Request Expert

For over 25 years, Expert has been a leader in deploying and operating fuel cell power systems. He is recognized internationally for his technical knowledge, expertise, and pioneering work in developing fuel cell solutions for industrial, commercial, and residential electrical energy applications. He has evaluated countless project opportunities, installing over 165 systems and representing all stationary fuel and cell product technologies. This body of work led to the development of widely adopted methods and practices to safely deploy and operate various 5kW to 300kW proton exchange membranes, phosphoric acid, and molten carbonate products. These installations occurred at DOD facilities, universities, utility properties, commercial buildings, food plants, state and local government facilities, and at commercial enterprises having critical power requirements for various voice and data communications across the US and in the UK, Iceland, and Puerto Rico.

The wide diversity of customer applications continually challenged Expert’s team with numerous first-ever fuel cell installation designs that tested various electrical, mechanical, and thermal recovery methods and practices. Out of these experiences, the team provided safe grid interconnection and facility integration methods for prime movers, combined cooling, heating, and power (CCHP) systems, and grid-independent and backup power systems. Many of these projects also highlighted the advantages of fuel flexibility by proving supply logistics and safe storage and handling procedures for Hydrogen and LPGas at customer sites. Others proved secure interconnection methods with pipeline Natural Gas to project sites.

Expert’s projects have been the subject of numerous published reports and oral presentations. Early reports focused on application designs, installation standards, performance metrics, and reliability-growth testing and recommended system improvements to accelerate the commercial rollout and broader market adoption. Recent presentations highlight the comparative environmental and economic advantages many fuel cell products enjoy over incumbent technologies.

In addition to technical expertise, Expert also possesses business acumen with fuel cell solutions. He is an expert in leveraging tax-advantaged financing and other state and local alternative energy incentive programs to benefit fuel cell projects.

He did this to show how a contractor could monetize tax credits to improve project margins while providing. In 2009 he assisted DOE in developing guidelines that encouraged procurement officials the use tax-advantaged agreements in federal government alternative energy contracts. As Chairman of the Fuel Cell Seminar and Exposition, the leading international fuel cell industry association, Expert proposed to DOE that it should sponsor a federal Indefinite Delivery Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) contract to stimulate industry growth and expansion, arguing that large orders are the purest form of stimulus. DOE is currently preparing to release the first draft of the IDIQ.

Expert has applied his knowledge of fuel cell performance and operating characteristics to develop efficient and diverse energy applications that demonstrate "total product" versatility and conformity within the built environment. In the course of developing many projects, he has developed application standards and, best of product solutions for each of the three fuel cell technologies, including proton exchange membrane fuel cell (PEM), phosphoric acid fuel cell (PAFC) and molten carbonate fuel cell (MCFC) products. Since each has a particular set of performance characteristics that inform specific energy service applications, his work has focused on developing methods, practices, and solutions that provide the best fuel cell product for a customer's particular design requirements.

For customers desiring onsite fuel cell CHP or CCHP energy services, he has shown how the optimal fuel cell solution should provide cost-effective, incremental, and efficient use of energy capital for current load requirements and indicate the ease of adding capacity to support future growth. With careful planning and design, such installations may achieve system operating efficiencies of over 70%.

Many commercial energy consumers maintain various Information Technology systems that are so vital to their operations that they must employ backup power systems to assure business sustainability and continuity in the event of a utility fault or failure. Expert's team has developed and installed fuel cell solutions that uniquely serve as uninterruptible power generation systems, have far superior performance and availability, and are more robust than incumbent uninterruptible power system (UPS) technologies. In contrast to batteries, these systems store, in the equivalent footprint, as much as 400% greater reserve energy capacity in the form of hydrogen, which a fuel cell transforms to pure power, providing hours or even days of extended run time in support of various customer mission-critical electric loads.

Expert is an acknowledged expert with power generation projects that utilize hydrogen as a fuel or, more appropriately stated, as an energy carrier. His Combined Heat and Power (CHP) generation projects involved hydrogen generation utilizing external steam reforming (external to the cell stack itself) or internal direct reforming processes using either Natural Gas or LPGas as the source fuel.

At the small-scale residential and commercial end of the spectrum, his fuel cell systems utilized catalytic partial oxidation technology to generate smaller quantities of hydrogen, but which process permits faster start cycles. In other applications, Expert's projects have demonstrated safe handling, resupply, and the superior energy density of stored gaseous hydrogen compared to energy storage using valve-regulated lead acid batteries. These projects also proved that hydrogen fuel storage supporting 10 - 25kW backup fuel cell installations, which are designed to provide extended run time for mission-critical electric loads, are more cost effective and reliable than diesel engine generators combined with traditional UPS systems.

Many of Expert's fuel cell deployments have benefited from the extensive infrastructure of pipeline natural gas across the US and the UK. He has developed fuel cell projects for gas utilities in TX, CA, MA, LA, and the UK. Still, he has often worked closely with local distribution companies that provide natural gas for his customer's projects. These projects demonstrated that reforming pipeline natural gas to hydrogen is the cleanest, most energy-efficient, and cost-effective means of power generation using fossil fuel. Fuel cell CHP and CCHP (Combined Cooling Heating and Power) installations have also proved the superior total system efficiency gains available from natural gas-fueled systems that capture waste heat from internal processes and transfer it to customer thermal loads or utilize it to drive the thermal cycles in adsorption chillers.

Not only have Expert's fuel cell projects demonstrated the benefits of advanced clean, quiet and reliable energy technology, but they have also established their energy conservation credentials. Over the years, he has consistently reported fuel cell electrical efficiencies ranging from 38% to 47% for prime movers and 65% to 75% in CHP and CCHP systems. His customers have also experienced the economic benefits of displacing electric utility kilowatts (Btu's) with lower-cost natural gas Btu's in fuel cell systems that are scaled to meet specific onsite energy applications.

For most projects, Expert has used various federal, state, and local energy policies that provide cash and tax incentives to encourage energy consumers to invest in distributed clean energy technologies. Over 30 states have adopted renewable portfolio standards, with mandates creating markets to trade renewable energy credits (RECs). In many of these states, fuel cells operating on natural gas are classified as "renewable," Fuel cell power generation owners are increasingly finding that many electric utilities are eager to buy their RECs and generation capacity.

In 2009 Expert contracted with UT Battelle, manager of the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, to provide fuel cell consulting services designed to evaluate and support fuel cell projects there. Part of the consultancy involved writing a scoping document for assessing a small PEM fuel cell system and an extensive megawatt class system in various applications that would be most effective in supporting the lab's mission and utilizing synthetic gases produced on-site.

The second part of the consultancy involved developing "bankable" fuel cell project finance models incorporating IRS Section 48 tax credits that potential project lenders could readily support. This work was also undertaken to support the DOE's fuel cell market transformation program. In 2009 Expert led the team in a consultancy with The Macquarie Group, a global provider of banking, financial, advisory, investment, and funds management services. The purpose was to evaluate a specific start-up fuel cell company's readiness and ability to take its new product to market using Macquarie financing services. The scope of work included the following tasks: - analyze and report on the design, engineering, and laboratory test results of the product - determine the company's ability to quickly transition from strictly an R&D firm to a more broad-based organization with resident capabilities to perform complete scale product manufacturing, site engineering, construction, and product support - analyze the addressable markets, competitive price points, and the adoption curve the product might reasonably expect to encounter.