New Head of Market and Policy at the Solar Association
Wieland Hintz is the new Head of Market and Policy and Deputy Managing Director at Swissolar. His predecessor, David Stickelberger, will continue to support the association as Senior Policy Advisor. Anna Plancherel will become the first Director for French-speaking Switzerland at the solar energy industry association.
According to a statement, Wieland Hintz has been head of market and policy at Swissolar since 1 March and is also its deputy managing director. The 45-year-old was previously responsible for solar energy at the Federal Office of Energy.
Hintz studied physics at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich and earned his doctorate at the CERN nuclear research centre in Geneva. He has worked for Alpiq and the Association of Swiss Electricity Companies, among others. Together with his family, he operates six wind turbines and a solar park with a capacity of 1.2 megawatts in Germany.
Hintz replaces David Stickelberger. Now 65, Stickelberger was the first managing director of swissolar from 1998 to 2023. Since 2023, he has been deputy to his successor Matthias Egli. In future, he will support the association as senior policy advisor.
“Over the past ten years, photovoltaics has become a mainstay of Switzerland’s electricity supply, now covering over 15 per cent of electricity consumption,” Hintz is quoted as saying in the press release. “In my new role at Swissolar, I will devote all my energy to ensuring that photovoltaics is optimally integrated into the Swiss energy system and to driving forward the decarbonisation of buildings and transport.”
Swissolar has created a new position of Director for French-speaking Switzerland. This will be filled by Anne Plancherel. She has been working since 2024, both as a strategic project manager and in setting up vocational training in western Switzerland. Plancherel will represent Swissolar in western Switzerland and further expand the regional network.
The 44-year-old environmental engineer studied at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne and continued her education in project management at the University of Geneva. “I am very much looking forward to working with our members, partners and authorities to further expand the potential of solar energy in French-speaking Switzerland and to strengthen the industry in the long term,” she is quoted as saying in the press release.