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04 June 2003
It's not just hot air - wind farm pioneer wins top award
Dr Ian Mays, Managing Director of the St Albans based international wind energy company Renewable Energy Systems, has won a prestigious Royal Academy of Engineering Silver Medal for his pioneering work in creating commercially viable wind farms. Dr Mays will receive his medal at the Academy Awards Dinner in London on Thursday 5 June.
Dr Mays has a compelling vision of a future UK with up to 20 per cent of its energy generated by wind turbines. His company specialises in optimising the output and cost-effectiveness of projects and arranging wind farms in the most harmonious possible way with the environment. RES has completed 27 wind farms, including King Mountain in Texas in 2001, then the world's largest installation, with 214 large 1.3 MW turbines.
One reason that RES branched out to the international market was the difficulty in developing projects in the UK. "Getting planning consent has been very difficult here, despite the more positive energy policy," he says. "We usually find that the majority of people are in favour of wind farms as they're being planned but that this support increases among local communities once the projects are built and operating. Going offshore helps to increase the available wind resource but as you would expect, offshore projects cost more to build than on land. We should make good use of both land and offshore resources and I expect we will end up with a mixture of the two in the end."
RES is currently involved in a proposed 30 turbine offshore windfarm near Skegness, plus a large-scale pilot project off the Northern Ireland coast that could generate 150-180 MW. Challenged about the practicalities of connecting too many variable energy sources to the national grid, Dr Mays is confident. "The grid can take at least 10 per cent input from fluctuating sources already," he says, "this can be further increased by the evolution of the mix of generating plant on the system, particularly with more rapid-response gas-fired power stations."
Dr Mays' interest in wind power dates back to his PhD project at Reading University developing turbine technology following his first job with Hawker Siddeley Aviation. He led Vertical Axis Wind Turbines Ltd, a company formed by the civil engineering company Sir Robert McAlpine in 1982 to develop wind turbines with the Department of Energy. RES grew out of this group and is now the leading international wind farm developer with over 140 employees and offices around the world. Its success and reputation puts UK expertise and technology at the forefront of the rapidly expanding world market for wind energy.
Dr Mays has been a leading advocate of wind power as past President of the European Wind Energy Association and past Chairman of the British Wind Energy Association.
ends
Notes for editors
- The Academy's Silver Medals, instigated in 1995, are awarded annually to engineers aged 50 or under who have made outstanding contributions to British engineering. Only four awards may be made each year.
- This year's other Silver Medals go to Stephen Furber FREng FRS, ICL Professor of Computer Engineering at the University of Manchester; Andy Hopper FREng, Professor of Communication Engineering at Cambridge University; and Richard Williams FREng, Anglo America plc Professor of Mineral and Process Engineering, University of Leeds.
- The Royal Academy of Engineering brings together the UK's most eminent engineers from all disciplines. They use their unrivalled knowledge and experience for the public good, giving independent advice to Government, supporting engineering education and research and encouraging excellence and innovation.
For more information please contact:
Lize King at the Royal Academy of Engineering
or
Anna Stanford at Renewable Energy Systems Group
Tel. 01795 536667, mobile 07761 103465, email anna.stanford@res-ltd.com
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