Dr. Kölmek is a Director at Tetra Tech, where he leads the electricity team under SPARC, a five-year technical assistance project supporting the Government of Ukraine. He oversees activities aimed at advancing electricity market mechanisms, enabling full market integration with Europe, guiding power system development, and facilitating private sector investment. His portfolio also includes procurement of equipment for the recovery and development of generation and grid infrastructure. Prior to SPARC, Dr. Kölmek served as the Electricity and Renewables Lead at the Energy Security Project (ESP), managing a seven-year technical assistance program for Ukraine’s electricity sector. There, he played a key role in launching the country’s new electricity market and facilitating its integration with ENTSO-E. In addition, he worked with the United Nations Office of Project Services (UNOPS) as Senior Electricity Advisor and Acting Chief of Party for the Energy Market Development Project, supporting reforms in both the electricity and district heating sectors.

Earlier in his career, Dr. Kölmek was the Head of the Organized Electricity Markets Group at Türkiye’s Energy Market Regulatory Authority (EMRA). His team was responsible for the wholesale electricity market including the day-ahead, intra-day, and balancing market segments as well as their financial settlements, cross-border trade, renewable energy support schemes (for both distributed and utility-scale), and the supplier switching mechanism. During his tenure at EMRA, he also held roles as Expert in the Electricity Market Department, Advisor to the EMRA Board on multi-sector regulation (i.e., electricity, natural gas, petroleum, and LPG), Head of the Strategy and Sector Policies Group, and acting Head of the Electricity Transmission Group, where he led the launch of the auctions-based ancillary services market and the capacity payments mechanism.

Dr. Kölmek has extensive experience in international regulatory cooperation. He held coordination roles with the Energy Regulators Regional Association (ERRA) and the International Confederation of Energy Regulators (ICER), and also led EMRA’s bilateral cooperation initiatives with national and regional regulatory bodies. Additionally, he taught graduate-level courses on electricity market development and delivered professional training on market design, energy transition, renewable integration, and power system flexibility.

Dr. Kölmek holds BSc and MSc degrees in Electrical & Electronics Engineering from Bilkent University, both with scholarships, and a PhD in Economics from Hacettepe University, supported by a scholarship from TÜBİTAK (the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Türkiye).