William "Bill" Spence

Chairman and CEO (Retired), PPL Corporation

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william "bill" spence

William "Bill" Spence has been a member of the Lehigh Valley Health Network Board of Trustees since 2018. He is the retired chairman and chief executive officer of PPL Corporation, one of the largest investor-owned utility companies in the United States. With more than three decades of experience in the utility industry, Spence oversees PPL’s regulated utilities in the United States and the United Kingdom.

Mr. Spence joined PPL in 2006 as executive vice president and chief operating officer. He was named president and CEO in 2011 and chairman in 2012. Previously, he had 19 years of service with Pepco Holdings, Inc., where he held a number of senior management positions, including president of Conectiv Energy and president of Pepco Energy Services.

He earned a bachelor’s degree in petroleum and natural gas engineering from The Pennsylvania State University and a master’s degree in business administration from Bentley College. Spence also is a graduate of the Executive Development Program at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School and the Nuclear Technology Program of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Mr. Spence serves on the board of the Electric Power Research Institute, on the Executive Committee of the Edison Electric Institute (EEI) and as co-chairman of EEI’s CEO Policy Committee on Reliability, Security and Business Continuity. He is a member of EEI’s Finance and Environment and Climate CEO Policy Committees. He is also a member of EEI’s Electricity Subsector Coordinating Council, which serves as the principal liaison between the federal government and the electric power sector to protect the grid from cyber and physical threats to critical infrastructure.

Mr. Spence serves on the board of directors of Williams Companies, Inc., on the board of trustees of the United States Council for International Business, on the Lehigh Valley Partnership executive board, as a trustee adviser to the Delaware Museum of Natural History and as a Pennsylvania Society council member. He is a member of the executive committee of the Downtown Allentown Community Development Initiative and serves on Allentown School District’s Building 21 Executive Committee.