National Energy Research Network continues to expand

So NERN now has 400 members. Since I started as manager, membership has been growing steadily at a rate of about 17 new members per month. In case you are wondering I've now been in post for nine months and NERN had 250 members when I started. I have yet to embark upon a significant campaign to advertise NERN to the wider world (although this is coming) so I think that new members are probably finding NERN through a variety of means. Word of mouth is important and I've certainly been flapping mine ever since I started. It also helps that NERN is a top hit in Google when you search energy research network. I hope that you are all encouraging colleagues and friends to join. I'm considering a special prize for our 1000th member – any suitably low carbon suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Where do the NERN members come from? I was mildly surprised and pleased to see that 25% of NERN members are based outside of the UK. In fact 14% of NERN members hail from outside of the EU. Within the EU, NERN has proved most popular in Germany, but the network has members in 11 different EU countries. Outside of the EU, NERN has been a hit in both the USA and India and has attracted members from 14 different countries. I'd be really interested in hearing from members about how they heard about NERN, particularly if you heard through what might be considered an unusual route.

NERN is a predominately male network with men outnumbering women by a factor of three to one. How do members feel that this reflects the gender balance of people in energy research?
The NERN membership is dominated by academics, who comprise 57% of NERN members. The other key NERN member groups are industry (15%), consultants (7.5%) Government and regulators (7.5%) and NGOs (7%). The remaining members include a suspiciously high proportion of policy specialists from learned and professional societies which are essentially a number of colleagues from my previous position who I've bullied into joining NERN (hello to all of you).

So what lies ahead for NERN now that it has grown into such a mighty cohort? Well, one of my aims is to grow NERN still further and in fact by the end of UKERC Phase I (April 2009) I hope we can achieve 1000 members. Should we be fortunate enough to be granted funding for UKERC Phase II then I have a number of plans in the pipeline, but actually, before I bore you these, I'd really like to hear any ideas that you might have about the future direction of NERN. Please send me an email or call me (+44 (0)20 7594 1572) with your thoughts.