Fort Felker
Director, National Wind Technology Center -
Department of Energy National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL)
Prior to becoming director of the NWTC in 2009, Fort Felker was the co-founder and vice president of Winglet Technology LLC, a company that commercialized his patented design of "elliptical winglets" for business aircraft. Elliptical winglets reduce drag and fuel consumption, improving the range and takeoff performance of aircraft. Before his 6-year stint as an entrepreneur, Felker was an engineering analyst at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory where he developed the underlying theory and computational modeling for the hypersonic flow about re-entry vehicles undergoing extreme maneuvers. From 1994-1996, Felker worked in senior engineering positions at Kenetech Windpower. As manager of engineering modeling, he was responsible for developing wind turbine engineering analysis tools. Later as director of engineering analysis and test, he played a key role in the development of the KVS-45 wind turbine, and led a team of engineers and technicians in the testing of large wind turbine systems. His early experience includes nine years with NASA Ames Research Center and six years with the U.S. Army Research and Technology Labs, working on rotorcraft analysis and testing. Felker holds one patent and is the author of 29 publications.
