Phillip A. Guerra, CPL

Phillip is a land acquisition manager at Lightsource bp, a global leader in solar development, management, and operations. He and his company develop utility-scale solar projects across 19 countries, including the United States.

After graduating from law school in 2013, Phillip began his career in the upstream oil and gas sector as a contractor for Antero Resources’ broker, where he ran title (surface, mineral, HBP, heirship) and completed pre-drilling and post-drilling ownership reports on behalf of his client in southeast Ohio.

In 2017, he continued his work as a field land manager for Rice Energy, now EQT Corporation, where he successfully negotiated over 150 deals in the first six months of employment. Phillip was quickly promoted to project manager, where he oversaw the client’s leasing activity in Ohio. In 2018, he and his team of 14 contractors closed over 680 deals and had zero “non-perf” zones due to landowners “holding out,” helping his client avoid any lost revenue.

In early 2019, Phillip transitioned out of oil and gas and into solar. He accepted his first in-house position at ForeFront Power, where he oversaw land acquisition for community solar projects on the east coast. In his three years at the San Francisco based company, he successfully closed 90 deals across seven different states, totaling over 400 megawatts of potential solar projects.

As a Certified Professional Landman, Phillip has been a proud member of the American Association of Professional Landmen since 2014. He has presented on several topics related to oil & gas and solar across the country, educating land professionals on the similarities and differences between the two industries. Phillip was awarded the AAPL’s Education Award in 2022 and formerly sat on AAPL’s Educational Committee as well as NAPE’s Operators Committee.

Phillip holds a BBA in Marketing and Real Estate from the University of Cincinnati and his Juris Doctorate from Florida A&M University’s College of Law. He lives with his wife, Kathleen, in Columbus, Ohio.

linkedin.com/in/phillip-guerra

Heath Thompson is the Director of Land at Hatch where he oversees the land group including title verification and business development efforts. Prior to Hatch, Mr. Thompson served in various Land and Leadership capacities at Brigham Exploration, Statoil and Equinor. His upstream expertise includes organic asset growth, stakeholder management, field development, creation and integration of systems and processes, as well as project management. Mr. Thompson holds a CPL certification and graduated with a Bachelor of Business Administration in Energy Management with Honors from The University of Oklahoma.