Gavan Mc Donell

Gavan Mc Donell

Gavan McDonell is an Australian civil engineer, economist and political sociologist in the fields of national infrastructure policy reform, international development and academic education for advanced sustainability studies.

McDonell has directed four public enquiries for different State and Federal governments, three as sole Commissioner under legislation similar to a Royal Commission. (See Public commissions of enquiry below). From the late 1950s to the mid 1990s he was a consultant, adviser and senior official in about forty countries, working on national infrastructure and regional development. (See International Consultancy below). From the late 1980s to the late 1990s, McDonell established in the University of New South Wales, Sydney, one of the first transdiciplinary programs in advanced social and political theory relating to environmental sustainability. This has produced leading contributions in research, policy and governance for science, technology and environment. (See Academic career below). As a senior investment banker in the early 1990s, he wrote the first survey by a Westerner since World War II of the energy, transport and related environmental issues of the eight energy-rich republics of the former Soviet Union in the Caucasus and Central Asia. (See European Bank for Reconstruction and Development below). During the early 2000s he made well known contributions to policy reform for the design and structure of the national electricity markets and grid, the country's most complex infrastructure system. (See National Electricity Market below.)

In 1997 McDonell received a Doctor of Engineering from the University of Queensland, the highest academic recognition, rarely awarded, given for original and distinguished contributions of a career. The citation observed that his work marked " ... the emergence of a new professional field which might be called 'the engineering, management and evaluation of large infrastructure systems ... linked with social and political theory and relating human concerns to the environment ... ', and that it had ' ... set policy agendas and legislative programs for longterm change at national and State levels in freight and urban transport, shipping and ports, electricity and energy, and toxic wastes'. In 1991 he was admitted to Fellowship in the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering, the highest professional award.