Prof Wikus van Niekerk is the Dean of Engineering at Stellenbosch University. He holds a Ph.D. from the University of California at Berkeley and an Executive MBA from the Graduate School of Business at the University of Cape Town.
He completed his Ph.D. on the active control of transient noise transmission, working on a project for Mazda Motor Corp. After holding the Sasol Chair in Vehicle Engineering at the University of Pretoria he moved to Stellenbosch University in January 2000. At Stellenbosch he has been Head of the Mechanics Division, Chair of the Department of Mechanical Engineering and Director of the Institute for Thermodynamics and Mechanics. He was the founding Director of the Centre for Renewable and Sustainable Energy Studies and played a leading role to establish research, education and training programmes in renewable energy and influence funding and policy priorities on the national level. He has a keen interest in solar and ocean energy and is investigating the exploitation of wave energy along the southwest coast and ocean current energy off the south-east coast of South Africa. As Dean of the Faculty of Engineering, he is responsible for six ECSA accredited engineering programmes with 3 000 undergraduate and 1 000 postgraduate students.
Prof van Niekerk is a registered professional engineer with the Engineering Council of South African and has been practicing as a consultant to industry for 22 years. He is regularly consulted by industry on a variety of areas including renewable energy systems and technology; solar, wind and ocean energy; and energy policy and research strategy. He has published more than 35 articles in refereed international journals and presented a number of papers at international conferences.
Prof Van Niekerk is a fellow of the South African Academy of Engineering, the South African Institution of Mechanical Engineering and the Southern African Acoustics Institute. He is a member of the ASME and SESSA, and a Board Member of the South African Institute of Mechanical Engineering, the South African Academy of Engineering and the Fraunhofer Chile Research Center for Solar Energy Technologies.
In 2014 Prof Van Niekerk received the SANEA Energy Award.