Our family grew up in San Antonio, Texas, and my father, Bob, was a petroleum geologist who loved his profession. We collected rocks together, and he showed me how the oil business worked. He explained his hypothesis about a potential field, and we went out on the rig to examine the core samples, sometimes seeing the oil or gas at high pressure. I remember celebrating under the black rain that days later proved to be a mirage, not a Spindletop. (The Spindletop oilfield, discovered on a salt dome formation south of Beaumont, Texas, in 1901, marked the birth of the modern petroleum industry.)

After high school, I attended the University of Texas at Austin, where I graduated with a bachelor’s degree in mathematics. During my Junior year, I met my future wife, Donata Francescato, in a language course in Germany. She was the most vivacious person I have ever known, and we were married in Italy two years later.

On my first job, I honed my skills as a systems analyst at Ray Geophysical Company. It was here that I witnessed the real birth of seismic geophysics—a digital revolution that would redefine the landscape of petroleum and gas exploration. For a brief period, I worked for a small international oil company, Pexamin, engaged in exploration in Egypt.

Fueled by a desire to better understand the interconnectedness of business and society, I pursued a master's degree at Harvard Business School. I also attended MIT, where I had the privilege to study under Professor Denis Meadows. He was finishing his book and report to the Club of Rome, The Limits to Growth. This book, which Prof Meadows occasionally asked me to present in his absence, had a profound impact on my thinking. It redefined capitalism and even anticipated the concept of climate change. Professor Meadows later introduced me to Aurelio Peccei, President of the Club of Rome, and Prof. Umberto Colombo—visionaries whose influence would shape my future in ways I could never have imagined.

When my wife obtained A postdoctoral fellowship to study communes in the States and in Europe in 1972. At Montedison, Italy’s public chemical company, where Prof. Umberto Colombo was head of research, I applied the principles of System Dynamics modeling from MIT and co-authored a book, using a Systems Dynamics model of the Italian educational and labor systems, titled Il Lavoro Intellectuale, with Giuseppe Colosante. Together with Umberto Colombo, I collaborated with Prof. Carol Wilson of MIT, who directed the Workshop on Alternative Energy Strategies (WAES), a three-year study in which seventy-five people from fifteen countries examined global energy alternatives,

Donata and I celebrated the birth of our daughter, Minou, in 1974, who brought immeasurable joy and purpose to our family. Italy was a land of new beginnings, not just for me but for my extended family as well. My sister-in-law, Grazia Francescato, rose to prominence as President of the Italian Green Party. My vivacious wife became Full Professor of Psychology at the University of Rome at 36. She published the first Community Psychology book in Italy and the second in Europe. Subsequently, she cofounded the feminist magazine EFFE and ECPA (European Association of Community Psychology), and published 26 books, the last in English: Fostering Brighter Futures (Amazon Italy).

Prof. Colombo was nominated President of CNEN, which later became ENEA (the Italian National Agency for New Technologies, Energy, and Sustainable Economic Development), and I followed him to Rome. At ENEA, I became the director of the Department for Promotion of Energy Efficiency with 120 engineers and scientists and fourteen regional consulting centers.

I helped draft Law 308 of 1982, which provided state grants for investments in energy efficiency and the use of solar energy. Another important program was the introduction of energy efficiency labels for household appliances at the European Union level. This involved negotiations between Italian, German, and other producers regarding how to measure energy efficiency and design labels for public use. The program was highly successful, with savings of over 70 percent in some cases. Similar energy efficiency labeling schemes for household appliances were initiated worldwide.

Italy is one of the few countries in the world requiring the public nomination of energy managers for organizations with significant energy consumption. ENEA gave birth to FIRE, the Federation of Italian Rational Use of Energy, to provide technical and educational support to these energy managers. Recently, for example, FIRE organized the first survey of Italian organizations using Artificial Intelligence for energy management. ENEA continues to conduct research and promote energy efficiency in the industry and building sectors through tax deductions. In 2019, I enthusiastically became a member of Greta Thunberg’s Fridays for the Future and began writing for MEER. Last year, I published the book Climate Opportunities Are Knocking at Your Door (Amazon US).