Overview

Speakers

The program

SPEAKERS

Poster #15 - Whitney Goldsborough Colella

President and Principal Research Engineer, Gaia Energy Research Institute, Arlington, Virginia, United States

Biography

Dr. Whitney G. Colella, PhD, MBA, serves as president and principal research engineer of Gaia Energy Research Institute (Gaia). Dr. Colella has over 20 years of research and development experience in academia, government, and private industry in the areas of advanced energy conversion system design, operation, and control. Her areas of expertise include the thermodynamics, chemical engineering process plant design, economics, computer modeling, techno-economic analysis (TEA), life cycle assessment (LCA), and independent testing of advanced energy systems. Dr. Colella has served as a principal investigator (PI) on energy R&D projects totaling over $8 million and as a key technical contributor on energy R&D projects totaling over $20 million. Dr. Colella spearheads computer simulation, testing, and independent analysis of novel, low-carbon energy systems to improve their thermodynamics, economics, and environmental performance. Dr. Colella develops and applies analytic approaches to understand the design and performance space of networked stationary polygenerative fuel cell power plants, electrochemical and hydrogen energy systems, distributed energy generation and storage devices, and advanced transportation systems. An aim of Dr. Colella’s research is to use relatively inexpensive computer simulation to better design low-carbon energy devices so that they meet time-dependent energy demands, lower energy costs, and reduce emissions.