Wednesday 14 May 2014

This inventor of a system for gaining solar power from sea by large floating algea fields producing biofuel is also a violinist

Frederik Hendrik Kreuger (Amsterdam 14 May 1928), is a Dutch high voltage scientist and inventor, lives in Delft, the Netherlands, and is professor emeritus of the Delft University of Technology. He is also a professional author of technical literature, nonfiction books, thrillers and a decisive biography of the master forger Han van MeegerenFrederik H. Kreuger stems from an old Amsterdam family where his maternal grandfather ran a small tobacco factory "Het Wapen van Spanje" in the Weteringstraat, in the old town near the Rijksmuseum.

He was educated in Haarlem HBS B (a bèta-oriented secondary school), took his Engineer's degree at the Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands and received there his Ph.D. degree in 1961. He worked as a high voltage scientist in Sweden, England and the Netherlands. In the Netherlands he was employed by the electrical industry and became later managing director of the Nederlandse Kabelfabriek in Delft. In 1986 he became a high voltage professor of his Alma mater in Delft and worked there until 1995.

He is the inventor of several constructions for high voltage cable systems and of equipment for the detection of partial discharges. Some examples are:
  • balanced detection of partial discharges (P.D.s) (also called Kreuger bridge)
  • discharge standard for partial discharge (P.D.) measurements.
  • the (now usual) elastomeric joints in solid H.V. cables (also called bi-manchet)
  • the (now usual) elastomeric terminals for solid H.V. cables
His book Partial Discharge Detection was for twenty-five years the leading text book in this field. He has also published books about Management and Mismanagement in Research and Disadvantages of Wind EnergyHis high voltage laboratory in Delft became a centre of knowledge for partial discharge detection and for the study of Direct current high voltage.

Kreuger is also the inventor of a system for gaining solar power from sea by large floating algea fields producing biofuel (European Patent EP07110895 – 22 June 2007). This project is managed by the Botanical Garden of the Department Biotechnology of the Delft University of Technology; several departments of the University are cooperating herein.

Kreuger plays the leading violin in the amateur gipsy orchestra Siperkov Ensemble. He made a study of Gipsy or Romanimusic and published a book in Dutch about the history and perception of Gipsy music. An excerpt of this book appeared as the article "Zigeunermuziek" in the Dutch version of Wikipedia.