecture and passive solar adobe construction to Passive House standards and beyond.

In its current iteration, my work focuses on designs that actively supports the energy transition: moving away from fossil fuels toward beautiful, highly comfortable, and ultra-efficient residences powered entirely by solar energy.

The guiding mission of my projects today is zero-carbon design, with a particular emphasis on affordability, ensuring that high-performance, sustainable living is accessible rather than exclusive.

Board Member – Luther Krueger

Luther Krueger has been collecting, designing, and promoting solar cookers in Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA since 2004. As host of “Saturday Solar Cooking Brunches,” instructing through community education courses, and setting up demos at farmers markets in south Minneapolis, Luther hopes to reach the tipping point for solar cooker adoption in Minnesota and beyond. Luther has installed a variation of the Barbara Kerr “through-the-wall” cooker in his south-facing garage wall, called the Sun Portal.

Beginning in 2020, Luther began traveling the path of solar cooking video interviewer. While working full-time, he has found time to travel several times across the USA, stopping to create video interviews with notable pioneers and practitioners of solar cooking. His library of video interviews can be seen at: Luther Krueger’s YouTube solar cooking channel, The Big Blue Sun Museum of Solar Cooking .

Luther retired in 2023 and volunteers full time with his solar cooking video projects, as well as a free solar cooking newsletter and occasional world-wide forums for discussions about solar cooking design, promotion, and DIY models.

Board Member – Troy McGee

Troy is a 5th-generation New Mexican with a computer science and information technology background. Troy is interested in all solutions that benefit New Mexico households, jobs, and the economy through our difficult transition away from fossil fuels. Troy has worked with several rooftop photovoltaic solar installers in the region and recently has been working on New Mexico’s Community Solar program.  Troy is a liaison between NMSEA and the Renewable Energy Industries Association of New Mexico (REIA-NM). His dream is to see each high school in New Mexico have an energy storage or agrivoltaic project built by students. This way, all students can witness firsthand the practical applications of renewable energy generation and storage and lead more students to renewable energy career paths.

 Secretary – Steve McWilliams

Life experiences: University, Military, career USDA, retired after 32 years as watershed program manager (soil science/hydrology/air), and married for 44 years.  Been in Albuquerque 45 years.  Hobbies over the years include ham radio, private flying, equestrian and travel.

Saw the “hockey stick” graph of the atmospheric temperature/CO2 rate equation in 1992 at the National Soil Science Institute at Texas A&M, and I did the math, and concluded it is OTTOMCO (obvious to the most casual observer) that I had experienced a stable world prior to that and the shit will hit the fan if nothing is done.  It has proven to be a correct analysis over the intervening years. 

Went to hybrid cars in 2002 and solar in 2009 when we needed to bring the roof into code and PNM offered the REC program with a 4.7 KW system.  About that time, we went to induction cooking, electric water heaters, and a third generation Prius.  Tesla in 2018 then another tesla for the wife in 2020 with solar carport bringing the solar system to 9.4 KW inverter capacity and battery storage enough for home and charging cars.  Smartflower in 2023 to trickle charge the teslas, and to put the house to complete electric for this winter.  Getting good at battery management.