Sandra Särav is the Deputy Secretary General for Economy and Innovation the Estonian Ministry of Economic Affairs and Commucations. She is a seasoned digital policy expert with a robust background in government and private sector roles. Leveraging experience from the Estonian Government and EU-level decision-making, she has served in public policy at Meta (Facebook) and led regulatory and sustainability efforts at Bolt, an Estonian tech unicorn. What brought her back to government was the sense of mission of building solutions for your own country. She’s also a lecturer at TalTech, teaching legal framework of digital government and EU law.

Born in A Coruña (Galicia-Spain) in 1972, he studied nursing at the University of Santiago de Compostela, working in 061 -Emergency service- and as a specialist teacher in life support, where he is the author of the Manual of advanced life support in pre-hospital emergencies (2007) among other health publications.   

In parallel, Gonzalez Casares has developed his political career at the local level, becoming first deputy mayor and councillor for Urbanism, Social Services, Health and Sport during the previous legislature in Lalín, a village in the heart of Galicia. 

After the elections to the European Parliament in May 2019, he became an MEP for the PSOE. In the European Parliament, he is a member of the Committee on Industry, Research and Energy – ITRE, where he is the spokesperson for the Spanish Socialist Delegation for Energy -, the Committee on Environment, Public Health and Food Safety Committee (ENVI) and the Committee on Fisheries (PECH).

González Casares has been the Socialist rapporteur in ITRE for the Regulation (EU) 2021/1119 of 30 June 2021 establishing the framework for achieving climate neutrality and amending Regulations (EC) No 401/2009 and (EU) 2018/1999 (‘European Climate Law’). 

Within the Fit for 55 package, he’s the Socialist rapporteur for the proposal to revise the Renewable Energy Directive (including the REPowerEU proposal on permitting), and ENVI’s rapporteur for the Proposal for a regulation on ensuring a level playing field for sustainable air transport (ReFuelEU Aviation). He was the Parliament’s rapporteur for the reform of the design of the electricity market. 

 Nicolás has been re-elected as MEP in June 2024.