Our Team

Mr. Williams is founder and President of WILLIAMS SPE, Inc., a Texas corporation which provides long-term wholesale or retail electrical energy to domestic or foreign markets, to governments or governmental entities, investor owned utilities, cooperatives, municipalities, and industrial or commercial customers at a significant cost savings through long term power purchase agreements.
The company’s principal, Dale Williams, has had a 35 year career of increasing management and operating responsibility with Southwestern Public Service Company and Xcel Energy. He retired in June 2010 as Xcel’s Director of Community Services and Economic Development. From 1999 to 2007, he was Director of the Harrington, Nichols, Celenese, Moore County, and Riverview Stations, and for the previous five years he served first as COO and VP and then as COO and EVP of Quixx Power Services where he developed financed owned and operated twelve power plants using traditional and renewable power generating technologies domestically and international in the unregulated power business.

He has a BS degree in Engineering from Texas Tech University and a MS in Engineering from the University of Colorado. He has served on the EPRI Steering Committee for Clean Coal Technology Development, the College of Engineering Deans Council at Texas Tech University and the National Science Foundation Education Advisory Council. In 2005, he was Texas Tech University’s first engineering technology department graduate to receive that university’s prestigious Distinguished Engineer award.

Bob has over 40 years engineering, drilling, completions in the oil & gas industry, a pioneer in lateral drilling & completions and coal-bed methane development world-wide with more than 3,000 wells drilled under his management and supervision.  His company owns multiple drilling patented methodologies related to lateral drilling and completions.

James C. (Jim) Manatt, Jr. is CEO, Chairman and Founder of Thrust Energy, Inc. and Providence Technologies, Inc., Roswell, NM, developing the Mancos Shale unconventional exploration program.  Providence Technologies, founded in 1994, is New Mexico’s only 3D seismic exploration services company. He is the owner and co-inventor of Directed Beam Seismic©, U.S. Patent 8,077,547. Prior to Thrust and Providence, he was President / COO, Permian Exploration Corp. Since 1979, his companies have conducted thousands of kilometers advanced 2D swath and 3D seismic data acquisition, processing and analysis in Texas, New Mexico, Italy, Poland, India and Yemen. 

He is an active or emeritus member of the Society of Exploration Geophysicists, the American Association of Petroleum Geologists, Canadian, Houston, Permian Basin Geophysical Societies, the ABQ and Roswell Geological Society, where he is Past President.  He is a Distinguished Alumnus and a Distinguished Military Graduate, Bachelor of Arts, New Mexico State University and was honored to return service to his Alma Mater as Chairman and Member of the NMSU Board of Regents, with fiduciary duty for some 3,000 employees, $2 billion in assets with an annual operating budget of more than $400 million. After college he served on active duty as a Vietnam era Military Intelligence Officer, U.S. Army.  He has served his state and community as a volunteer Chairman of New Mexico First, a bi-partisan NM think tank; as a Founding Director, Spaceport America along with many local community and charitable interests.  He is a licensed commercial / instrument / multi-engine pilot and a licensed Realtor.

Managing Member, North Fork LLC, subsidiary, Gardes Holdings, Inc. Doug has over 40 years’ experience as a senior geologist / geophysicist, leading to numerous successful roles as Vice President, Exploration, Acquisitions & Divestitures across the oil & gas industry world-wide.  He has conducted robust scientific due diligence and evaluation of hundreds of oil & gas field acquisitions, deals, leases, farm-ins and other transactions similar to the North Fork Unit acquisition.

Managing Member, North Fork LLC, subsidiary Gardes Holdings, Inc. Steve is the company’s lead on engineering, drilling, completions with a 40-year track record of success in the oil & gas industry throughout the Lower 48 and, importantly, the Cook Inlet of Alaska. Steve has been directly engaged in successful drilling and development of North Fork Unit and other Cook Inlet fields since 2007, for previous operators and owners.  He represents institutional knowledge of North Fork Unit.

