Practice Areas

Industries

Energy, Utilities and Renewables

Keith J. Cunningham

Partner

Keith Cunningham is co-chair of Pierce Atwood's Bankruptcy & Creditors' Rights team and has provided business and legal counsel to clients in bankruptcy and creditors' rights matters, debt financings and commercial transactions since 1988. "Praised by clients for his ‘very practical and strategic advice,'" (Chambers USA 2012), Keith's representation encompasses a wide range of interests, including secured creditors, trade creditors, governmental agencies, lessors, licensors, licensees, acquirers of assets from bankruptcy estates, and acquirers of entities in bankruptcy. Keith's experience includes commercial collections, adequate protection issues, reclamation claims, cash collateral authority, automatic stay relief, claims allowance and litigation, preference and fraudulent transfer risk management and defense, and Chapter 11 plan issues. In debt financings and commercial transactions, Keith is regularly called upon by clients to help structure, negotiate and document complex secured and unsecured credit facilities and commercial agreements.

Before joining the firm in 1996, Keith clerked for the Honorable Mark W. Vaughn of the United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of New Hampshire, and chaired the Bankruptcy/Creditors' Rights/Loan Workout Practice Group of a large New Hampshire firm.

Recent Experience

Represented New York State Electric & Gas Corporation in AES Eastern Energy’s Chapter 11 case in Delaware, including in its settlement of a myriad of complex issues created by AES Energy’s closure and subsequent sale of four coal fired generating facilities at which NYSEG owns and operates critical transmission and distribution assets
Represented the California ISO in Solar Trust of America's 2012 Chapter 11 case in Delaware. The Consent Agreement Keith helped to negotiate between the debtors, California ISO and Southern California Edison paved the way for the debtors' assumption and assignment of two interconnection agreements that were essential to the succesful sale by the debtors of their interests in two of the largest solar power projects under development in the U.S.
Represented the California ISO on bankruptcy matters with respect to its consolidated petition with certain other regional transmission organizations and independent system operators to exempt specified transactions from the provisions of the Commodity Exchange Act and Commodity Futures Trading Commission regulations
Represented a New England healthcare institution in the negotiation and documentation of $112 million of direct pay letters of credit to provide replacement credit enhancement and liquidity support for tax exempt bond issuances
Representing the California Department of Water Resources in its efforts to recover overcharges resulting from the 2000-2001 western energy crisis, with past successes including bankruptcy settlements with Chapter 11 debtors Mirant Corporation (N.D. Tex.), Enron Corporation (S.D.N.Y.) and NEGT (D. Md.) resulting in allowed secured and unsecured claims totaling in excess of $2.4 billion
Successfully represented two defendants alleged to have received in excess of $18 million in preferential payments by the Litigation Trustee in In re Quebecor World (USA), Inc. (S.D.N.Y.)
Represented a NYSE traded apparel and footwear manufacturer in a $300 million credit facility
Lead counsel for a publicly traded mezzanine debt and private equity firm in the sale, at foreclosure, of an integrated 25.85 megawatt wood-fired power plant and associated woodchip operation

Honors & Distinctions

Keith is listed in Woodward/White’s The Best Lawyers in America for debtor-creditor law, has an AV Preeminent rating by Martindale-Hubbell, and has been recognized for his expertise in debtor-creditor matters by Chambers USA, publisher of America's Leading Business Lawyers. In 2012, Keith was recognized by Law & Politics for the second time as a New England Super Lawyer, a designation bestowed upon only five percent of the lawyers in New England.