On the recommendation of the Supervisory Board and following the positive opinion of the Works Council, the Minister of Finance has appointed Willemien Terpstra as CEO and Chair of the Executive Board of N.V. Nederlandse Gasunie. The appointment starts on 1 March 2024 and will be for a term of four years.
Currently, Terpstra is currently global vice president for decarbonisation with international chemical company LyondellBasell, where she is responsible for the decarbonisation of the group’s operations worldwide.
‘We are very pleased with the arrival of Willemien Terpstra,’ says Gasunie Supervisory Board Chair Pieter Duisenberg. ‘She is extremely motivated to further shape Gasunie’s social task of bringing about the energy transition. Her knowledge, experience and competencies make her perfectly suited to lead the strategic development of Gasunie and the implementation of our agenda for the future concerning hydrogen, heat, CO2 and natural and green gas. The Supervisory Board sees her as an enthusiastic successor to Han Fennema, to whom we owe tremendous gratitude. Under his expert, passionate, down-to-earth leadership, Gasunie has developed from a gas TSO into a green energy infrastructure company. With this, Han has laid the foundation for the next chapter in Gasunie’s story.’
Terpstra will be succeeding Han Fennema, who announced his intention to step down earlier this year, after serving nearly 10 years as Gasunie’s CEO. Fennema will be stepping down as CEO on 1 November 2023. Gasunie CFO Janneke Hermes will act as Interim Chair of the Executive Board until Terpstra steps in as CEO.
‘I feel extremely motivated to work together with all Gasunie staff on further shaping the energy system of the future, a system in which we will strive to achieve a new balance between sustainability, reliability and security of supply,’ says Terpstra. ‘Gasunie plays a crucial role in the energy sector and has an ambitious vision of the future concerning the energy supply for the Netherlands and its neighbouring countries. I am looking forward to making a contribution in the coming years to the realisation of this vision of the future and, with Gasunie, to being a major player in making our society sustainable.’
