Since joining the office of Advanced Energy Systems within the Office of Fossil Energy, in August 2017, Dr. Ross has been engaged in several projects related to the chemistry and engineering considerations of combustion. These projects include: (1) developed two concepts to improve the competitiveness of lower rank western coals, (2) developed two engineering concepts for measuring flame temperature in a coal combustion furnace, (3) assembled a database for specific western coals, (4) reviewed and commented on several documents related to the sources and maintenance of critical minerals including certain rare earth elements, (5) became project manager of four Technology Commercialization Fund (TCF) projects, (6) reviewed and analyzed the thermodynamics of supercritical carbon dioxide, (7) prepared a presentation to be given at the University of Michigan School of Nuclear Engineering on the use and engineering of supercritical carbon dioxide in power plants, (8) reviewed an additional seven TCF proposals for the measurement of selenium in a variety of water and waste water streams, and (9) began an investigation into the treatment of selenium in power plant waste streams with the carbon dioxide products of combustion. Dr. Ross became the program director for the Solid Oxide Fuel Cell Program in April of 2018.

Dr. Ross has over 30 years’ experience in the fields of high level and low level radioactive waste management, process control, process engineering, equipment design and fabrication, prototyping, process chemistry and analytical chemistry. Since joining DOE’s Office of Environmental Management in January 2008, Dr. Ross has participated in several high visibility programs. He managed the development and coordination of the Tank Waste Corporate Board meetings. He served on a QARD-based audit of the Defense Waste Processing Facility High-Level Waste vitrification operation. Based on his previous experience consulting with the Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste Management, he served as a reviewer on two essential documents from the Hanford Waste Treatment Plant: the Wasteform Compliance Plan and the Wasteform Qualification Report. Dr. Ross was a team member of the Technical Readiness Assessment review of the ²³³U Down-Blending project at Oak Ridge as well as the Lehman-style review of the DOE-Idaho Sodium Bearing Waste project. He provided support on Technical Readiness Assessment reviews of both the DOE Richland Sludge Treatment Project and the Hanford K-Basin. Throughout this entire period, Dr. Ross has had oversight responsibility for the DOE-Idaho Calcine/Hot Isostatic Pressing project.

Prior to coming to DOE he provided technical support to the Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste Management. The work included the development of the Waste Acceptance System Requirements Document, the Integrated Interface Control document, an engineering analysis of the Accelerator Transmutation of Waste proposal, and analyzed the impacts of a variety of U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission regulations on the management of radioactive waste including Code of Federal Regulation Parts 60, 61, 63, 72,73,74,835, and 961. 

Prior to consulting to DOE-RW Dr. Ross was both Manager of the Solidification Laboratory, an Applications Engineer, a Product Line Manager, a Project Manager and a research engineer. As a research engineer he both designed and fabricated a cyclone dust collector for coal particulates and an heat exchanger as part of a prototype coal calorimetry test stand for which he was the lead engineer. He developed several process control algorithms for both small and large scale plant engineering applications, using classical PID and ladder logic controllers as well as state of the art algorithms based on neural networks. He was also the lead engineer in the installation and set-up of a tern metal control system for a steel plant rolling mill.

Education

Central Michigan University, BSc, Chemistry, 1970, Mt. Pleasant, Michigan

Baylor College of Medicine, PhD, Biochemistry, 1977, Houston, Texas