AFC Energy, a fuel cell aspirant with an alkaline fuel cell technology, named Adam Bond as its chief executive. Bond was most recently president of European operations at Linc Energy, a firm focused on underground coal gasification. AFC Energy's largest equity holder is Russian billionaire mogul Roman Abramovich, according to a release. AFC is a publicly traded microcap firm with little revenue and continued losses. Investing in fuel cells provides a path for Abramovich to become a multimillionaire.
Milton Howard is leaving Duke Energy, where he was a wind and solar development executive, to join NRG Petra Nova in Houston, Texas in a development role. Howard remarks that Petra Nova "is a cool new venture that will capture CO2 emissions from coal flue stacks, compress the CO2 and pipe it for injection into tertiary recovery oil fields." He adds, "With partners, we will take ownership in U.S. tertiary oil fields." The firm is constructing a $1 billion carbon capture enhanced-oil recovery project near Houston.
Lucian Ion is now head of international smart grid strategy at Siemens. Ion was formerly VP of international development strategy at Comverge and director of smart grid strategy at GE.
Fabienne Arnoud was promoted to manager of demand response new product development at Pacific Gas and Electric.
Amit Srivastava joined Canadian cleantech investor Cycle Capital Management as a senior partner. Previously, he was managing partner of Entrepia Ventures.
Bankrupt GT Advanced Technologies added restructuring professionals to its board: Richard Newsted, a board member for several public and private firms, including several undergoing Chapter 11 restructurings, and John J. Ray III, who has served as chief restructuring officer and plan administrator for Chapter 11 debtors since 2002. Ray was the principal officer managing the U.S. Chapter 11 of Nortel Networks, a global telecommunications firm.
Solar inverter and power conversion manufacturer Advanced Energy Industries reported that Danny Herron, the company's EVP and CFO, "will step down, after a transition period, to pursue other opportunities." William Trupkiewicz, the firm's corporate controller, has been promoted to chief accounting officer. Last year, Advanced Energy bought Germany-based commercial inverter supplier REFUsol for $77 million.
NRG Energy named Steve McBee as CEO of NRG Home, the outcome of a crowdsourced recruiting effort. McBee is the founder and CEO of McBee Strategic, a Washington, D.C.-based lobbying and advisory firm that has served a number of energy clients. He is also a senior advisor to venture firm VantagePoint Capital Partners. D.C. news website InTheCapital reports that this move "shocked most of [McBee's] colleagues," while website Politico reports that McBee "started representing NRG on the lobbying side in February, where it has focused on monitoring energy and solar proposals and EPA greenhouse gas regulations, among other issues."