Nathan Reish remembers the first time he met Haney. It was over a decade ago when Reish was working as a geoscientist at the Elk Hills Oil Field for Occidental Petroleum, which spun off to become CRC in 2014.
One day at the field office in Elk Hills, a party was being held for a departing employee. At one point during the celebration, someone Reish didn’t know got up, began telling some jokes and singing a song with his own lyrics that poked fun at the employee who was leaving.
“I remember thinking at the time ‘who is this clown?’ It turned out it to be Ken,” Reish said. “Then it was announced he would be our new team lead.”
It was an unusual first impression, but Reish — who now works as a geoscientist for petroleum consulting company DeGolyer and MacNaughton — said Haney had an immediate positive impact both on himself and on the heavy oil team at large.
“Ken’s personable, approachable. He has the ability to bring the best out of everyone around him,” he said.
CRC’s Vice President of Asset Development, Melissa Morse, was also a member of the team and has worked with Haney across several positions in the company.
“He didn’t just build a team – he built a culture. That culture was not just around our technical workflows but our values and objectives,” she said. “Ken always made working on the team a fun place to be.”
While Haney knew how to make work fun, such as including games and challenges during quarterly business reviews, Morse said he remained focused on meeting his and the company’s goals.
“Ken has an uncanny ability to take any challenge and view it as an opportunity. He loves to dive into details and problems,” she said.” He has this overwhelming practicality and positivity. I don’t think anything gets him down.”
Through Haney’s work at CRC, Morse said he has played a critical role in the company’s transition to carbon management. He oversees the engineering aspects of CRC’s Carbon TerraVault projects, which will capture, transport and store carbon generated from industrial emissions and captured directly from the atmosphere.
“He’s been a key figure in leading CRC through the energy transition. In CRC and really in Kern County, he was one of the forerunners of really developing his expertise in carbon utilization and storage,” she said. “He’s somebody who was a first adopter and ahead of his time in adopting that expertise. Since then, he has become a resource and a leader in that space.”
Haney said he was one of just two employees who were working on carbon management when CRC started doing it in 2018. Now, nearly 50 employees are working on it.
Carolin Haney said her father’s dedication to his work made a mark on her at a young age.
“The passion that he has for the work that he’s doing and the impact that he’s making has always been very prominent and very inspiring to me. It taught me the importance of finding a job you can feel truly invested in,” she said. “It’s beneficial for me to watch him grow and thrive in a career that he still gets excited to talk about. He genuinely cares about the impact that his work is having.”
While that work takes much of Haney’s focus, both Morse and Reish said he took the time to mentor them and often encouraged them to accept new career and leadership opportunities.
Morse said Haney was “one of the first people who really encouraged me to pursue leadership roles.”
“He gave me opportunities that other folks would not have given or weren’t giving,” Reish said. “He allowed us to take on new roles and responsibilities and really put his faith in us as a team.”
Morse and Reish are excited to see their former boss be selected for induction into CSUB’s Alumni Hall of Fame this year.
“I couldn’t be happier for Ken. I think it’s great recognition for him after his career contributing to Bakersfield and Kern County,” Morse said.
“CSUB is fortunate to have him included in the Hall of Fame,” Reish said. “Ken is a great example for anybody’s career.”
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