Petroleum Reserves Engineer, Gardes Holdings, Inc. Claude’s 40 years in the oil & gas industry include, Vice President, Engineering, Bridgeforth Energy, LLC; Director, Petroleum Engineering, Société Generale; and Sr. Petroleum Engineer, Commonwealth Bank.  Claude has evaluated the reserves and economics under the strict auspices of the US Securities & Exchange Commission regulations for literally hundreds of oil & gas reserves analyses, field acquisitions and related transactions.  His North Fork Unit models are an integral part of this analysis.

Mark began his career with ARCO where he spent 25 years with various Land, Negotiations, Acquisition, Business Development, Marketing and Senior Management positions in their Denver, Lafayette, Dallas, Houston, Anchorage, Bakersfield and Plano (International) offices. Mark has over 25 years of direct experience in Alaska and 5 years located in Anchorage. After the merger with BP, Mark Co-Founded Prodigy Alaska, LLC, Renaissance  Alaska, LLC, Buccaneer Alaska, LLC and Stellar Oil & Gas, LLC all focused on E&P in Alaska. Mark received his Bachelor of Business Administration in Petroleum Land Management in 1976 from the University of Oklahoma.

• Mr. Barnds has over 35 years of domestic and international energy experience in 3 primary areas: oil, gas and power. He has global experience developing, acquiring and commercializing power generation, gas supply, reserves, LNG, pipelines, gas storage, bio methane and downstream markets. Executive level experience spans the upstream, midstream and downstream sectors in exploration and production, regulated utilities, independent power, LNG, and midstream businesses. Integrated projects range from LNG to power, rural electrification and distributed generation in the US with a primary focus on Alaska, Canada, the Caribbean and Central America. 
• As Senior Vice President, Business Development, WesPac Midstream LLC he led efforts to develop LNG, power and distributed generation projects along the Gulf Coast, the mid Atlantic, Great Lakes, Alaska and the Caribbean.  Development responsibilities ranged from developing reserves and LNG in the Cook Inlet of Alaska to repowering district energy systems in the Caribbean, Alaska and Canada. 
•  As Senior Vice President, Business Development, Oxbow Gas LLC, he focused on bio methane production (Renewable Natural Gas or RNG) and the acquisition of renewable energy companies to buy, sell and trade US renewable energy credits such as RECs, RINs and LCFS.  
• As Toyota Tsusho’s exclusive gas and power consultant, he successfully led Toyota’s effort to acquire North American power assets and the sale of power to municipalities, co ops and utilities.  
• As Vice President with Calpine Corporation, he developed and managed a 3 BCF/day portfolio of gas supply, reserves, pipelines, storage, MLP and asset monetization strategies, developed onshore and offshore LNG projects and led state and federal gas regulatory strategies in support of Calpine’s 27,000 MW portfolio of gas fired generation.

• Procurement and Project Manager with over 30 years experience in Oil & Gas and Manufacturing sectors
• Directional Drilling Coordinator for Gardes Energy Services
• Responsible for HSE / Compliance for offshore operations for the past 13 years

• Office Manager and Administrative Assistant at Gardes Holdings, Inc. since 2006
• Experienced in human resources, bookkeeping, vendor management, and inventory management
• Previously held various positions at Marathon Oil Company

A Professional Oil and Gas Engineer with 25 years of international oil and gas project management and technology procurement experience,  has been involved in projects  in China and the US including pipe line, CNG, SSLNG, flaring gas capture & treatment, offshore production integrity management,  CBM reservoir engineering, production engineering, enhanced oil recovery (EOR) projects, workovers and completions, drilling rig procurements.  He has a strong network of technology and capital fund resources, has helped the international investors  in US oil and gas prospect acquisition assessment consulting since 2009.

Mr. Hu plays an excellent level of golf with many other actives in the oil and gas industry in Houston, TX USA.