Melanie Little is the President and Chief Executive Officer for Colonial Pipeline Company, the largest refined petroleum products pipeline system in the United States. She joined Colonial Pipeline in January 2023 with more than two decades of experience in the energy industry. 

Prior to joining Colonial, Melanie served as the Chief Operating Officer at Magellan Midstream Partners, L.P., with responsibility for assets in 15 states, consisting of 12,000 miles of pipelines, 55 terminals and a team of over 1,400.

Prior to being promoted to COO, Melanie served in various leadership roles at Magellan, with the opportunity to lead teams in operations, commercial and compliance. 

Prior to joining Magellan in 2004, she worked for The Williams Companies, Inc. Before joining Williams, she held project management positions in the areas of environmental remediation as a contractor for the Department of the Army. Melanie is a Veteran, serving in the U.S. Army and in the Army Reserves and Georgia National Guard.

Melanie holds a Bachelor of Science in Environmental Engineering from the United States Military Academy and a Master of Science in Civil Engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology. She also serves on two non-profit boards: The Discovery Lab in Tulsa, OK and the International Liquid Terminals Association. 

In January 2023, Melanie joined the Board of Directors of Cenovus Energy, the second-largest Canadian oil and natural gas producer, refiner and upgrader. And as of March 2023, she serves on the Board of the American Petroleum Institute, the largest U.S. trade association for the oil and natural gas industry. 

With more than 20 years of energy industry experience, Angela (Angie) Kolar is Colonial Pipeline’s senior vice president, of Operations, EHS and Compliance. She oversees the company’s enterprise risk, safety, environmental, crisis preparedness and emergency response, pipeline compliance, ESG, and safety management system functions.

Under Angie’s leadership, Colonial was most recently awarded American Petroleum Institute’s (API) most prestigious safety honor – the 2021 Distinguished Pipeline Safety Award in the medium operator category. This marked the third year in a row that Colonial was recognized with the award. 

Prior to taking on her current role in 2017, Angie was the southeast district director of Operations where she was responsible for operations and maintenance across five states. In 2004, she joined Colonial as a senior accountant and transitioned through various leadership positions, including director of organizational effectiveness, director of compliance and ethics, operations manager, and business manager. Prior to Colonial, she held positions with a public accounting firm and, later, with a global pharmaceutical company, Pfizer Inc. 

In the industry, Angie is the past chair of the API Pipeline Steering Group, currently serves on the API Pipeline Safety Excellence subcommittee, and is the past president of the greater Atlanta chapter of Women’s Energy Network. Angie also chaired the Pipeline Safety Management System (SMS) Industry team, which represents oil and gas pipeline operators and trade associations industry-wide in their drive toward zero pipeline incidents. Outside of the industry, Angie serves on the Board of HOPE Atlanta, a non-profit striving to eliminate hunger and homelessness in the Atlanta metro area. In 2021, Angie was recognized by the Atlanta Business Chronicle as a Woman of Influence for her work across the oil and gas industry and involvement in the community.

Angie earned a bachelor’s degree in accounting from East Tennessee State University and a master’s degree in business administration from Arkansas State University. 

Clay Miller is Colonial’s senior vice president and chief financial officer. He is responsible for the company’s financial operations and related controls, and supports its commitment to safe and reliable operations, profitable growth, and disciplined cost management. He has more than 20 years of experience that include private-to-public company transactions and executing post-transaction plans of transformation, securing capital for growth and operating needs, installing acquisition and integration capabilities, managing relationships with financial regulators, and implementing cost-management practices. 

Clay leads the company’s strategic analysis, treasury, accounting, tax, financial regulatory reporting, project management office, and procurement functions. Under Clay’s leadership the company recently completed the construction of its new corporate headquarters facility and primary command center. Clay previously served as the company’s corporate controller. He has fostered high-performance teams and more broadly enhanced the culture through initiatives that assess and develop potential talent.

