Russell Brown

Wed, Dec 11th 2019 at 12:50 pm - 2:00 pm

Russell will explain the scope of Aggreko's operations worldwide

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‘Aggreko’ is a well-kent name but members of the Rotary Club of St Andrews are much better informed as to why that is so following a talk by Russell Brown, who looks after the oil and gas sector for Northern Europe. Aggreko was founded by a Dutchman and was part of the Salvesen Group before being spun off as a PLC headquartered in Glasgow. Russell, who grew up in Lanark and then St Andrews, joined the company after an apprenticeship with Exxon Chemical at Mossmorran. In a well-illustrated presentation he explained how Aggreko has become a world-leader in the supply of power generation and temperature control equipment, with clients in 124 different countries.

Generators are often needed for relatively short periods of time, for instance to supply power during an emergency when there would otherwise be a blackout, and Aggreko has the capacity to meet such a need at short notice, with rental generators whose output may be as small as 30 kilowatts. It is equally able to meet longer term needs and handle much larger loads, with generators as large as 200 megawatts. Aggreko supplied power for the Beijing and the London Olympics, as well as for the Glasgow Commonwealth Games. Russell’s slides also included a huge, modular power supply operating in Nigeria, applications in Myanmar and in a Norwegian offshore oilfield, and, much closer to home, equipment being used here in St Andrews. He also told his audience that data storage centres are now among the hungriest of all power consumers. In answer to questions he emphasised Aggreko’s commitment to renewables and greener, cleaner energy. Bob Swan thanked Russell for a highly informative talk.

Supplying the generator for the Chariots of Fire Beach Race is one of Russell's charitable efforts for Rotary