Company

Key Staff

Robert Thomas, Co-Founder, Chief Technology Officer and Acting Chief Executive Officer
Robert managed the Energy Conservation and Wind Energy Programs for the US Navy in the 1970s.  Later in 1980 thru 82, he was manager of the Wind Energy Program for the California Energy Commission and is recognized as a key figure in the development of the wind energy industry in the United States.  He holds a B.S. in Aeronautical Engineering from the University of Michigan and has completed engineering graduate wind energy related research at the University of California, Davis. Robert has conceived, patented, developed and built all of the Wind Harvest Company designs to the point of commercial development. He has developed the analytical tools needed to measure and calculate turbine performance and to analyze turbine economics. He has defined and recognized worldwide wind turbine markets. He lives in Ventura California where the headquarters and ‘skunk works’ for the Wind Harvest Company will be established. Robert has been compelled to work toward establishing a world wide wind industry as well as developing the technology to advance that dream recognized in the early 70’s that the world must develop renewable energy to advance the well being of the planet and its people.

George Wagner, Co-Founder, President
A former prosecutor with the City of Los Angeles, and an attorney in private practice, Mr. Wagner was co-founder and President of the California League of Conservation Voters, and Executive Director of the Jung Institute of Los Angeles.  He was also co-chairman of the campaign for the California Coastal Protection Act. He has been a leader in the environmental movement for several decades.  He holds a B.S. from UCLA and a Law Degree from Southwestern Law School.  George has shared administrative duties of the Wind Harvest Company with Robert Thomas for the past 20 years. Through his capital raising abilities, George has insured that WHC has continued its valuable research and development work and that international patents were secured. He lives in Point Reyes, California and manages the WHI administrative office there.

Kevin Wolf, Chief Operating Officer 
Mr. Wolf began consulting for the Wind Harvest Company (WHC) in 1999.  Wolf was the principal of his own successful consulting company (Wolf and Associates) where he primarily focused on assisting organizations with their strategic planning and facilitating consensus-based meetings and complex environmental disputes. After six years of consulting help, WHC’s board asked him to work full time and help them form and capitalize Wind Harvest International.  From then to the present, Wolf has helped the company in many areas including: securing agreements on use of wind farms, gaining letters of intent for future purchases of WHI’s turbines, identifying blade manufacturing companies, selecting consultants, managing an internal wind farm database, meeting with investors, maintaining the project management software, facilitating meetings among consultants and other work as needed.  Wolf has a long list of successful projects and clients with whom he has worked (see attached resume) and a record of success in helping WHI advance its goals and objectives.

Consultants

Ion Paraschivoiu, Ph.D. President of Iopara Inc. Inc.
Dr. Parachivoiu is leading the computer modeling team.  He is a professor in the Dept. of Mechanical Engineering, Ecole Polytechnique de Montreal. He made a significant contribution to the theory of the aerodynamic performance of the Darrieus VAWT and is one of the pioneers in VAWT technology. The computer programs that he developed in this domain are based on the Double Multiple Streamtube model developed by him and successfully used by others for design and evaluation of VAWT field tests. At École Polytechnique de Montréal he teaches undergraduate and graduate courses in Aerodynamics and Wind Turbines. He has published over 200 Journal and Conference Proceedings papers and six books on Fluid Dynamics, Subsonic Aerodynamics and Wind Turbine Design. He is the owner and President of  Iopara Inc. Inc., a consulting company focusing on wind turbines and aeronautics (www.Iopara Inc..ca) which founded in 2007.

Marius Paraschivoiu, Ph.D.
Dr. Paraschivoiu will be the lead Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) modeler (6%).  He is an Associate Professor, Dept of Mechanical Engineering, Concordia Univ. in Montreal.  He earned his master's in aerospace engineering from Ecole Polytechnique de Montreal and Ph.D. from MA Institute of Technology ( MIT).  Currently, he is a CFD professor of Mechanical Engineering and director of the Concordia Institute of Aerospace Design and Innovation (CIADI) He holds  a chair in ”production and storage of clean energy” at Concordia University. His research interests include airfoil design, wind turbines and computational aerodynamics. He has published over 75 Journal and Conference Proceeding papers. He is the President of the Canadian Society for Mechanical Engineering.

