Ashley Zumwalt-Forbes is an engineer with thirteen years of experience in acquiring, financing, and developing both greenfield and brownfield natural resources projects around the globe. She is principal at Smoketree Resources, a critical minerals-focused family office and consulting entity, and a nonresident fellow at Rice University's Baker Institute for Public Policy.
 
Ms. Zumwalt-Forbes formerly served as the U.S. Department of Energy's deputy director for batteries and critical materials, overseeing the deployment of ~$6B in non-dilutive equity and ~$10B in tax credits into the U.S. battery supply chain. She has deep expertise in starting and scaling energy supply chain ventures, having served as co-founder and president of Black Mountain Metals (private nickel mining company) and Black Mountain Exploration (private natural gas company - successfully IPO’d). She was key to both the IPO and business combination for Metals Acquisition Corp, having served as its co-founder and senior advisor from 2021–2023.
 
Prior to joining Black Mountain in 2017, Ms. Zumwalt-Forbes worked in several lead engineering roles at ExxonMobil and XTO Energy, managing drilling, completions, and planning aspects of international shale exploration, laying the groundwork for >US$1 billion capital deployment. She is on the advisory board of both Texas Christian University’s Energy Institute and the University of Oklahoma’s School of Petroleum Engineering.
 
Ms. Zumwalt-Forbes graduated summa cum laude from the University of Oklahoma with a bachelor's degree in petroleum engineering and holds an MBA from Harvard Business School. She was highlighted as the featured honoree on the 2020 Forbes 30 under 30 in Energy list, a 2021 Oil & Gas Investor Forty under 40 award winner, and one of the top 25 women in business in Dallas-Fort Worth by Dallas Business Journal. She now resides in Austin with her husband, daughter, and two cats.