If you're looking to practice law at a high level and help save the planet at the same time, renewable energy might be the area for you. The team at V&E explain what this kind of work involves and how to get a piece of the renewables action...
Kaam Sahely, partner: The ETP group is very broad given how large the firm’s footprint is in the energy area. The group includes all of V&E’s project development lawyers, project finance lawyers, renewables lawyers (both on the deal side, M&A, joint ventures, and tax equity), and also our traditional hydrocarbon lawyers (oil and gas upstream, midstream, downstream, and LNG), as well as infrastructure, including both energy and non-energy infrastructure. One of the big projects we’ve been working on for a few years is the high-speed rail project down in Houston.
Danielle Patterson, partner: Right now, we're seeing a lot of investment in the infrastructure space and particularly renewables and power projects. The way I describe what we do in particular is that it’s sort of where M&A meets private equity meets project development meets project finance. One needs to have an understanding of how all of those transactions work together before any given renewable deal or energy focused deal.
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Lauren Davies, counsel: When you start as a junior lawyer, you could be doing transactions that involve M&A, joint ventures, project development, construction, sale and supply arrangements, financing, equity investment, environmental work or other types of transactions within the energy space. We practice in a variety of sectors; oil and gas, renewables, infrastructure and the list goes on. As your career develops, you become more specialized so, for example, you may focus on the M&A side of the ETP group or you may become an expert in project development and financing, and within those disciplines you could focus on certain elements of the energy sector such as renewables and clean energy. Energy is at the core of V&E and we are regularly ranked as the world’s leading energy law firm. Our ETP practice is really at the heart of what the firm does, giving us the opportunity to work regularly with other groups within the firm such as the tax, M&A or our disputes teams.
Stephanie Coco, senior associate: The energy transactions and projects group is our broader energy group so renewables are part of what the group does, but we also do the full gamut of energy work, whether it's upstream, midstream, project development, etc. In the renewables space, we've seen a lot of buying and selling of renewable asset portfolios over the past couple of years. We’ve also done a lot of work for development type companies when they're developing renewables projects or doing construction arrangements for those projects. Recently we’ve had a number of our traditional energy clients who we've always represented in the oil and gas space starting to branch out into renewables as well. So, we’ve been doing their initial stage development work.
Mary Alexander, counsel: In the US renewable space, there are tax credits available for many different types of projects. The most utilized credits are those for wind and solar. The tax group and the energy transactions and projects group represent clients involved in these projects from the beginning development stages all the way through to completion and operation. We’ve also represented clients in dispositions and acquisitions of operating projects. We help clients address the tax issues that are relevant to the particular stage of the transaction and anticipate issues that may arise in a later stage. We frequently represent clients acquiring projects that are in early phases of development and, from a tax perspective, we must determine if the projects our clients are acquiring will be eligible for the anticipated tax credits associated with the applicable project so that our client gets the most value out of the projects as possible.
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KS: This depends on the partner. For example, I run the practice and cover the projects, renewables and project finance areas. Partners generate the clients and make sure that we’re doing the work for our clients by staffing deals correctly and training our associates to make sure they get a good spread of work across the different parts of the group. We spend a lot of time making sure our first, second and third years are getting good experience across all the different areas that I mentioned previously.
DP: We're involved from day one with structuring for the transaction, upper-tier structuring for the form of the client’s investment, we're working on the term sheet, we're working on due diligence. Of course all of that is working across disciplines so we're going to be highly reliant on working with our tax team, particularly in the renewable energy space. We've got our tax equity partners and we're working with the environmental and regulatory folks, securities, finance, all of that to really put the deal together. We're generally quarterbacking the deal, so we'll be heavily involved in leading the contract drafting, negotiation, and execution. A lot of our deals, whether it's an M&A deal or a project development deal, we have a lot of ongoing and repeat work from any kind of particular investment. Sometimes it's the ongoing implementations and monitoring, or we may help clients structure initial investments and they might have a lot of repeat investments that we'll keep working on with them.
