Gunnar Asplund

Experience

Lunds University of Technology 1969,
ASEA /ABB 1970- 2009
Laboratory engineer, development engineer High Voltage Direct Current (HVDC)
Project manager Swedish part of the Brazilian Itaipu HVDC Project
Commissioning manager Itaipu in Brazil, 3 years
Head of department, HVDC
R&D manager HVDC, 1993 - 2009
Elways AB, 2009 -

With the permission of ABB started a company, Ludvika Power Electronics in 1990 to develop a new type of powerful electric amplifiers.
The company was bought by ABB and was developed in several steps into a new type of HVDC with the power of more than 1000 MW. This is called HVDC Light and has until now had sales of 25 billion SEK.

72 individual patents, 281 patents in total

Prizes

Prizes Gunnar Asplund received:

The Polhem Price

Sveriges Civilingenjörsförbund/ Sveriges Ingenjörer, 1999

Gold Medal

Royal Academy of EngineeringIVAS:s gold medal, 2000

Honorary doctor

Royal Institute of Technology,KTH 2005

Uno Lamms HVDC Award

IEEE Power Engineering Society 2006

Grand Technologies Award

Ny Teknik and Vinnova, 2008

Mekanisternas Ljungström Prize

Swedish Association of Mechanical Engineers, 2018

Listen to a pod about electric roads

In the Science pod from Sveriges Radio (Swedish Radio), you will hear Gunnar Asplund talk about the invention and his thoughts both in 2012 and now 2021. The pod is in Swedish.