Deanna R. Reitman

Representative Experience

Carbon

• Assisted large public company to create climate and sustainability benefit products from the purchase and sale of emission reduction credits, carbon sinks, and investments in carbon product development in order to create a new purchase and sale online trading hub for such climate and sustainability benefit products, including the terms and conditions, onboarding policies, and procedures for the trading hub.
• Assisted a broker-dealer to develop the rules, contract templates, policies and procedures to create its own emission reduction registry in order to tokenize these emission reductions to trade on a swap execution facility and assisted in the creation and application of the swap execution facility.
• Assisted in the development of a methodology for emission reductions for a consortium of rice farmers in Asia and Africa, which included the structuring and documentation of the agreements between farmers in the consortium.
• Developed ESG policies and procedures, including website language and design, for a large energy and commodities trading company.
• Assisted an investment bank with the establishment of their carbon-credit marketing desk, including the creation of all documentation to procure supply, deliver and market such carbon credits.
• Assisted a turbine generator with its response to a California Air Resources Board (CARB) verifier in order to find a solution to its reporting obligations under the cap-and-trade regulations when information is classified by the U.S. Department of Defense.
• Drafted and negotiated purchase and sale agreements for carbon reduction offset credits (CROCs).
• Assisted with the verification and certification of projects (e.g., VERRA, Gold Standard).
• Lead counsel for a client in its financing of a carbon reduction project in multiple African jurisdictions for the purchase of marketable carbon credits.
• Coordinated advice from the U.S., EU, UK, Australia, Chile and other jurisdictions on the regulation, generation, verification and marketing of carbon offset credits generated from forest carbon sequestration.
• Structured carbon streaming / prepay finance of carbon-credit project.
• Established the corporate structure for the U.S. carbon business and advised upon the finance, purchase and sale of carbon credits (verified carbon units (VCU) / regulated) in the U.S.
• Developed VCU, renewable energy credits (RECs), renewable identification numbers (RINs), and low carbon fuel standard (LCFS) standard purchase and sale agreements.
• Structured transactions including LCFS and REC physical and financial swaps.
• Established commodities businesses in Canada for the finance, purchase and sale of VCU.
• Developed, implemented and trained on regulatory and rule requirements for marketing and trading carbon.
• Assisted in regulatory response to CARB regulatory inquiry into rule noncompliance.
• Structured prepay financing of carbon credit project.
• Developed project documentation for anerobic digester development program.
• Advised upon bilateral and carbon commodities credit facilities.
• Advised upon RIN and REC trading using credit sleeves.
• Advised on debt investment structures.

Hydrogen

• Represented developer of hydrogen facility north of Los Angeles County, California, in the development, offtake, financing and operation of its 13,100 kg capacity per day hydrogen facility utilizing certain existing infrastructure.
• Represented developer of hydrogen facility in Rotterdam, The Netherlands, in the development, offtake, financing and operation of a 13,100 kg capacity per day hydrogen facility.
• Represented developer of hydrogen facility in Antwerp, Belgium, in the development, offtake, financing and operation of a 13,100 kg capacity per day hydrogen facility.
• Represented developer of hydrogen facility in Southern California in the development, offtake, financing and operation of a 36,300 kg capacity per day hydrogen facility.
• Represented developer of hydrogen facility in Central California in the development, offtake, financing and operation of a 13,100 kg capacity per day hydrogen facility.
• Represented developer of hydrogen facility in Northern California, in the development, offtake, financing and operation of a 13,100 kg capacity per day hydrogen facility.

Metals

• Advised on the divestiture of the precious metal trading and automotive catalyst recycling and coating business from large global chemicals and metals company.
• Advised a global precious metals company on commodity regulatory, trading, commercial transactions and financing matters.
• Advised on the creation of a green metals business, including discussions of digitization/tokenization of the green metal / sustainable asset.
• Advised a large global metals company on compliance responsibilities related to state and federal government investigations, including document production, negotiating with investigators, and coordinating witness interviews and onsite examinations.
• Advised and assisted with legal and regulatory matters to establish a precious and base metals trading business in China.
• Developed, advised and assisted with the business, legal and regulatory matters to establish a global battery materials business.
• Advised and assisted with the establishment of a global base metals business.

