Dr Mike Mason

Oxford Martin Fellow, Oxford Martin Programme on Integrating Renewable Energy

Website Chairman of Tropical Power

Engineer and entrepreneur Mike Mason is best known for co-founding ClimateCare, one of the world’s first carbon trading businesses which was sold to JP Morgan in 2008. He is involved as an investor and director in a range of companies from Healthcare to Renewable Energy.

He served for many years as an international judge for the Ashden Awards for Sustainable Energy, and is now leading research at the University of Oxford focusing on making bioenergy both commercially affordable and a positive force in food production rather than a competitor. His aim is to move the bioenergy debate from ‘fuel or food’ to ‘fuel and more food’.

Mike is using ruminants and other grazers to provide models of cellulolysis. The aim is to understand why these animals are so much more effective than human designed anaerobic digesters and to translate what can be learned from them into commercial reality.

Mike’s current commercial activities and investments include Tropical Power and Yasa Motors. He is also a director of Healix Holdings. Tropical power is a renewable energy company operating in Africa with interests in renewable technologies that can deliver cost effective power in ways that are grid friendly rather than grid challenging. YASA Motors is developing ultra-high power density electric motors for the new generation of electric and hybrid vehicles and for aerospace applications. Healix Holdings is a global supplier of health care solutions and insurance.