WVU energy strategist preparing Appalachia for what’s coming next

A Richwood native and WVU graduate, Sam Taylor returned to West Virginia after working for General Motors and has spent nearly 15 years advancing some of the University's largest energy initiatives. (WVU Photo/Matt Sunday)

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Long before Sam Taylor began helping West Virginia University chart Appalachia's energy future, time away from the Mountain State showed him why he wanted to come home.

Taylor, chief technology officer for the NSF Resilient Energy Technology and Infrastructure Engine , grew up in Richwood and attended WVU before his career took him beyond the state's borders. His work with General Motors gave him opportunities to travel the world, but it also deepened his appreciation for West Virginia and the life he left behind.

"I was in Detroit working for General Motors, and I came across a few guys from the United Kingdom who were telling me about their upcoming vacation plans to go whitewater rafting and fishing in West Virginia," he said. "In that moment it became clear to me that I might have messed up leaving this place. When I had the chance to return, I took it."

Taylor, director of the WVU Institute for Sustainability and Energy Research and chief technology officer for RETI, helps bring together researchers, companies, and community partners to address emerging energy and infrastructure challenges. (WVU Photo/Matt Sunday)

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Taylor joined WVU in July 2011 and has spent nearly 15 years working on some of the University's largest energy initiatives. Today, he serves in two closely connected roles: director of the WVU Institute for Sustainability and Energy Research, commonly known as WISER, and chief technology officer for RETI.

Across his work with WVU and the U.S. Department of Energy, Taylor has managed more than $1 billion in research, development, and technology-deployment programs.

"I've always been excited by big projects," he said. "I get really excited when I see places where we could punch above our weight. Places where we and a few key partners can show we have the expertise to do national-level work."

His interest in the future of West Virginia also extends beyond energy. Taylor earned a doctoral degree in agricultural and resource economics from WVU in 2020, and his dissertation examined what causes people to leave the communities where they live.

Focusing on Appalachia and West Virginia, he studied how opioid deaths and major water contamination events affected population loss. The work grew from his concern about the long-running struggle to retain people in West Virginia and reinforced his interest in how economic development affects the communities where it happens.

Today, Taylor is bringing the same interest in big problems to his work with RETI.

"Our job for the past few years at WISER has been to see 10 minutes into the future," Taylor said. "We were talking about data centers two years ago and thinking about where the pinch points would be. Now people are coming to us with those same concerns."

Through the WVU-led RETI consortium, Sam Taylor is working to position Appalachia as a national center for solving complex energy, infrastructure, and advanced manufacturing challenges. (WVU Photo)

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Led by WVU in partnership with Carnegie Mellon University, the University of Pittsburgh, and more than 60 industry, government, workforce, investment, and community partners, RETI will use $321 million in public and private funding to look even further into the future.

RETI aims to strengthen the reliability and resilience of the energy system, move promising technologies from laboratories into commercial use, support advanced manufacturing, prepare workers, and create companies capable of generating lasting economic value across the region.

As chief technology officer, Taylor helps identify emerging energy and infrastructure challenges and determine which combination of researchers, companies, and other partners can form the strongest team to address them.

The work comes as aging infrastructure, increasing electricity demand, and rapid data center development are creating new challenges across the country. Taylor said he believes Appalachia is particularly well positioned to help address them.

"Our heritage is that we do the hardest, biggest, craziest thing," Taylor said. "We built the longest tunnels and the biggest bridges, and we've worked in the deepest places. It has never been the easiest place to do things, but the ability to take on difficult, physical work is part of this region's core identity."

As chief technology officer for RETI, Taylor, shown here with his RETI colleagues Liz Vitullo, from left, and Erienne Olesh, is helping to move promising technologies from laboratories into commercial use while considering their effects on workers and communities across Appalachia. (WVU Photo/Matt Sunday)

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The region also offers energy resources, heavy-industry assets, skilled workers, and proximity to major Mid-Atlantic population centers.

Each of RETI's three lead universities brings different strengths to the consortium. While Carnegie Mellon and Pitt offer extensive capabilities in fundamental research and policy, Taylor said WVU stands out for applied research and technology deployment.

"At WVU, we shine on the applied side," he said. "You may have a great idea, but how do you turn it into something that will actually leave the University? How do you get it out into the field?"

But moving technology into the field is only part of the challenge. Taylor said RETI is also focused on making sure new investment creates lasting value for the communities where it happens.

Large energy and infrastructure projects can bring substantial investment without necessarily creating large numbers of permanent jobs. A data center, for example, may significantly affect local land use, water resources, and electricity demand while supporting relatively few permanent positions once construction ends, Taylor explained.

"That can be a hard sell," Taylor said. "How do we cross the divide between a major capital project and something that creates lasting value for the people who live here?"

Across his work with WVU and the U.S. Department of Energy, Taylor has managed more than $1 billion in research, development, and technology-deployment programs. (WVU Photo/Jennifer Shephard)

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Taylor said RETI is approaching those challenges by considering workforce preparation, local sourcing, community impact, and public policy alongside technical performance and cost.

For Taylor, RETI success will ultimately depend on more than research awards, new technologies, or investment. It will also depend on whether that work creates opportunities for people to build careers and stay in the region.

Taylor said he wants Appalachia to be known as a center for innovation, much like Silicon Valley, North Carolina's Research Triangle, or the medical-technology sector in Pittsburgh, but in a way that builds on the region's own history and capabilities.

"If we are successful, central Appalachia becomes known across the country and the world as the place that knows how to take on hard, physical, technology problems and deploy the solutions," he said.

"We're still powering the country. We're still making the steel and providing the things that make the modern economy work," Taylor said. "But 10 years from now, I want us to be known for solving the next generation of high-tech problems facing the nation, and for those solutions having happened here."