She thus becomes the first woman to lead the entity, which has been headed by Manuel Bartlett since December 2018. Calleja takes over on October 1.
Mexico's virtual president-elect, Claudia Sheinbaum, introduced this Monday the next head of the Federal Electricity Commission (CFE), Emilia Esther Calleja, who will take the reins of the state-owned electricity company in her six-year term (2024-2030).
Calleja Alor thus becomes the first woman to lead the CFE, which since December 1, 2018, has been headed by Manuel Bartlett, appointed by outgoing President Andrés Manuel López Obrador since the beginning of his six-year term.
Emilia Esther Calleja Alor will be the new director of the Federal Electricity Commission (CFE) starting next October 1, announced the virtual president-elect.
Since May 2023, Calleja Alor has served as general director of the CFE Generation I Subsidiary Productive Company.
With her appointment at that time, she became the first woman to hold the position of general manager of one of the 10 subsidiary companies of the CFE and today she will be the first woman to hold the position of general manager of the state-owned company.
With 21 years of technical experience in generation at the CFE, the official has held operational and administrative positions. She first held the position of superintendent at the Salamanca Thermoelectric Power Plant in Guanajuato.
She holds a degree in electronic engineering from the Celaya Institute of Technology and a master's degree in Administration and Senior Management from the Autonomous University of Coahuila.
Esther Calleja Alor is currently General Manager at the subsidiary CFE Generación I. During her career she has held positions such as:
She has also been General Superintendent of a thermoelectric generation plant and Regional Supervisor in the Sub-management of Central Thermoelectric Production.
She was also a technical verifier supporting the Thermoelectric Generation Coordination of the Sub-directorate of Non-Regulated Businesses and president of the Impartiality Committee of the Management Systems Certification Body.
He has worked in different institutions in the public and private sectors. His career and work experience focuses on operations within the energy generation process, failure analysis, installation, configuration and commissioning processes, environmental management systems, and administration of human, material and financial resources.
If the initiative to reform state-owned enterprises presented by the government of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador last February is approved, the CFE will exercise greater control over the Mexican electricity market.
The initiative, which proposes changes to articles 25, 27 and 28 of the constitution, establishes that the CFE will cease to be a productive state enterprise and will become a public company, which would change its governance, which currently resembles that of private companies.
It also establishes that a state-owned company (which could be the CFE itself) will be in charge of planning, operation and regulation of the electrical system, concentrating in a single entity the functions that are currently carried out separately by the National Energy Control Center (Cenace) and the Energy Regulatory Commission (CRE).
In addition, it indicates that private generators will not be able to have “prevalence” over the state company. Although the initiative does not explicitly establish this, both President López Obrador and the next president have expressed that their intention is to establish a cap of 46% of market share for private electricity generation, reserving 54% for the CFE.
