Cesar Ovalles

In 2006 Cesar moved to California as a Staff Scientist at the Chevron Energy Technology Company. Cesar returned to his research roots and continued developing new heavy oil characterization techniques and methods of upgrading and transporting heavy and extra heavy crude oils. He was successful in the implementation of faster and more accurate characterization techniques for the separation and quantification of asphaltenes and asphaltenes solubility fractions. He also developed a methodology for the prediction of reactivity of hydrocarbon feedstocks to hydroprocess technologies.

In 2009, Cesar was named Technical Team Leader of the Project Support Team of the Petroleum and Material Characterization Unit. He supervised a twelve member team in the areas of heavy oil upgrading, asphaltene characterization, GC support including using a state-of-art GCXGC-TOFMS-FID technology, international lab support, sulfur speciation and oil fingerprinting, environmental litigation support, development of advanced chemical sensors for process control and environmental monitoring.

In 2012, Cesar was named Technical Team Leader of the Heavy Oil Characterization Team of the Petroleum and Material Characterization group. He was involved in the development and field testing of the radiofrequency downhole heating project and in the lab-scale demonstration of the subsurface upgrading via solvent deasphalting for the enhanced oil recovery and reduce the environmental impact. In 2020, Cesar was named Consulting Scientist to the Products and Technology Unit. He is a subject matter expert in Petroleum Chemistry, characterization of heavy crude oils and their fractions, heavy oi upgrading processes, and C1 Chemistry.

After his thirty-three years of industrial experience Cesar has published 62 papers in peer-reviewed scientific journals, 4 books, he had been awarded 18 patents (16 Patent Applications) and he had presented 116 papers at scientific and technical conferences. Additionally, he has published 14 articles in Venezuelan journals and 85 Technical Reports for an outstanding amount of 322 total scientific productions.

In addition to his significant contributions to the petroleum industry and to Chevron, Cesar is committed to teaching the younger generation of chemical scientists. During his years in Venezuela he taught graduate courses in the area of chemistry and technology of petroleum and heavy and extra heavy crude oil upgrading at Universidad Central de Venezuela and Simon Bolivar University. Additionally, he has been the co-advisor of 22 undergraduate research theses and four Master and Doctorate dissertations. In 2009 he participated in the evaluation of applicants for the NASA MUST Scholarship for the Hispanic College Fund Selection Committee. Annually, more than fifteen applicants are evaluated and ranked which form the basis of the decision in grating the scholarships.

Cesar has been also active in the scientific community. Cesar has also served as Associate Editor of Revista de la Sociedad Venezolana de Catalisis from 1996-2000 and Vision Tecnologica (technical Journal of PDVSA-Intevep) from 2000 to 2002. He is currently serves as referee of scientific articles for several Venezuelan (Interciencia, Acta Cientifica, etc.) and international journals (Energy & Fuels, Fuels, SPE-Reservoir Engineering, J. Can. Pet. Tech., etc.). Jointly with other colleges in the area, Cesar has organized and co-organized 9 technical symposia at the ACS national meetings since 1998.

Cesar is married to his college sweetheart, Luisa Elena, and is the father of two grown children. His son, Cesar Arturo, is a computer science graduate currently working for Safeway Supermarkets and his daughter, Manuela, is a microbiologist working for Mission Bio, a start-up company in South San Francisco.