Commercial and Structured Transactions

• Negotiated long-term contracts for U.S. and international companies for the operation and service of floating production and storage assets.
• Structured and negotiated domestic and international physical and financial commodities commercial transactions, including crude, products, natural gas, coal, RINs, RECs, metals and carbon credits in the United States, Latin America, the Caribbean and the United Kingdom.
• Structured and negotiated international transactions for the purchase and sale of commodity feedstock to support company assets, which included the creation of hedging strategies and the negotiation of the agreements to implement such hedging strategies.
• Negotiated terms for domestic and international commodities infrastructure projects, including Eagle Ford drilling projects, terminal, and pipeline projects in the United States, Europe and Latin America.
• Negotiated domestic electricity purchase, sale and transmission contracts.
• Assisted, in both a legal and business capacity, in the development, creation and implementation of startup global natural gas, crude, and product marketing and trading firm.
• Negotiated physical energy trading and commercial contracts, including waterborne, rail, truck and pipeline movements.
• Negotiated storage and transportation contracts for oil, oil products, natural gas and coal.
• Negotiated refining, processing, tolling and cleaning agreements for oil, oil products, natural gas and coal.
• Negotiated storage subleases, assignments and repos.
• Represented a trading firm in several repurchase agreements for the sale of crude oil accounts receivables.
• Represented the shareholders of an Oman exploration and production company in the sale and swap of its shares.
• Advised upon and implemented a corporate restructuring for an international commodities marketing and trading firm.

Finance

• Represented a U.S. company in the restructuring of its credit facility to finance its technology that converts fossil fuel cars, trucks and busses into electric cars, trucks and busses.
• Represented a U.S. company in a project finance credit facility for the construction and retrofitting of biodiesel facilities.
• Represented a U.S. developer in its joint venture with a Chinese entity for the construction and finance of a liquified natural gas (LNG) facility.
• Conducted due diligence for U.S. and international companies for the purchase, sale, construction, finance and/or refinance of upstream, midstream and downstream commodity assets.
• Advised developers, sponsors, investors and governments in the negotiation and structuring of financing for both domestic and international energy projects.
• Represented a large international oil and gas company in developing a form master participation agreement for trade finance with institutional banks.
• Represented a syndicate of banks in several trade finance facilities with a large South American pulp producer.
• Represented a trading firm in a repurchase agreement for the sale of crude oil accounts receivable from a South American national oil company.

Regulatory

• Advised upon the swap execution facility (SEF) regulations for the establishment of a sustainable derivatives SEF.
• Advised on U.S. regulatory requirements for a virtual power purchase agreement and sale of renewable energy credits for a UK power project.
• Advised upon and assisted with the settlement of CFTC, FERC and CARB self-reported regulatory violations.
• Advised upon the CFTC rules and regulations governing the purchase and sale of regional grain exchange, including the conduct of due diligence to ensure there are no regulatory issues in the purchase and sale.
• Advised upon the CFTC rules and regulations for reporting and position thresholds for a large state pension fund.
• Advised a retail electricity provider on the advertising regulations in Texas.
• Experienced in working with, and advising, petroleum industry clients on operating in the petroleum industry, including upstream matters such as compliance with Mineral Management Services (MMS), mid-stream matters and down-stream matters such as compliance with the Petroleum Marketing Practices Act (PMPA).
• Gave training on futures, options, and commodities’ physical and derivatives trading and regulation.
• Developed global regulatory compliance programs for energy trading (physical and financial), wholesale and retail.
• Advised international commodities marketing and trading companies on the practical application of OFAC sanctions and provided practical solutions to OFAC sanctions-related issues.

Commercial and Dispute Resolution

• Negotiated settlements to commercial and contractual disputes, including arbitration proceedings.
• Advised international commodities marketing and trading companies in employment-related disputes and disputes involving proprietary company information.

Maritime

• Assisted in the purchase, sale and reflagging of commercial vessels in multiple jurisdictions, including Panama, Republic of Marshall Islands, Cayman Islands, U.S., Liberia and Hong Kong.
• Drafted mortgages, trust indentures and other finance documentation for commercial fleets, and recorded such documentation with the relevant jurisdictions.
• Assisted in the refinancing of a U.S. vessel and barge fleet.
• Assisted in the purchase and sale of personal use vessels, such as yachts.