Prior to joining Colonial in 2013, Clay served as vice president and corporate controller of a leading chemical manufacturer, marketer, and service provider he helped guide through a spin-off that rendered it an independent public company. Following this transaction, Clay helped lead transformational cost-reduction initiatives that enabled the company to recapitalize and initiate an acquisition-based growth strategy that added new lines of business and expanded the company’s operations globally. Clay began his career in public accounting where he held positions at Arthur Andersen and Ernst & Young. 

Clay earned a bachelor’s degree in business administration as well as a master’s degree in accountancy from the University of Georgia’s Terry College of Business. He holds a master’s in business administration from Emory University’s Goizueta Business School. In addition, Clay is a certified public accountant. He has been a member of various professional organizations throughout his career and has served on the Liquid Energy Pipeline Association’s Accounting Committee. And Clay was recently named to the University of Georgia’s Terry College of Business CFO Roundtable Advisory Board.

David Gray is Colonial’s senior vice president, general counsel, chief compliance officer, and corporate secretary. He is an experienced executive with over 20 years of diverse experience in the energy sector, including leading legal, commercial, risk, audit, compliance, and regulatory groups with a focus on the safe, reliable, and profitable transportation and storage of fuels. His experience includes high-growth environments in heavily regulated energy businesses, and he has deep experience in setting and driving business strategy, building and leading high-performing teams, building trusted relationships with partners, regulators, and stakeholders, and driving top-performing cultures of ethics, compliance, and safety. 

David leads the company’s Legal, Audit, Enterprise Compliance, and Information Governance groups, and is actively engaged in representing the company with various industry groups, including Liquid Energy Pipeline Association (LEPA). David has more than 25 years of legal experience in complex regulatory environments, primarily focused on the energy industry. 

Prior to joining Colonial in 2019, David was senior vice president for the midstream business of EQT Corporation, one of the largest midstream providers in North America. In this role, he was responsible for business development, asset optimization, and the rates and regulatory departments. Under David’s leadership, the midstream business experienced record growth, driven by large-scale and transformational greenfield builds and asset optimization projects, which ultimately resulted in the successful IPO of Equitrans Midstream Corporation. He also was instrumental in building strong relationships with partners, regulators, and stakeholders. 

During his tenure at EQT, David also served as general counsel for Equitable Gas Company, providing the legal oversight of the sale of that business, and assistant general counsel for midstream and commercial. He provided extensive legal oversight in various areas, including regulatory, commercial, corporate governance, litigation, and environmental matters. Prior to EQT, he was assistant general counsel for FirstEnergy and Allegheny Energy, Inc., and he has approximately 12 years of experience in private law practice with several firms. 

David is a graduate of the University of Pittsburgh, where he earned his bachelor’s degree in economics. He holds a juris doctor from the University of Pittsburgh School of Law. 

Dan Gordon is Colonial Pipeline’s senior vice president and chief commercial officer – a role newly created when he joined in 2019. He leads the company’s Commercial Affairs functions, where he has responsibility for business development, mergers and acquisitions, commercial business lines, and strategy. With a focus on maximizing opportunities to grow and position Colonial for long-term success, Dan has overseen significant accomplishments since joining, from starting up a new terminals business through acquisition; to optimizing the system through the implementation of long-haul segregated batches; to re-structuring Colonial’s engagement and interaction with its customers. 

Dan has more than 20 years of commercial affairs experience, all focused on the energy industry. Prior to Colonial, he was executive vice president, Business Development, for Delek US Holdings, Inc. Under Dan’s leadership, Delek US successfully established a new business in Mexico, and made several key acquisitions that expanded the business. At Delek, he also served in other capacities and was responsible for its crude acquisition strategy, trucking operations, hedging, and pricing for MAPCO convenience stores. 

Dan began his career with RaceTrac Petroleum. There he served as executive director of Supply and Distribution, where he oversaw the distribution of more than two billion gallons of refined fuels and directed supply and trading, scheduling, commercial, and transportation. In his time there, Dan gained valuable insight into Colonial as a shipper on the system. 

