In addition to being the Shell Professor of Sustainable Development in Energy and Executive Director of the Energy Futures Lab at Imperial College, Professor Brandon is the Chief Scientist of Ceres Power, a company founded in 2001 to commercially exploit revolutionary fuel cell technology originally developed within Imperial College London during the preceding 10 years. Ceres Power won the prestigious Carbon Trust Low Carbon Innovation Award in 2003, and the Prime Minister Tony Blair has praised Ceres Power as a “world leader” in fuel cell technology. In 2006, Ceres Power won the Frost & Sullivan Excellence in Technology Award in the European micro combined heat and power (CHP) market.
The company’s underlying core technology was developed and incubated within Imperial College by a renowned founding group of fuel cell and materials experts including John Kilner, Alan Atkinson, Bob Rudkin and the late Brian Steele. The company is developing a range of products based around intermediate temperature Solid Oxide Fuel Cell. The fuel cell runs at 500-650°C, much lower than the conventional SOFC operational temperature range of 700-1000°C. The lower operation temperature makes it possible to use cheaper metal components and the system can be started up much faster.
Professor Brandon obtained his first degree and PhD from Imperial College London and then spent over fourteen years in industry with both BP and Rolls-Royce in senior R&D roles in fuel cells and related areas. He was appointed to the academic staff at Imperial in 1998 and now has a Chair at the College as the Shell Professor of Sustainable Development in Energy.
Professor Brandon’s research involves the quantitative analysis of energy systems, with a particular focus on the design, characterisation, modelling, control and optimisation of fuel cells. His present research work encompasses high temperature Solid Oxide Fuel Cells (SOFCs), metal supported Intermediate Temperature-SOFCs, and lower temperature Polmyer Fuel Cells. He collaborates extensively with industry in this field, as well with other research centres and universities around the world. He leads the EPSRC ‘Supergen’ Fuel Cell consortia, and the fuel cell topic within the UK Energy Research Center. He is the Executive Director of the Energy Futures Lab at Imperial College – http://www.imperial.ac.uk/energyfutureslab – which is leading cross-faculty, interdisciplinary energy reserach programmes across the College. He is a Visiting Professor at the Global Fuel Cell Centre, University of Connecticut, USA, Associate Editor of the ASME International Journal of Fuel Cell Science and Technology, and a member of the Grove Fuel Cell committee.