Offshore valuation survey - Biographies

Tim Helweg-Larsen - Director, Public Interest Research Centre

Tim Helweg-Larsen is Director of the Public Interest Research Centre (PIRC), an independent charity engaged in environment, energy and economics. PIRC seeks out ideas that support the long-term public interest and communicates them to policy makers. Previous work by PIRC has included a pioneering plan for decarbonising the UK, Zero Carbon Britain, and Climate Safety, a report on the latest climate science. Tim trained as an engineer in renewable energy at Warwick University.

Andrew Mack - Project Leader, BCG London

Andrew Mack is a Project Leader in The Boston Consulting Group, having joined the London office in 2005. He has focused on low carbon topics in both the private and public sectors, and is part of the Sustainable Development Practice Area. In 2009 he was seconded to the Conservative Party, where he worked on energy, climate change and transport policies.

Prior to BCG, Andrew worked as a consultant for Mercer Management Consulting based in Toronto. He has worked for clients throughout Europe as well as in Africa and North and Central America. Andrew holds a Masters in Engineering, Economics and Management from Oxford University, and an MBA from INSEAD.

David MacKay - Chief Scientific Advisor, DECC & Professor of Natural Philosophy, University of Cambridge

David MacKay was appointed as Chief Scientific Advisor to the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) on 1st October 2009. The Chief Scientific Advisor’s role is to ensure that the Department’s policies and operations, and its contributions to wider Government issues, are underpinned by the best science and engineering advice available.

David MacKay studied Natural Sciences at Trinity College, he then went to Caltech to complete a PhD in Computation and Neural Systems. In 1992 he returned to Cambridge as a Royal Society research fellow at Darwin College. In 1995 he became a university lecturer in the Department of Physics, where he was promoted in 1999 to a Readership and in 2003 to a Professorship in Natural Philosophy. He was elected a fellow of the Royal Society in 2009.

David MacKay’s research interests include reliable computation with unreliable hardware, and communication systems for the disabled. He believes that what the climate-change discussion needs is clear, simple numbers, so that we can understand just how big our challenge is, and not be conned by grand-sounding schemes that don't actually work. He has also written a book on the subject (Sustainable Energy - Without The Hot Air: David MacKay, UIT Cambridge, 2009).

Dr. Eddie O’Connor - Founder and Chief Executive, Mainstream Renewable Power

Dr. Eddie O’Connor was named world energy policy leader by Scientific American magazine in 2003.

Dr. O’Connor is a Chinese expert who has delivered two ground breaking speeches on China and as a result General Xiong Guang Kai, President of the China Institute for International Strategic Studies visited the Insititute of International and European Affairs in Ireland.

He was the Founder and Chief Executive of Airtricity from 1997 until January 2008, when the company was sold to E.ON and Scottish & Southern Energy for approximately €2 billion. In February 2008, Eddie founded Mainstream Renewable Power. Its core business is to develop, build and operate renewable energy plants in collaboration with strategic partners. The company employs over 90 highly experienced staff and has offices in Berlin, Cape Town, Chicago, Dublin, London, Santiago and Toronto.

Eddie is acknowledged as the driving force behind the European Offshore Supergrid. This vision and activity will, when built, guarantee European energy self sufficiency as well as producing carbon free electricity.

From 1987 to 1996 Eddie was Chief Executive of Bord na Mona, the Irish Peat Board, where he was responsible for the successful turnaround of the company.

In 1970 he began working with the Electricity Supply Board, where he held several managerial positions, until he left in 1987 when he was Manager of Fuel Purchasing.

Eddie holds a Bachelor of Chemical Engineering (1970) and a Master’s in Industrial Engineering (1976) both from University College Dublin and has a doctorate in Business Administration from the International Management Centres, Europe. In June 2008, Eddie was awarded an honorary doctorate in Science from University College Dublin. He is Secretary of the European Wind Energy Association.