SPEAKER: Phil Watts

Chief Scientist and President at Photonicfuel

To those looking closely, the headlines were a sign. “Missingchild located at 1962 Seattle Worlds Faire solar exhibition, again!”Fifty years ago, Photonicfuel’s president, Phil Watts was the mostreported missing visitor in a single day, only to be found peckingaway on IBM’s computer demonstration database or perusing the solarexhibits.

Today, Phil has come a long way from a teen outstanding in his field,just a mere 120 miles from Old Faithful geyser in Wyoming to aninventor up to his neck in hot water in Colorado. Following a careerin medical product development, Mr. Watts has channeled his productdevelopment talent into zero emission, renewable power generation.His latest innovation, an electrical generator, processes waste heatinto electricity. His current endeavor converts energy stored in hotwater to electricity solving the problem of ultra-low cost energystorage.

As the Chief Scientist and President at Photonicfuel, Phil Watts hasbeen a key player in developing disruptive technologies in the fieldof alternative energy for the past 30 years.

MODERATOR: Mike Cote

Editor of ColoradoBiz Magazine

Mike Cote is the Editor of ColoradoBiz Magazine. He has spent more than 20 years in the media industry as a reporter and editor at newspapers in Florida and Colorado, and now at ColoradoBiz magazine in the metro Denver area. He has also taught reporting and editing at the University of Colorado, where he earned his master's degree in journalism.

Before joining the team at ColoradoBiz, Mike served as both the City Editor and the Business Editor at the Boulder Daily Camera.

PANELIST: Michael Miller

VP, COO of Engage Communication Group

Michael W. Miller has been an impact player and recognized expert strategist in the Energy, Supply Chain, Sales, Business Coaching, and Operation fields for more than 25 years.  Voted a “Legend in Energy” by the National Association of Energy Engineers (AEE), Michael has worked with more than 30 Fortune 500 Companies, numerous small and large businesses, and more than 100 utilities world-wide.  Over the last 10 years, Michael has proven results of slashing more that $100 MM off operating costs. Currently, Michael is VP, COO of Engage Communication Group.  Prior to this, Michael has held roles as Global Manager responsible for a $250 MM operating budget at 41 worldwide industrial facilities, Founder CEO of a successful consulting firm BLUEnergy, LLC, VP of the country’s largest residential REIT (Responsible for a $250 Million budget), and Energy Director for the one of the world’s largest suppliers of metal and plastic packaging ($100+ Million budget).

As a Business Coach, Michael assists business professionals with their products and services to produce uncommon results by evaluating each major phase (Designing, crafting, effectively speak the narrative, fulfilling a specific market need, and satisfying customers). 

Michael’s unique combination of professional accomplishments include a BS in Nuclear Science and Engineering (Virginia Tech), MBA (Summa Cum Laude), Six Sigma Black Belt, and five years of Advanced Business Training through The Aji Network (The Aji Network helps Business Professionals accumulate uncommon knowledge and superior capacity to think and act effectively with offers and practices to produce competitive advantage, superior value, and top 1% income results).  His professional certifications from the AEE include Certified Energy Manager (CEM), Certified Energy Procurement Professional (CEP), Carbon Reduction Manager (CRM), and Business Energy Professional (BEP).  He is lauded by his peers as an accomplished Speaker, Instructor, Leader, Thinker, and Business Strategist.

PANELIST: Ronal Larson

Former Professor (E.E. at Georgia Tech) and former Principal Scientist at SERI (now NREL)

Dr. Ronal Larson (PhD from the University of Michigan) is a retired  former Professor (E.E. at Georgia Tech) and former Principal Scientist at SERI (now NREL).  His U.S. solar energy activities began in 1973 as the first IEEE Congressional Fellow, working on the first two solar bills passing the House Science Committee (and then the full Congress).  His fellowship continued for an extra year with the (now-disbanded Congressional) Office of Technology Assessment. After SERI, he worked in 1982 and 1983 as Chief-of-Party for a USAID solar energy project in Sudan.  As a past Chair of the American Solar Energy Society (ASES), he was earlier responsible for its Membership and Strategic Planning Committee activities. He was co-editor of an ASES White paper on the economics of renewables, an MIT Book on Commercialization of a range of Solar Thermal systems, and a 2003 ASES hydrogen policy paper.   For its first eight years of existence, he served as Secretary of the Colorado Renewable Energy Society (CRES - an ASES Chapter, which he helped co-found), where he still works on state regulatory and legislative policy issues and renewable energy education..  He has been active in several dockets at the Colorado Public Utility Commission – this past year mostly emphasizing energy efficiency – on behalf of an NGO, Ratepayers United of Colorado (RUC). He has built a solar “Zero energy” home (built around the University of Colorado’s 2002 national-winning Solar Decathlon house) and was active in the July 2006 ASES Conference, held in Denver, which emphasized climate recovery.   A principal current activity is developing and promoting the concept of sequestering CO2 through charcoal additions to the world’s soils (now called “biochar” or “terra preta”).   Here he is a volunteer with a biochar-oriented group helping the new Colorado “Collaboratory”, which will host the first North American Regional Biochar in Boulder in August, 2009.  In 2007, he was appointed by the Colorado Senate Majority leader to the Colorado Senate Bill 91 Task Force – a renewable energy, policy-oriented group.  Dr. Larson currently serves on two Boards of Directors for Colorado renewable energy companies and a “Colorado green jobs” steering committee.   Through his renewable energy consulting firm, he has traveled extensively – mostly in developing countries – and often on charcoal-making stoves.

PANELIST: Thomas Franklin

Intellectual Property Attorney – Kilpatrick Townsend

Tom Franklin is a partner in the full service intellectual property (IP) firm of Kilpatrick Townsend. Kilpatrick is one of the largest firms specializing in IP with a 150 year history and nearly 200 lawyers in eight different offices. Mr. Franklin supports a national practice where he splits his time between the Townsend offices in Denver and San Diego.  Mr. Franklin uses strong IP protection strategies to assist large companies maintaining their dominance and assist startups vying to dominate.

With over a dozen years in private practice, Mr. Franklin specializes in strong patent protection for high tech companies in the electronic and software fields. He regularly performs due diligence, patent portfolio development, expedited patent protection, and other techniques to efficiently achieve his clients goals.  Mr. Franklin received his law degree from University of San Diego after a B.S. in Electrical and Computer Engineering from San Diego State University (Class of 1990), summa cum laude.  Prior to practicing law, Mr. Franklin spent eight years as an engineer with Hughes Electronics and a senior engineer with L3 Communications and Lockheed Martin.