Farooq Saeed, Ph.D.
Dr. Saeed will help on all parts of the project (6%).  He is an Assistant Professor at the  Dept of Aerospace Engineering, King Fahd Univ of Petroleum & Minerals.  He earned his master's and doctorate in aerospace engineering from the Univ of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He was a student of Michael Selig, whose PROPID code and its variations have been extensively developed and used for the design of HAWT blades. As a postgraduate researcher for Prof. Ion Paraschivoiu, he worked on the design and analysis of VAWTs based on the double-multiple streamtube concept. Currently, Dr. Saeed is an assistant professor of aerospace engineering at King Fahd University of Petroleum & Minerals. His interests include airfoil design, aircraft icing, wind turbines, experimental and computational aerodynamics, boundary layer control, etc. Dr. Saeed has over 50 Journal and Conference publications as well as numerous contributions in books. He is one of the chief consultants for Iopara Inc. Inc. in analysis and design of VAWTs, CFD analysis, specific airfoil design, etc.

David Malcolm, Ph.D., P.Eng.
Dr. Malcolm has worked since 2001 as a Senior Scientist for Global Energy Concepts which recently was acquired by Det Norte Veritas.  Before working for GEC, he was a senior scientist for  R Lynette Associates/Advanced Wind Turbines Inc. Dr. Malcolm has a great deal of experience in aero elastic analyses of wind turbine blades and structures, He was the Principal investigator for a major DOE project to determine the cost effectiveness of various rotor configurations. He was responsible for the structural integrity of all designs for Advanced Wind Turbines Inc. He did the conceptual and detailed analysis and design of fiberglass pultrusion blade for a vertical axis wind turbine.  He developed software for the identification and display of natural modes of vertical axis wind turbine rotors and their frequency responses. Among other assignments, Dr. Malcolm is presently working to integrate his aeroelastic model with Parschivoiu’s aerodynamic loads model , used to analyze WHI’s 1500 LAVTS.

Michael D. Zuteck, Blade designer
 Mr. Zuteck has pursued rotor research and design as an independent consultant in the field of wind energy since 1977.  He proposed to Sandia the concept of a sweep twist blade design, provided the initial study analysis of engineering feasibility, was the lead designer for the effort to reduce this design to practice, helped guide build by Knight & Carver, and verification atmospheric and fatigue testing.   He also provided key design guidance and analysis for the Sandia 9m research blades including the CX-100, TX-100, and flatback BSDS blades fabricated by TPI Composites, and also supported subsequent testing of these blades.  He supplied the initial structural design concept and analysis for a variable diameter extensible blade.  These projects are all within this decade. Mr. Zuteck B.S. in Physics from MIT and a MS in Physics from the University of Illinois.

John H. VandenBosche, Principal Engineer with Chinook Wind
Mr. VandenBosche is a skilled mechanical engineer who has extensive experience in the wind energy industry and is a registered US patent agent.  He presently runs his own consulting firm called Chinook Wind where the majority of work is for wind farm project developers with site prospecting and wind resource assessment.  He also has done due diligence research and performance testing on a number of wind turbines on behalf of clients who are considering purchases or ensuring warranty obligations.  Other areas in which he has worked include:  power curve measurements, assistance with turbine commissioning, SCADA system planning, design, and installation, evaluation of wind turbine retrofit options, investigation of lightning damage and icing effects, and development of operation and maintenance strategies. From 1996 to 1998 he provided engineering consulting services to the wind energy industry in California and to the National Renewable Energy Laboratory.  A major focus of the work was field-testing of wind turbines.   In 1996 he received a Master of Science degree in Mechanical Engineering from University of Texas at El Paso.

Dan Christ, CFO consultant
Mr. Christ has more than 20 years of financial management as a CFO or Senior Vice President in different companies and as a consultant working with custom manufacturing industries as well as in the consumer product, health-care, renewable energy and Internet services fields.  Dan graduated from the University of Oregon with economics and accounting and received an MBA from the University of San Francisco. He is also earned his CPA certificate in California after four years spent with Deloitte, Haskins & Sells in Portland and Hood & Strong, CPAs in San Francisco.

Lance Block, Manufacturing consultant
Mr. Block has over 35 years of experience with developing engineering drawings and designs and working with manufacturing companies to fabricate products.  He has certifications as a Lead Auditor   (ANSI N45.2.23), Level II Mechanical Inspector (ANSI N45.2.6), and Level II NDE Inspector (SNT-TC-1A. He has a long list of clients whom he has helped with their manufacturing bidding, systems analysis and quality control needs.