OUR TEAM
THE FOUNDERS
ANDY PHELPS
PATRICK MCCLURE
DAVID POSTON
MARC GIBSON
ANDY PHELPS
Chief Executive Officer
Andy has more than forty years' diverse leadership experience at Bechtel in the engineering and construction industry focused on large international multi-billion-dollar capital projects in the nuclear, mining, and environmental business sectors. This experience includes a one-year White House fellowship in Senior Executive Service with US Department of Defense and two years leading UK nuclear industry restructuring from within the British Government. Andy holds an engineering degree from Georgia Institute of Technology and has completed management studies at the University of Tennessee and Harvard Kennedy School of Government. Andy was also an associate director at LANL.
Chief Operations Officer
Patrick McClure
Patrick was the project lead for the Kilopower project at Los Alamos National Laboratory. He helped define the groundbreaking approach to reactor development for Kilopower and he was the regulatory lead for the project. Patrick is also a former line manager at LANL for the Nuclear System Design and Analysis Group. He has been at LANL for 25 years performing nuclear design for very small reactor systems and safety analysis for a variety of reactor concepts with an emphasis on severe nuclear accidents like Three Mile Island and Fukushima. He has a B.S. from the University of Oklahoma and a M.S. from the University of New Mexico.
David Poston, PHD
Chief Technology Officer
Dr. Poston was LANL’s Chief Reactor Designer for the NASA Kilopower Project, including the successful DUFF and KRUSTY reactor tests. Dave's 30 years of reactor experience has primarily been focused on near-term concepts for space exploration (including designs for science and human missions to the Moon, Mars, and outer planets). In addition, he has developed several Nuclear Thermal Rocket (NTR) design concepts for NASA, and numerous special purpose reactor concepts for commercial and defense applications, ranging from 1 kW to 10MW. Prior to his experience at Los Alamos, Dave worked at GE Nuclear Energy for 4 years on advanced reactor design: SBWR, PRISM, and SP-100. Dr. Poston received a BS in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Michigan, an MS in Mechanical Engineering from Stanford University, an MS in Nuclear Engineering from the University of California at Berkeley, and a PhD in Nuclear Engineering (thesis in Nuclear Thermal Propulsion) from the University of Michigan.
MARC GIBSON
Chief Engineer
Marc Gibson was the lead engineer for NASA’s nuclear systems Kilopower project tasked with advancing the technology readiness of fission power systems for space. Marc started his career at NASA in 2007 after working in the private sector for ten years as chief engineer for numerous commercial and government research projects. At NASA, Marc was responsible for the engineering and development of nuclear systems for in-space and planetary surface power in support of the Space Technology Mission Directorate. Marc received a bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Akron and a masters in Aerospace Engineering from the Case Western Reserve University.
Anthony BeLLeTETE
Chief Financial Officer
Anthony is a licensed Certified Public Accountant with over 28 years in public practice. In his early career, he worked with both KPMG and Deloitte & Touche, international accounting firms, in audit and tax assignments. Most recently, Anthony served as the managing member of a Los Alamos, NM based public accounting firm working with many high-tech start-up enterprises. Anthony earned his Master of Business Administration degree from Queens University of Charlotte.
Gabriela Lopez Escobedo
Project Manager
Gabriela has over 29 years of experience in program and project management, project controls, contracts, construction, site investigations, and environmental cleanups. Gabriela was a Program Manager at the LANL Weapons Infrastructure/Planning Office responsible for the planning and oversight of a $150M annual budget for the Weapons Facilities Portfolio. Notable assignments: management of a capital line-item construction project for LANL Strategic Computing Complex, Program Manager for Strategy and Integration for Environmental Management Programs at LANL, and Project Manager for the Escondida Water Supply Selection and Definition Phases for the Santiago Chile BHPB Hub for Bechtel Ltda. Gabriela is a certified Project Management Professional by the Project Management Institute and holds an M.S. in Geology.
Steven Clement
Nuclear Facility Operations and
Startup SME
Mr. Clement is an expert in the fields of nuclear experimentation, nuclear facility operations and nuclear facility startup. He will assist in the areas of ground experimentation and launch facility startup and operations.
Joseph A. Sholtis
Senior Engineering & Safety Advisor
Experience-based evaluation of the design, safety, development, testing, safety analysis report preparation for launch approval, as well as in-space startup & operation of space nuclear systems.
Dr. Louis Restrepo
Consultant
Independent Consultant with Expertise in Nuclear Safety Analysis and Documentation, Integration of Safety into Design, Risk/Reliability Analysis, and Phenomenological Modeling.
Monica Poston
Media/Website/Marketing Manager, PR
Monica has a BFA from Elon University. She has a rich background spanning various facets of the arts. She has designed multiple websites, run various social media pages, and created many digital medias, logos, and posters.
Daniel Lawton
Strategic Advisor
Provides strategic counsel to the company regarding commercial, financing and legal issues. Mr. Lawton has practiced law at firms in Europe and the United States. He has a B.A. in economics from the University of Michigan, is a graduate of Harvard Law School and was a Teaching Fellow at Harvard University (Economics under Martin Feldstein).
Jim Bridenstine
Advisor
Jim served as NASA’s 13th administrator, represented Oklahoma’s 1st Congressional District in the House of Representatives, and flew combat missions as Naval Aviator in Iraq/Afghanistan. Under his leadership at NASA, America again launched astronauts on American rockets and introduced NASA’s human lunar exploration initiative, Artemis.
Paige Ramsey
Information Security Officer
Paige Ramsey has a B.S. in Emergency Management from Utah Valley University, B.S. in Information Technology from Colorado State University and M.S. in Cyber Security from Grand Canyon University. She has 10 years of cyber security experience from different DOE contracting jobs. She is a Signal Officer in the New Mexico Army National Guard.