New captain on HySafe bridge – General Assembly elects Thomas Jordan as president

Tokyo, October 22. The General Assembly of the HySafe members met today as guest of Kawasaki Heavy Industries in the company’s headquarters in Tokyo.

Waiting for the start of the meeting
Waiting for the start of the meeting

The board election promised to be of special interest this year because president Andrei Tchouvelev and secretary Benno Weinberger had decided not to run again for their respective office.

Mitgliederversammlung  HySafe
Andrei Tchouvelev (left) giving his last report as president

So this was the last time that Andrei Tchouvelev gave the report of the president to the assembly. The board had submitted a proposal for the succession to the members, who apparently liked it. No other nominations had been received. All elections were held without great discussion and unanimously (except for abstension of the candidates).

Who is in favour? Everybody
Who is in favour? Everybody

So the result was that Thomas Jordan, member of Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (Germany), was elected new president of HySafe. Mr. Jordan is an experienced researcher in the field of hydrogen, especially hydrogen safety. He contributed a lot to the impressive body of knowledge which was compiled by his institute over the years. Mr. Jordan was also the coordinator of the EU project with the same name, which in 2009 became the nucleus of the global association HySafe. His last position in Hysafe was vice president, so he is an insider and knows the association very well.

Just a little present as a token of appreciation
Just a little present as a token of appreciation

Mr. Jordan and the assembly as a whole expressed their thanks and appreciation to the outgoing president Andrei Tchouvelev who had taken over the office of president in a difficult phase. The present situation of the association has a lot to do with his tireless committment to the field and the institution.

Making the vice president the new president meant, of course, that the position of the vice president became vacant. It was filled by electing Hervé Barthélémy (Air Liquide).

Benno Weinberger from INERIS (France) had served the members and the board as secretary since 2010; like the president he had decided to step down. The assembly elected Frank Markert from the Technical University of Denmark as secretary.

Re-elected was Iñaki Azkarate (Technalia, Spain) as treasurer. Also elected for a two-year term was Marco Carcassi from the University of Pisa (Italy), who is the scientific head of the ICHS conference. (His term would normally have ended next year, just like that of the other committee chairs, but it was decided that the term of the conference chair should start and end in the ICHS years for practical reasons.)

The elected board members
The elected board members from left: M. Carcassi (conference chair), I. Azkarate (treasurer), Th. Jordan (president), H. Barthélémy (vice president), F. Markert (secretary)

All new board members are distinguished experts from the field, and they are also acquainted with the inner workings of HySafe. So we can expect that the association will keep making progress. The next big milestone will be the ICHS 7 to be held in 2017 in Hamburg.