1941   born in Stuttgart, married, two daughters

1960   Abitur at the Zeppelin-Gymnasium, Stuttgart

1961-1969 Studies of Physics and Physical Chemistry at the Universities of Stuttgart, Munich and Aberdeen/Scotland,  Industrial Apprenticeship at Bosch (S-Feuerbach) and Lavalette (Paris), Language Studies in Spain an Portugal

1969   PhD on the Kinetics of Ion Exchangers

1970-1979   Research at Deutsche Automobil GmbH (DAUG), Esslingen-Mettingen (Development of Electric Car Batteries)

1974-1979   President of the Workers Council

since 1964   Member of the German Socialdemocratic Party (SPD)

1977-1982   President of the local SPD Branch

1979-2004   Member of the European Parliament, 

1982-1995 Member of the Board of SPD Baden-Württemberg

2003-2005 Member of the Board of SPD (Parteirat)

2005-2007 Special Advisor to the EU Commissioner for Energy

Since 2005 Director of the Centre for European Energy Strategy - C.E.R.E.S sprl, Brussels


Other Memberships:
Metal Workers Union, Workers Welfare, German Red Cross, Europa-Union, Euro-Solar, Transatlantic Policy Network (TPN)

Member of the consultative board of EnBW (Energie Baden-Württemberg), Karlsruhe
Member of the consultative board of Energiedienst Holding AG, CH-Laufenburg
Member of the advisory board of Vattenfall Europe Mining AG, Senftenberg
Member oft the Advisery Board of Babcock-Hitachi Europe, Oberhausen.
Member of the Scientific Board of the journal "Recht der Energiewirtschaft" ("Law of the Energy Economy")
Honors member of the Kerntechnische Gesellschaft eV
Member of the curatorship of the Forum für Zukunftsenergien eV
Member of the curatorship of the Castle Kapfenburg

International Memberships:
Vicepresident of the European Materials Forum (EMF), Strasbourg
Honorary President of the European Energy Forum, Strasbourg and Brussels
Member of the International Advisory Committee of IMPRESS
(Intermetallic Materials Processing in Relation to Earth and Space
Solidification), an initiative of the European Space Agency (ESA)
and the European Union (EU)

Decorations:
Officier de la Légion d'Honneur
Al Mérito de Chile: Gran Cruz

Foreign Languages:
English, French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese