

“Without the proper standards, there will be no progress and indeed no business” he said. Another area being targeted by LIKE involved unique designs of HV bushings, either for specialized applications or to reduce normal dimensions.ĭuring that visit to Wunsiedel, Jens remarked to me that every business sector relies on having reliable standards that ensure products confirm to the quality necessary to function as intended. One example of such a custom solution at the time was a new line of cable terminations being developed in cooperation with cable manufacturers. Based in Selb, its mission was to identify applications where unique designs or processes can solve specific problems (such as the invisible tower) or reduce costs. At the time, he was Managing Director of Lapp Insulators Knowledge & Engineering. Josef Kindersberger and the late Martin Kuhl. Within a year, Jens had invited INMR to visit the Lapp Insulator factory in Wunsiedel, a place which many in the insulator field regard as one of the ‘cradles’ of composite insulator technology due to the pioneering work of researchers and industry experts such as Prof. So I said nothing and to this day still wonder what I should have replied. I recall him driving toward the mountain where this solution was applied and then suddenly pointing up toward the peak while exclaiming with great pride: “Do you see it? The invisible tower?” I wasn’t sure how best to answer without appearing an idiot. It was at this time that Jens invited me to accompany him to see a novel application of composite tension insulators applied as part of a unique catenary type solution to eliminate need for a transmission tower that would otherwise have obscured a viewpoint to distant Cape Town. Obviously, this program had inspired him to pursue a career in this discipline. Jens, like many in the German electrical power sector, had earned his PhD at the University of Braunschweig, where the late Professor Hermann Kärner had set-up an extensive program researching the insulation properties of composite materials. Although it was our first direct meeting, I had already heard of him through his work on a CIGRE Working Group studying how best to fingerprint silicone materials for hydrophobicity and other key performance properties. INMR’s relationship with Jens goes back to early 2013 when he was visiting South Africa to participate in a conference on insulators organized by Eskom and a local university. Jens Seifert of Reinhausen Power Composites in Germany has been selected this year as recipient of the Claude de Tourreil Memorial Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Field of Electrical Insulators. Andrew Phillips of EPRI (2019), Raouf Znaidi (2020) and Dr. William Chisholm (2017), Jean-Marie George of Sediver (2018), Dr. Vaclav Sklenicka of EGU HV Laboratory (2016), Dr. Frank Schmuck (2013), Tony Carreira of K-Line Insulators (2014), Alberto Pigini (2015), Dr. Igor Gutman of the Independent Insulation Group (2012), Dr. Gorur of Arizona State University (2011), Dr. LIANG Xidong of Tsinghua University (2009), Dr. Recipients of this honor over the years have come from across the globe and included luminaries such as Prof. Therefore, in 2009, INMR instituted an annual award to honour his memory and to keep his name and contributions alive in the minds of succeeding generations of power industry professionals. That he would no longer be remembered by the T&D engineers whose profession he had touched so profoundly. But with each passing year, it seemed inevitable that his name and accomplishments would eventually fade from view. He was cremated in his home city in Switzerland and his ashes scattered on the graves of his parents.įor the next three years, INMR paid frequent homage to Claude, re-publishing some of his most interesting columns and contributions. Despite a valiant struggle, he succumbed to it in early March 2006. Sadly, Claude contracted leukemia in 2005 just as the fruit of his life’s work was beginning to ripen and mature. Claude’s unemotional and scientifically based arguments helped convince engineers at power utilities to give serious attention to how and where this technology could be applied on their networks. Thanks to his research, many technical papers and tireless work as Convenor of CIGRE Working Groups, engineers the world over began to learn the salient facts about composite insulator technology. In the case of composite insulators, it is fair to say that electrical supply utilities worldwide, which now increasingly rely on these insulators for line and substation applications, owe a great debt to the late Dr.
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