Our Team Timothy Heidel Breakthrough Energy Ventures

Tim has focused much of his career on accelerating the development and adoption of new approaches for controlling and optimizing the transmission and delivery of electric power, particularly in the context of high renewable generation penetrations.

Prior to joining BEV, Tim was Deputy Chief Scientist at the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association (NRECA) where he led technology development R&D programs in the areas of electric utility data analytics and grid cybersecurity. Prior to joining NRECA, Dr. Heidel served as a Program Director at the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E), where he managed a portfolio of over 75 research projects in the areas of electric power systems engineering and power electronics. Tim began his career as the Research Director for MIT’s “Future of the Electric Grid” study, coordinating research efforts from economics, policy and electrical engineering on the most important challenges and opportunities that are likely to face the U.S. electric grid over the next several decades.

Tim Heidel holds S.B., M.Eng., and Ph.D. degrees in Electrical Engineering and an M.S. in Technology and Policy from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.