Jeff Fornero, Ph.D.

Jeff Fornero Ph.D. is a Nidus Entrepreneur-In-Residence, with a unique combination of industry and academic experience. Jeff’s 20 years of hands-on engineering experience is the foundation on which he launched his academic research in bioelectrochemical systems. Jeff currently is working as  VP of Engineering with portfolio company Electrochaea LLC, a carbon capture renewable natural gas technology company.  Previously, Jeff was a founder and CEO of Six Convert, an environmentally sustainable carbon dioxide recycling technology company that merged with Electrochaea LLC in August 2011.

Operating Experience
Jeff’s 20 plus years with Shell Oil in refinery and chemical plant operations gives him a solid understanding of how technologies are deployed in practice. He began his career in Deer Park, TX as engineering support for operations delivering unit reliability performance improvements. Jeff had responsibility for several $50M projects at plants across the United States. With increasing roles of responsibility, he moved into operating management positions delivering results in Distilling/Gas operations including a 25% increase is distilling rates while maintaining an excellent reliability performance. Jeff was the refinery maintenance manager and responsible for a $70M budget, 200 direct reports, all maintenance contractors, and purchasing.

In 2005, Jeff returned to school at Washington University graduating with a PhD in Energy, Environmental, and Chemical Engineering in 2009. His research focus was on bioelectrochemical systems and he published three papers in peer-reviewed journals and contributed to a book. He is currently applying his practical knowledge gained from the energy business to commercialize bioelectrochemical systems.

Jeff received his BS in Civil Engineering from the University of Illinois-Urbana.

Email Contact Information: jeff@niduspartners.com