David Molenaar

Wednesday 27 November, 11:30 – 11:55 | From fear to fun

Wednesday 27 November, 14:00 – 15:00 | Innovation Award Show Jurymember

David Molenaar (born 1971) has used his 5 month garden leave period to make an industry / government / non-governmenal organization tour to listen and learn. As a result, he started something new and something green: Green SOCCS. Green SOCCS supports mass electrification by removing (permit) barriers in power (export) cable installation. He teamed up with his offshore brother: Jan van der Tempel.

After completing high school in Purmerend,  Molenaar studied Mechanical Engineering at Delft University of Technology. There he obtained his engineering degree in 1996, specializing in Measurement and Control Engineering (applied to a wind turbine). Molenaar continued his career in the wind sector as researcher and on February 18, 2003 he succesfully defended his PhD thesis at the TU Delft PhD titled “Cost effective design and operation of variable speed wind turbines – closing the gap between the control engineering and wind engineering community”. This research was performed in close collaboration with Lagerwey and was awarded with the DOW Energy dissertation award.

Molenaar worked during his doctoral research in the period of July 2001 – January 2002 for Siemens Nederland N.V. to tender for the Dutch first offshore wind farm work. As a project manager, he was responsible for the design of a cost-support structure for the planned turbines. In 2004 he started as a project engineer at Siemens Nederland N.V. At the end of 2004 he was involved, as a technical specialist, in the acquisition of Bonus Energy A/S. In October 2005 he was appointed Business Unit Manager Wind Power. In that position Molenaar realized Siemens’ final turnkey wind farm with non-Siemens turbines. From October 2007 to date,  Molenaar was also responsible for establishing and expanding the Offshore Engineering Center of Competence (CoC) from Siemens Wind Power in The Hague. From January 2017 till February 2024, Molenaar was the managing director of Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy B.V.

Molenaar is one of the inventors of the patented (NL1027103C) Ampelmann system: a vessel for transferring persons or property on an offshore installation. Molenaar is an adviser to Seaqualize, was for 8 years a member of the supervisory board of Stichting AandachtsLab (a child day care center for children and youth with multiply physcial and mental disabilities) and a member of the ECN / TNO industrial board. On November 21, 2019, Molenaar has been honoured by the Dutch Royal Institute of Enegineers KivI for his contribution to the Dutch offshore industry.

His two missions: i) leave the planet in a better shape than he found it and ii) dare to have some serious fun while doing.

David Molenaar is married to Nannila Zevenhuizen and he and his wife have two daughters (Norelle: born 2006 and Leanne: born 2009). Every Sunday mornig he enjoys biking on the beach along the Dutch North Sea cost line. He is an amateur chef and prefers the Italian cuisine because of its sheer taste and working with good quality and fresh products.

“We listen and we discuss, but we don’t act.”