Resume of Francis de Winter
Francis de Winter & Associates
Contract R&D and Engineering Consultancy in the Thermal Sciences
3085 Carriker Lane, Bay D
Soquel, California 95073, USA
Telephones: + 1 831-425-1211 (office); + 1 831-462-6246 (shop)
Home Phone & Fax: + 1 831-423-2210; E-Mail: fdw@ecotopia.com
Employment History:
1988 to Present: Self-employed engineering consultant
1974 to 1988: President of Altas Corp., Santa Cruz, CA.
1966 to 1974: Member of the Technical Staff, JPL Spacecraft Power Section, Pasadena, CA.
1965 to 1966: Sr. Engineer, Thermo Electron Corp., Waltham, MA.
1961 to 1965: Technical Director of the Thermophysical Property Measurement Dept., and Manager of several Groups, Dynatech Corp., Cambridge, MA.
Professional Experience:
Mr. de Winter has specialized in heat transfer and such associated fields as fluid flow and thermodynamics. He has worked on freeze-drying, on the design of instruments for determining thermophysical properties of materials, on thermal control of space vehicles, and on spacecraft power system design, notably the JPL Venus-Mercury flyby (Mariner 10) mission and the JPL Voyager mission to the outer planets (and now to space beyond). The JPL spacecraft power work involved solar photovoltaic, solar thermionic, and radioisotope thermoelectric power system design. In terrestrial solar energy applications, Mr. de Winter has worked on swimming pool heating, on the flat plate collector, on heat exchangers in solar water heating systems, and on gas water heaters for solar backup service. The de Winter "Heat Exchanger Factor" has become a standard part of the solar energy literature, and is used worldwide. He holds two US Patents, has written numerous technical articles, has prepared several surveys on solar energy activities, is the editor of the 1990 MIT Press annotated bibliography book on "Solar Collectors, Energy Storage, and Materials," and has edited the proceedings for numerous conferences on solar energy and other energy topics. He was the founder and president of the Altas Corporation, a company involved in contract R&D in solar energy between 1974 and 1988.
Local Civic Activities:
He is a Past Chair of the Energy Advisory Committee, City of Santa Cruz, Calif., Past Commissioner of the County of Santa Cruz Energy Commission, Past Chair, Past Vice Chair and Past Treasurer of the Environmental Council of Santa Cruz County, and currently he is the Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Open Space Alliance of Santa Cruz County.
Professional Society Activities:
Past Member (3 terms), Board of Directors, International Solar Energy Society (ISES). Past Member, Board of Directors, American Solar Energy Society (ASES) (1976 - 1991). Other positions held in ASES include Past Chairman (1978, 1982, 1984, 1985), Past Vice-Chairman (1980), and Past Treasurer (1981, 1988-1991). Mr. de Winter has been involved in many committees in ISES as well as ASES. He was Finance Chairman for the 1991 ISES World Congress in Denver, Colorado, Chairman of the 1986 ASES Annual Meeting in Boulder, Colorado, and Technical Program Chairman for the 1978 ISES World Congress in New Delhi. He is a past Member of the Board of Directors of the Solar Lobby. He is the 1983 recipient of the ASES Charles Greeley Abbot Award, a member of the Solar Energy Hall of Fame since 1985, was designated Pioneer in the Field of Renewable Energy at the World Renewable Energy Congress in Denver in 1996, and is a Fellow of ASES.
Educational Background:
Primary - Amsterdam, the Netherlands, and Buenos Aires, Argentina
Secondary - American Community (High) School Buenos Aires, Argentina
B.S. (1958), M.S. (1960), Mechanical Engineer (1961), all in the Department of Mechanical Engineering of MIT, Cambridge, MA, USA
Languages:
Fluent in Dutch, Spanish, and English. Working knowledge of French.
Detailed resume and list of publications
updated 2004 November 5
