The following is an excerpt from Practice Perspectives: Vault's Guide to Legal Practice Areas.
Dylan Gera’s practice focuses on representing project developers, lenders, tax equity investors, and government agencies in connection with debt financing, tax equity investment, and the development of energy projects, with a particular emphasis on solar and wind energy.
Andrew Price has spent his entire career helping clients successfully resolve their business disputes. Whether it is before a state court jury or an arbitration tribunal, Andrew has a proven track record of achieving superior results for his clients. He has handled numerous cases involving contracts, intellectual property, securities, business torts, and professional liability. He is well-versed in dealing with the unique aspects of cases involving governance of partnerships, joint ventures, LLCs, and corporations. Andrew also has significant experience in handling disputes involving cross-border transactions or foreign law issues.
Andrew is a past recipient of the American Marshall Memorial Fellowship, awarded by the German Marshall Fund to Americans identified as emerging leaders. During his fellowship, Andrew spent six weeks traveling across Europe, where he met with leaders and discussed pressing business and political issues.
Andrew currently serves as U.S. Co-head of commercial litigation and on the firm’s Management Committee. He previously served as the U.S. Hiring Partner responsible for attorney employment.
Describe your practice area and what it entails.
Andrew: I exclusively work on disputes in the energy space handling litigation in state and federal court. This is an advocacy practice. I appear before judges, arbitrators, etc., helping clients solve business disputes.
Dylan: I’m on the firm’s projects team. We close financings to help developers build and operate energy projects. I rep-resent lenders, tax equity investors, or project developers with negotiating, drafting, and finalizing debt and investment documents. I mostly work on financings for solar and wind projects but also have experience with nuclear and natural gas projects.
What types of clients do you represent?
Andrew: I provide counsel to a range of clients upstream, midstream, and downstream. I represent many midstream companies and multinational oil and gas companies, including Energy Transfer, as well as privately held companies in the upstream space, such as Shell.
Dylan: I have represented the usual players involved in project finance, such as project developers, lenders, and investors, as well as government agencies. I’ve recently worked with KeyBanc, rPlus Energies, and the DOE.
What types of cases/deals do you work on?
Andrew: I handle all sorts of cases that come up in the energy space, including gas gathering agreements, oil or gas transportation agreements, disputes involving merger agreements, asset acquisition agreements, corporate governance disputes, and shareholder disputes.
Dylan: I work on construction debt and tax equity financings for utility-scale solar and wind projects. I’ve represented the DOE in connection with guaranteed loans for nuclear projects. I’ve also advised both sellers and buyers of tax credits generated by renewable energy projects, which have become a significant component of our group’s work since the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act.
How did you choose this practice area?
Andrew: I thought I was going to be a corporate lawyer until I did moot court and mock trial work to try advocacy. During my summer clerkships, I tried both, which helped make my decision to do disputes over deal work. I gravitated toward the commercial side, and being in Houston, this mostly touches on energy, chemicals, or refineries.
Dylan: During my interviews with the firm, Sameer Mulji, a senior associate, explained project finance in a way that sounded interesting. The projects team thought I was a good fit, so I joined the group. I basically lucked into project finance, but I’m glad I’ve chosen to stay. The mentorship, training, and substantive experience I’ve received in a relatively short time has been invaluable.
What is a “typical” day like and/or what are some common tasks you perform?
Andrew: Daily, I am managing case teams. I check in on the status of projects and make sure that what needs to happen happens, whether that’s legal research, brief writing, or witness files/binders being assembled. I interact with team-mates and communicate with clients and opposing counsel about the issues in a particular case. I also mentor and communicate with junior lawyers about issues they’re having on cases that I’m not working on and provide a sanity check for them when making decisions. I’m also on the Management Committee, so I am also dealing with bigger picture strategic issues that face the law firm.
Dylan: As a mid-level associate, a “typical” day involves attending status calls for active deals, drafting and revising transaction documents, and discussing due diligence questions with our specialist colleagues. I manage work streams and allocate assignments so that we can close out open matters in a transaction. There is usually at least one instance of a client with an urgent request that requires shuffling priorities around.
What training, classes, experience, or skills development would you recommend to someone who wishes to enter your practice area?
