OBITUARY

Bill Charters died on 15/3/2017.

Emeritus Professor WWS (Bill) Charters AM FTSE was a noted renewable energy pioneer more than two decades ago.

His 1995 nomination to ATSE noted him as a leading world authority of design performance and utilisation of renewable energy systems.

His work on solar thermal systems and solar vapour compression heat pumps including the 1998 CSIRO Research Medal, the Christopher Weeks Memorial Award of the International Solar Energy Society (1991) and its Farrington Daniels Award in 1993.

His nomination noted that he had at that time he had been for more than 25 years a consultant and adviser on ecologically acceptable and environmentally viable energy solutions to Australian and overseas governments and a range of UN and other international agencies.

Professor Charters died in Melbourne on 15 March 2017, aged 82.

Professor Charters was born in Shanghai, China, and studied Mechanical Engineering at Leeds University, graduating BSc (Eng) Honours in 1955, followed by study for a NSW qualification from Princeton University, specialising in the dynamic stability of gas turbines.

After a period of professional engineering experience with Rolls Royce and the Royal Navy, he joined the University of Melbourne in 1965 as a Senior Lecturer, progressing to Reader, then Professor.

He was In Chair of the then Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering for six years, Deputy Dean for three years and then Dean of the Engineering Faculty.

Professor Charters' solar energy utilisation research led to a series of RD&D projects involving solar thermal systems that resulted in university patents and the industrial manufacture of solar-boosted heat pumps.

As an engineer, inventor and champion of industrial development, Professor Charters was one of the pioneers of the commercial exploitation of academic achievements. His work was supported widely - by the Reserve Bank, the Australian Research Council, Nuffield Foundation, Gas & Fuel Corporation of Victoria, and the National Energy Research Development and Demonstration Council.

Internationally recognised as a leader in the field of renewable energy, he was Foundation Chairman of the Victorian Solar Energy Council, a Director of the Energy Research and Development Corporation and a member of the Australian Science and Technology Council Working Party on energy research and technology.

His work for UN agencies took him to many developing countries. He was an adviser on solar renewable energy to governments of Australia, China, Fiji, India, Mexico, New Zealand, Pakistan and the UK.