New Energy Appoints Global Technology Development Expert to Board of Advisors

New Energy Technologies, Inc. announced the appointment of Curtis Watkins, an energy advocate with deep industry ties and experience promoting the energy economy through leading initiatives, and connecting and collaborating with energy companies and professionals, to the company’s Board of Advisors.

Watkins currently works in the Emerging Technology Office at Duke Energy, where he is responsible for testing and verifying new technologies that have the potential to become part of a new emerging energy portfolio of solutions. He works with a range of technologies, from smaller-scale applications for individual homes, to larger-scale grid technologies and distributed energy resources. Prior to his joining the Emerging Technology Office in 2010, he worked in the IT area developing secure solutions to allow third party vendors access to sensitive, internal data.

Watkins began his career as an entrepreneur, helping build a high-tech startup focused on mobile technology solutions aimed at improving municipality process and procedures for code enforcement operations, and also starting an energy incubator program, CLT Joules, as a way to combine his passion for energy technology and entrepreneurism.

Through his leadership, the CLT Joules program has raised significant corporate sponsorships to fund the operations and taken in nine energy companies as part of the program, donating professional service work to energy innovators and small businesses to further their development. CLT Joules was noted by then Duke Energy CEO Jim Rogers as “one of the top three energy developments in Charlotte” in 2012.

“I’m pleased to have Curtis as a member of our Advisory Board team,” said John A. Conklin, president and CEO of New Energy Technologies. “Curtis is a proven entrepreneur and energy professional. As we continue to develop our SolarWindow technology toward commercialization, we look forward to utilizing his experience with driving innovative technology solutions in the utility and municipal energy industries, and guidance in the development of strategic partnerships.”

Watkins also serves on the University of North Carolina at Charlotte’s Energy and Infrastructure Production Center (EPIC) Implementation Committee as well as on the Emerging Technologies Coordinating Council (ETCC) Advisory Council. He was named by the Charlotte Business Journal to the top “Forty Under Forty” for 2013 and was the Young Professionals in Energy “Person of the Year” for the Charlotte chapter in 2011. He holds a bachelor’s degree in business administration from the Virginia Commonwealth University.

Currently under development for eventual commercial deployment in the estimated 85 million commercial buildings and homes in America, SolarWindow is the world’s first-of-its-kind technology capable of generating electricity on see-through glass windows and flexible plastics.