Dan is a graduate of the University of Florida, where he earned his bachelor’s degree in finance. He earned his master’s degree in business administration from the Georgia Institute of Technology.

As Colonial Pipeline’s senior vice president and chief information officer, Darrell Riekena leads the strategy and operations of Technology and Security across the company, including infrastructure, applications and systems, solutions delivery, data and analytics, and physical and cyber security. With more than 30 years of technology, industry, and supply chain knowledge, Darrell is responsible for providing technology, data, and security solutions that enable the company’s core business and growth initiatives. 

Prior to joining Colonial in 2022, Darrell served as the CIO and executive vice president for Republic National Distributing Company (RNDC). At RNDC, he led technology and digital transformation supporting company growth, including mergers and acquisitions and new business channels.

Darrell is a highly regarded CIO with extensive experience in IT leadership and has held executive-level roles in technology and business operations with Target, The Kroger Company, National DCP (Dunkin’), LimitedBrands, and JCPenney. Darrell was nominated for Georgia CIO of the Year in 2018, 2019, and 2021.
Darrell holds a bachelor’s degree in management information systems from the University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee. He also serves on a variety of industry and nonprofit boards, including Tech Alpharetta, TechBridge, and Georgia CIO Leadership Association. 

Jamie Chapman came to Colonial in 2021 to lead the Engineering and Asset Integrity teams after spending nine years with Kinder Morgan, directing engineering and project management teams on primarily liquid refined products pipelines coast to coast and internationally.

Prior to his work with Kinder Morgan, Jamie’s background includes additional engineering leadership roles, project management, and design experience with engineering consulting firms. 

He began his career serving six years in the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers where he earned multiple awards for outstanding service and performance and separated as a Captain. In addition, he holds a master’s degree in civil engineering from the Missouri University of Science & Technology and earned his bachelor’s degree in civil engineering at Tulane University.

Jamie now leads the Technical Services group, which is comprised of our Asset Integrity, Engineering, Corporate and Field Project Management teams. 

Jamie is a current member of the Pipeline Research Council International Executive Assembly and participates in the American Petroleum Institute and the API Committee on Pipeline Standards.

As Colonial Pipeline’s Vice President of People and Communications, Chris Smith is responsible for leading Colonial’s human resources (HR) strategy and operations, including total rewards, talent acquisition, leadership and employee development, employment practices and HR technology, and enterprise communications. 

Chris joined Colonial in July 2018 as the Director of People Technology and Business Intelligence with over 20 years of experience. She is a results-oriented leader who motivates and encourages her teams to partner cross-functionally to deliver strategic initiatives. During her tenure, Chris has been promoted into additional leadership positions including Chief of Staff and Senior Director of People Technology and Process Improvement as well as Vice President, People Services and Rewards. 

Prior to joining Colonial, Chris served in various roles across different industries, leading teams with a focus on HR transformation, project management, system implementations and process improvement. Chris began her career at Accenture where she managed and consulted with multiple clients to deliver successful projects across people, process and technology. 

Chris is a graduate of Florida State University, where she earned a bachelor’s degree in Management Information Systems (MIS).

Afshean Talasaz is Colonial’s senior vice president of optimization, efficiency & innovation (OEI). He joined Colonial Pipeline in March 2023. 

Before joining Colonial, Afshean served as the Director of Digital Innovation and Enterprise Architecture at Magellan Midstream Partners, L.P., with responsibility for Digital Innovation, Data, Architecture, Cloud, and Technology Strategic Partnerships across the enterprise. 

Prior to his role at Magellan, Afshean served in various leadership roles in the upstream sector in Corporate Planning, Strategic Planning, M&A, Data Science & Advanced Analytics, and Digital Transformation. 

Afshean holds a Bachelor of Arts in Economics and a Master of Business Administration from the University of Central Oklahoma. He also serves on the board of the Oklahoma Center for Non-Profits.