Grant has over 34 years of leadership and development experience in the chemicals and oil & gas industries. 29 years with Shell included R&D and commercial roles. His final role was leader of Shell Chemicals technical and commercial development of EOR surfactants. More recently, he served as an Operating Partner and advisor for Ara Partners private equity funds working on investment technical due diligence, and advice to portfolio companies.  He has a background in chemical process and product development and business. He has a PhD in Chemical Engineering from UC Berkeley and an MBA from the University of Texas.

Watty has thirty-six years of domestic E&P onshore and offshore experience in a variety of engineering, operations and safety/environmental roles. Most recently he was Director of EHS for SM Energy, and prior to that had onshore and offshore production engineering roles with Newfield, BP, and Arco in the US. He is very familiar with field operations, and stimulation techniques. Watty has a BS degree in Petroleum Engr from Texas A&M University. Watty will serve as COO.

David has been the Aghorn Energy Professor of Petroleum Engineering, Texas A&M University. David is one of the most active academics working in the area of wettability alteration and surfactant injection driven oil recovery in unconventional reservoirs. His research group focuses on geological and petrophysical analysis, wettability determination, surfactant driven imbibition experiments, numerical modeling, reservoir simulation, CO2 and miscible gas injection for EOR. Distinguished Member of SPE 2014. Ph.D. Physical Chemistry, University of Bristol, 1988, B.S. Chemical Engineering, University of Texas, 1984. 

Val has over 38 years of leadership experience in the oil and gas industry, including 30 with Shell in various reservoir engineering and operations leadership roles, ultimately leading Shell’s global technology and business development organization for enhanced and improved recovery methods.  He served as an advisor and Operating Partner with Bayou City Energy in private equity. Prior to that he had joined Kinder Morgan as Vice President of CO2 Source & Transportation,  where he led the world’s largest CO2 development and supply business for Permian CO2 enhanced oil recovery projects.  Val has a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering and an MBA from University of Texas.

Kirk Raney was a lead researcher in Shell Upstream R&D efforts to deploy EOR technologies. Kirk is a recognized technical expert on surfactants for a variety of applications including surfactants for EOR.  Most recently he has consulted for oilfield services and oilfield chemical companies. He has a Ph.D in Chemical Engineering from Rice University and will serve as Chief Science Officer.

Isaiah is a PhD student in Petroleum Engineering at Texas A&M University. For the past three years, Isaiah has focused his research on optimizing surfactant formulations for unconventional shale plays. His work incorporates laboratory testing, field evaluation, and reservoir modeling towards improving surfactant performance in EOR deployment. Isaiah has a MS in Petroleum Engineering from Texas A&M University and a BS in Petroleum Engineering and Geology from New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology.