Inside Spy, Dec 1991 (id HGuuh5SIk_8C): searched for Meyer, NIST and "energy-related".
Found (snippets only; full text not read)
NIST evaluation (government record, priority 4). Spy magazine, Dec 1991, pp.45-47 (full view on Google Books): "NIST's report says, 'the Water Fuel Cell. . .would be a net consumer of energy, not an energy producer.'" Page 46 refers to NIST's office that evaluates "energy-related inventions for prospective investors free of charge" and quotes "We do not believe the machine can be made to ..." (snippet cut off). https://books.google.com/books?id=HGuuh5SIk_8C&pg=PA47
Air & Space Smithsonian, Oct/Nov 1991, p.32: "Meyer, a Grove City, Ohio inventor ... Energy-Related Inventions. The verdict was clear." (snippet)
Alex Heard, "Apocalypse Pretty Soon" (2000), p.354, endnote: "N.I.S.T. on Meyer's claims: George P. Lewett, correspondence to me, June 28, 1991". Lewett was then head of the NIST Office of Energy-Related Inventions ([memory], medium confidence). Heard also cites "The Birth of New Technology ... Technical Brief (Grove City, Ohio, 1990)", a 1990 edition earlier than the c.1996 copy in the folder.
Interested-party note: a NIST evaluation is a government agency's assessment. Report it as NIST's characterization beside Meyer's. The NIST evaluation file itself (the ERIP evaluation, its number, the date and the evaluator's reasoning) has not been obtained. The NIST/ERIP records at the National Archives (RG 167) or a FOIA request to NIST would be the source ([memory] for the RG number, low confidence).
Ship & Boat International, June 1991, p.38 (RINA trade journal): a diagram of the Meyer cell and mention of Griffin ("former Controller of the Navy and a past president of RINA") and Dr Keith Hindley. Snippet: "Demonstrations of the water splitting process were, however, surprising".
Asian Defence Journal 1992, p.59: "Water Fuel Cell", with "very small amount of initial power using high voltage and low current. In trials ...".
Proceedings of the 28th IECEC (Intersociety Energy Conversion Engineering Conference), 1993, p.2-909 (Bailey and Grotz review): "over 28 patents ... He began this work in 1980 and has spent over $1.6 million."
Fortean Times 94-99 (1997), p.9: the fraud finding, "ordered to repay $25,000". Compare the docket's $40,515.72 garnished, $41,754.29 total.
"The Future of Leadership" (White, Hodgson and Crainer, 1996), p.120: Meyer "has now managed to get his device patented around the world".
How this bears on the claims
Claims 1 and 2: this is the first sign of a US government technical evaluation (NIST Office of Energy-Related Inventions, 1990-91) concluding that the WFC "would be a net consumer of energy". It is the strongest record for the historical-record priority, and it is not yet obtained.
Corroborates the UK maritime-industry interest (Griffin and RINA) in a trade journal of the time.