The Energy Translation Changemaker

From intern to senior vice president of business development, Sara Mochrie built her career at WSP beginning with project roles then moving to program management and now business development.

United States | Tuesday, March 26, 2024
Reading Time : 4:33 minutes

As Earth & Environment sector leader for power, Sara sees her role as a coach and risk manager, helping others understand WSP’s capabilities and advising clients in moving projects from idea to implementation. It was Sara’s personal passion for the environment that led to her first job as a marine scientist studying environmental stressors and their impact on marine environments. She has spent the last 25 years consulting on a variety of energy projects including onshore and offshore renewables, transmission and pipelines to understand the environmental risks and advance projects to successful completion.

What inspires or motivates you in your career?

I am a competitive person by nature, and I love to win. It motivates me to see my team feel inspired and take on challenges. The projects I work on across the energy transition are complex and it takes our whole team and even multiple parts of our business to come together to achieve success. One recent example is when we came together to win a very strategic project in New York that will expand the transmission grid and contribute to achieving the state-wide goal of nearly 70 percent renewable energy sources by 2030.

What is the biggest challenge in your field that you’re working to help resolve?

I often refer to my role as translation. The energy market is erratic, and we have to follow market changes and determine the best way to advise our clients about regulations, political approaches and supply chain challenges. We must be agile and flexible. In the past it would take years for the market to shift, these days it is much more the flavor of the month or the week.

Sara Mochrie

Senior Vice President, Earth & Environment Power Market Leader

United States

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The projects I work on across the energy transition are complex and it takes our whole team and even multiple parts of our business to come together to achieve success.

Sara participating in a 2023 offshore wind panel discussion.

The erratic nature of the energy market is impacting our clients’ budgets and there is not a lot of certainty around how much projects are going to cost. This used to happen a lot in the oil and gas industry, but it took a long time for a bubble to form and deflate. The current market bubbles are quick and a company’s ability to tolerate them has changed. The industry has seen some offshore wind projects canceled and multi-billion-dollar hydrogen hub projects fold when they didn’t get Department of Energy funding.

I work with client teams that are sometimes new to delivering energy transition projects and help them de-risk their projects. Energy transition wasn’t even a job title a few years ago. From a U.S. perspective, we are not as advanced in our energy transition as other countries. We use knowledge transfer and expertise from our work in more advanced regions to share what worked elsewhere and match clients with partners to progress projects.

What are some impactful projects you have been a part of?

I see my work as helping build an infrastructure project not an energy project. Then take the best parts of WSP and inject them into the project. The projects are then not only impactful to the market but also for our clients. For example, helping a solar client understand they need to look at their planned development of 50 solar farms as a whole portfolio instead of individual projects. I enjoy working with them to ensure the land is resilient, understand potential flood risks and find a durable solution.

I also enjoy last mile projects, such as the Champlain Hudson Power Express. This is a unique project that cuts across agricultural regions, water and into the urban heart of NYC. Getting transmission infrastructure into an urban environment is a hard last mile. It takes decades to build these projects and I walk away feeling like I make a difference. It is fun pursuing these projects and determining how we can be the most helpful to our clients.

Sara enjoys last mile projects, such as the Champlain Hudson Power Express. This is a unique project that cuts across agricultural regions, water and into the urban heart of NYC.

I see my work as helping build an infrastructure project not an energy project. Then take the best parts of WSP and inject them into the project. The projects are then not only impactful to the market but also for our clients.

What emerging trends or technologies to advance the energy transition while driving positive environmental impact do you find most promising?

The transmission needs for the energy transition dovetails with transportation. For example, when a new lane is added to a congested highway. A trend we are seeing is more corridor optimization. Many transmission pathways are full, but how can we look to optimize and fit more capacity into areas that are already disturbed. Using this approach to disturb less land helps to lessen social equity and environmental justice impacts and doesn’t create new industrial scars.

There is a need for permitting acceleration everywhere. Fieldwork to support permitting can take two years and some projects lose funding during this time. It would be a game changer for the industry if agencies would consider conditional permits based on AI desktop studies. Then use in-person field studies to confirm and finalize the permit after a conditional permit is issued.

Why do you enjoy working at WSP?

I like how much we can do for clients. Early in my career, we always had to partner with other firms. With the growth of WSP’s capabilities, now it only takes a phone call to a colleague to find a solution. Figuring out everything we have in our “store” and how to deploy it can be challenging at times. I feel like I can really make a difference at WSP. It is rewarding when the client comes to you with a challenge, and you know we can help. We have an incredible amount of knowledge here to share.