When Leon was at the EESD he worked with Robert Brenner, Phil Heckel and George McCormick.

Leon has spent the last 36 years with Exxon and ExxonMobil. He has held numerous individual contributor, advisor, and supervisory roles spanning Exploration, Development, and Production. Leon’s early assignments were related to field surveillance in South Texas, followed by active ventures in structurally complex basins in South America and Papua New Guinea. Following Exxon and Mobil’s merger in 1999, Leon worked in new opportunity identification/maturation, and deepwater development in West Africa and the Arctic. He returned to PNG ventures in 2013.

Leon is a past member of the Dean’s Advisory Board of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, including time chairing that board. Leon received BS and MS Geology degrees from the University of Iowa in 1980 and 1982. Leon has also been honored as a CLAS Alumni Fellow (2011) and as a Distinguished Alumni (Service) in 2014.

Research interests: 

• Petroleum exploration and development, structural geology