Andrew: Solid research, writing, and communication skills are table stakes. The communication piece is multidimensional. The way I communicate with my team and clients requires a certain skill set, and the way I communicate in an advocacy setting requires another. There’s a lot of focus on advocacy communication, but another important dimension is being able to work on teams and communicating effectively with colleagues. Communicating with clients is, of course, critical. Being a good listener is a must.
Dylan: Taking Business Associations during law school is useful because projects associates routinely work on corporate law matters as a component of our finance work. Electives such as Secured Transactions, Federal Income Tax, and Energy Law would also be useful to help someone interested in project finance to learn the foundations of the substantive knowledge of the work we do.
I recommend advanced clinics as a way to learn the practical skills inherent to this job, such as how to work with clients and opposing counsel; how to work under real-world deadlines; and how to draft, take feedback, and revise work product. Finally, the firm’s projects team has a newsletter and two podcasts, which I think are some of the best resources out there for updates on the energy and project finance industry. The link is https://www.projectfinance.law.
What is the most challenging aspect of practicing in this area?
Andrew: The very nature of my practice is adversarial. That’s the system we have to resolve legal disputes. The truth is going to come out before the judge or the jury because both sides have fierce advocates. Even when dealing with good friends or pleasant counsel on the other side, both sides are trying to win. I must be careful about getting the idea that I did a good job for my client based on winning or losing. It can be disorienting to not have total control over the outcome for Type A personalities. Additionally, a trial is all-consuming, both leading up to trial and in trial.
Dylan: Project finance deals involve a lot of money and pose a lot of risk for developers and banks. You have to get things right, and you must be comfortable taking responsibility for this and for the work of the other people on your deals, especially the people you supervise. There are tight timelines for closings and a lot of active matters to work on at any time, so it is often difficult to devote time to things other than work. Although this is a hard job, it helps to know that our practice has a positive impact.
What is unique about your practice area at your firm?
Andrew: We have a long history of outstanding advocacy and accomplished advocates at the firm. I take this legacy of great trial and disputes lawyers seriously. There’s an immense amount of training at the firm, with senior lawyers putting a lot of time and effort into training you. I focus on getting young advocates experience early in their careers. The firm is committed to train the next generation of trial and disputes advocates.
For example, summer associates at Norton Rose Fulbright are given real opportunities to see what the day-to-day looks like. They’ll shadow junior and senior associates and partners, seeing what it’s like to be a lawyer in various stages of your career: substantive motions and research memos, attending client meetings, depos, mediations—anything that’s going on in the practice group.
Dylan: We have a deep bench of lawyers who cover the full life cycle of energy projects, including early-stage development through financing, construction, and operations. While I mostly work as a finance associate, the team includes dedicated real estate lawyers and an M&A team as well as development and procurement specialists. This coverage and knowledge are invaluable because the typical project life cycle phases are interconnected. This is a good place to be an associate: We are encouraged to make decisions and resolve issues on our own initiative but are never prevented from asking for help. The firm’s projects team has a collegial and supportive atmosphere. Everyone on the team, in my experience, is just a nice person.
How do you see this practice area evolving in the future?
Andrew: AI is going to undoubtedly impact this practice area. It will help lawyers do their research better, quicker, and more efficiently. It will serve as an aid to junior lawyers, helping with tasks such as document review, compiling deposition summaries, timelines, witness binders, and outlines. However, I don’t see AI replacing junior lawyers standing up in front of a judge and key decision-makers. This set of skills is not going anywhere; I can argue that this will actually be in higher demand.
For those considering corporate work, why would you advise them to specialize in Energy, Oil, & Gas?
Dylan: Working in renewables is interesting and exciting. You get to learn a lot about diverse areas of the law. If you specialize in renewable energy work at the firm, you will benefit by being on a great team and learning from the best in the field.
Additionally, the energy projects we help finance and develop last a long time, and the power they generate is a resource that people depend on. It’s cool to be a part of something where the impact of what you do is discernible, long-lasting, and a net good for people in the real world and not just a good financial investment. Recently, I was invited to a ribbon-cutting ceremony for a solar project for which we represented the tax equity investor in the financing. It was cool to see firsthand the tangible impact of our efforts.