Dr. Catherine Hickson, CEO of Alberta No. 1 and Vice President of Geothermal Canada, is based in Vancouver, British Columbia. She has been working in geothermal since 1981 when she was a student hired by the Geological Survey of Canada (GSC) to carry out temperature measurements of gradient holes using a hand winch. She completed her PhD in volcanology at the University of British Columbia and then joined the GSC as a Research Scientist. She spent the next spent 25 years of her career with the GSC, including seven years as the head of the GSC’s office in Vancouver. Her research over these years, in addition to geothermal studies, included volcanology, regional mapping as well as multidisciplinary international work. For ten years, she was the leader of the Multinational Andean Project involving the geological surveys of Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Venezuela before segueing into the private sector. In 2008, she joined geothermal start up, Magma Energy Corp (now owned by Innergex), as VP Exploration, and helped raise over $150M in funding for the new company. She travelled the world establishing a presence for Magma (later Alterra Energy) in six countries and on three continents. In 2014 she established her own company, Tuya Terra Geo Corp to provide geothermal services to support geothermal development. In 2018 she became the Chief Geologist of the Alberta start-up, Terrapin Geothermics. Under her leadership Terrapin secured a $25.4M in project development funds from Natural Resources Canada’s Emerging Renewable Power Program, for its Alberta No. 1 project south of Grand Prairie. She now serves Alberta No. 1 as its CEO. Her work has lead her from the tip of South America to the northern most reaches of the Canadian Arctic and east to west from Europe to Asia leading and supporting geothermal projects in the international arena.
