Join us for a presentation from Joe Hartvigsen, CEO and Co-founder of OxEon Energy. Joe will provide an overview of OxEon’s company background, core technologies, and current project work, highlighting how OxEon is contributing to energy innovation and infrastructure development. This session will offer attendees the opportunity to learn more about OxEon’s capabilities, project focus areas, and role within the broader energy community.

Lunch will be provided. 

Presenter: Joe Hartvigsen - OxEon Energy

Joseph Hartvigsen is CEO and co-founder at OxEon Energy. OxEon employs 40 people at its research and manufacturing facility in North Salt Lake, Utah. He earned an M.S. in Chemical Engineering from Iowa State University following a B.S. ChE from BYU in 1982. He was a solid rocket motor thermal-fluids analyst at Hercules Aerospace and then worked in hypersonic thermal protection, spacecraft splashdown and contrail suppression in the Boeing Defense and Space Group.

The past 35 years he has focused on Solid Oxide Electrolysis (SOXE) R&D and has been principal investigator (PI) on numerous programs in the fuel cell, electrolysis and synfuels areas. As a co-investigator on the Mars 2020 mission he was responsible for development and flight qualification of the SOXE stack in the MOXIE system and provides support of Mars operations. In April 2021, MOXIE produced oxygen on Mars using CO2 captured from the Mars atmosphere. This was the first ever production of materials using resources not originating on earth. It successfully operated sixteen times on Mars. As PI on NASA NextSTEP-2 ISRU and Tipping Point projects his team successfully scaled the SOXE for lunar and Mars human exploration missions. He was the PI on a DOE EERE BETO project which successfully produced liquid fuels from both CO2 and CH4 fractions of biogas. In the fall of 2025, this system was demonstrated at the Wasatch Resource Recovery food waste digester near OxEon in North Salt Lake, Utah. 

His work has led to three dozen issued patents, hundreds of publications, thousands of citations, and three book chapters. His current research activities are in plasma reforming, high temperature electrolysis, co-electrolysis, and Fischer-Tropsch synthesis, where his project team at OxEon Energy has made major advances. 

From his home-based business, he has produced hundreds of hydroelectric turbines that are in service around the world. Joe maintains antique Caterpillar tractors, which he used to raise wheat on his great-grandparents homestead in Marsh Valley, Idaho (until the Mars project and starting OxEon consumed all his farm time).



Parking Details:
Parking is available under the building or around the outside of the building. Come upstairs to check in.