LD: From a deal perspective, the role of a counsel can be similar to the role of a partner. As counsel, on a very high level you would be expected to lead deals as well as manage the internal team. At the beginning of a transaction, you would try and establish what the clients’ objectives and needs are. It will be your responsibility, along with the partner on the transaction, to make sure that the clients’ objectives are being met. From an internal perspective, counsels spend a lot of time ensuring the deals are staffed appropriately, managing and overseeing the associates and trainees on the deal, and ensuring proper delegation. A counsel would also be responsible for communicating with the client, with the lawyers on the opposite side of the deal and, if it is a cross border transaction, which it often is, we will be responsible for liaising with the relevant local counsel. The partners have a huge amount of responsibility and don't always have as much resource to give internally, so they look to the counsel to help them in mentoring and teaching the team.
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MA: I think first and foremost is understanding your client’s goals in a particular transaction and understanding the space that they're in. Then it's looking at the different documentation that's necessary to effectuate a transaction and making sure that you know you've got all the protections in place that your client needs. A counsel is often the client’s point person for a transaction and you have to fully understand the business deal to make sure you can appropriately respond to client questions, advise the associates doing diligence, research and marking up agreements, and keep the partners on the transaction informed as to the material issues.
SC: As a senior associate, we're given a lot of responsibility and autonomy. We're responsible for all the drafting of the transaction documents and your deal management type tasks. Frequently we have a very active role in the negotiations and have lots of client contact. We play the legal advisor role for our clients, but because we do have such a depth of knowledge in the industry, the clients view us as more than just legal advisors. They really value our input on market standard commercial positions and frequently ask us what we’ve seen on key points.
Michael Zarcaro, associate: Probably a lot of the same responsibilities that a general corporate attorney would have, but I think our clients really look for us to have more asset specific knowledge. We’re given a lot of open drafting responsibilities, even at the more junior associate level, than what you might come across in a more generalist corporate practice group, in part due to the more bespoke nature of our work with the uniqueness of the transactions that we work on.
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KS: You have to believe that reducing carbon in the environment is the right thing to do, and the more interested you are in that piece of it the better you’ll do because you have more passion for the work, for the cause, and then you can really dig into the project and see what’s happening.
DP: First and foremost, you need to be a really solid lawyer. You've got to have the legal expertise, drafting skills, legal analysis, and negotiation skills that every lawyer needs. I think what makes what we do so interesting and so rewarding is that you really learn a lot about the industry. You need to understand how these projects work and you need to understand all the pieces of the puzzle; how does the project get built? Has it become operational? How and when did they get financing and come online? For me really
MA: I think first and foremost is understanding your client’s goals in a particular transaction and understanding the space that they're in. Then it's looking at the different documentation that's necessary to effectuate a transaction and making sure that you know you've got all the protections in place that your client needs. A counsel is often the client’s point person for a transaction and you have to fully understand the business deal to make sure you can appropriately respond to client questions, advise the associates doing diligence, research and marking up agreements, and keep the partners on the transaction informed as to the material issues.
SC: As a senior associate, we're given a lot of responsibility and autonomy. We're responsible for all the drafting of the transaction documents and your deal management type tasks. Frequently we have a very active role in the negotiations and have lots of client contact. We play the legal advisor role for our clients, but because we do have such a depth of knowledge in the industry, the clients view us as more than just legal advisors. They really value our input on market standard commercial positions and frequently ask us what we’ve seen on key points.
Michael Zarcaro, associate: Probably a lot of the same responsibilities that a general corporate attorney would have, but I think our clients really look for us to have more asset specific knowledge. We’re given a lot of open drafting responsibilities, even at the more junior associate level, than what you might come across in a more generalist corporate practice group, in part due to the more bespoke nature of our work with the uniqueness of the transactions that we work on.
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KS: You have to believe that reducing carbon in the environment is the right thing to do, and the more interested you are in that piece of it the better you’ll do because you have more passion for the work, for the cause, and then you can really dig into the project and see what’s happening.
DP: First and foremost, you need to be a really solid lawyer. You've got to have the legal expertise, drafting skills, legal analysis, and negotiation skills that every lawyer needs. I think what makes what we do so interesting and so rewarding is that you really learn a lot about the industry. You need to understand how these projects work and you need to understand all the pieces of the puzzle; how does the project get built? Has it become operational? How and when did they get financing and come online? For me really
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