Dale Vince (born 29 August 1961) is a British "green energy"

industrialist A business magnate, also known as a tycoon, is a person who has achieved immense wealth through the ownership of multiple lines of enterprise. The term characteristically refers to a powerful entrepreneur or investor who controls, through perso ...

. A former

New Age traveller New Age travellers, not completely synonymous with but otherwise shortened to New Travellers (often referred to as "crusties"), are people in the United Kingdom generally espousing New Age beliefs along with the hippie culture of the 1960s (over ...

, he is the owner of the electricity company

Ecotricity Ecotricity is a British energy company based in Stroud, Gloucestershire, England, specialising in selling green energy to consumers that it primarily generates from its 87.2 megawatt wind power portfoliothe company prefers the term windmill ra ...

Early life and career

Vince was born in

Great Yarmouth Great Yarmouth (), often called Yarmouth, is a seaside town and unparished area in, and the main administrative centre of, the Borough of Great Yarmouth in Norfolk, England; it straddles the River Yare and is located east of Norwich. A pop ...

, Norfolk. Leaving school at 15, he spent time as a

. In 1991, he saw his first windfarm ("I thought, either I can carry on by myself with the windmill on my van, or I can get into the big stuff") and in 1995 he founded the Renewable Energy Company. In 1996, he launched his first

wind turbine A wind turbine is a device that converts the kinetic energy of wind into electrical energy. Hundreds of thousands of large turbines, in installations known as wind farms, now generate over 650 gigawatts of power, with 60 GW added each year. ...

supplying "green electricity". In October 2020 ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

'' reported that he plans to create

artificial diamonds Lab-grown diamond (LGD; also called laboratory-grown, laboratory-created, man-made, artisan-created, artificial, synthetic, or cultured diamond) is diamond that is produced in a controlled technological process (in contrast to naturally formed ...

chemical vapor deposition Chemical vapor deposition (CVD) is a vacuum deposition method used to produce high quality, and high-performance, solid materials. The process is often used in the semiconductor industry to produce thin films. In typical CVD, the wafer (substra ...

using "

carbon dioxide Carbon dioxide (chemical formula ) is a chemical compound made up of molecules that each have one carbon atom covalently double bonded to two oxygen atoms. It is found in the gas state at room temperature. In the air, carbon dioxide is transpar ...

captured directly from the atmosphere to form the diamonds – which are chemically identical to diamonds mined from the earth – using wind and solar electricity, with water collected from rainfall." In April 2022, Vince announced he planned to sell Ecotricity and go into politics. He said part of the reason was that a new owner "can achieve even more, faster. We’ve got a massive pipeline of projects that need to be built requiring £2 billion of investment." As well as developing his interest in politics, he would focus on renewable projects such as

tidal lagoon Tidal power or tidal energy is harnessed by converting energy from tides into useful forms of power, mainly electricity using various methods. Although not yet widely used, tidal energy has the potential for future electricity generation. Ti ...

s and

geothermal energy Geothermal energy is the thermal energy in the Earth's crust which originates from the formation of the planet and from radioactive decay of materials in currently uncertain but possibly roughly equal proportions. The high temperature and pres ...

Football

In 2010 Vince became a major shareholder of Forest Green Rovers FC, and three months later was appointed club chairman. In February 2011, Rovers players were banned from eating red meat for health reasons, and a few weeks later the sale of all meat products was banned at the club's ground, leaving only vegetarian options and free-range poultry and fish from sustainable stocks. Vince has also introduced a number of different eco-friendly developments at the club including the installation of solar panels on its New Lawn home ground, the use of a solar-powered robot grass mower, and the creation of the world's first organic football pitch. In September 2015, Vince revealed Forest Green were using a player recruitment method similar to the 'Moneyball' model that had been initially used in baseball to sign players by using computer-generated analysis. In October 2015, Forest Green became the world's first all vegan football club. In 2021, the team became the first in the world to play in a football kit made from a composite material consisting of recycled plastic and coffee grounds. The United Nations has recognised Forest Green Rovers as the world's first carbon-neutral football club and it was described by

FIFA FIFA (; stands for ''Fédération Internationale de Football Association'' ( French), meaning International Association Football Federation ) is the international governing body of association football, beach football and futsal. It was found ...

as the “greenest team in the world”.

Honours

Vince was appointed an

Officer of the Order of the British Empire The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding contributions to the arts and sciences, work with charitable and welfare organisations, and public service outside the civil service. It was established o ...

(OBE) in the 2004 New Year Honours for "services to the Environment and to the Electricity Industry". In 2013, he was given the

honorary degree An honorary degree is an academic degree for which a university (or other degree-awarding institution) has waived all of the usual requirements. It is also known by the Latin phrases ''honoris causa'' ("for the sake of the honour") or ''ad hono ...

Doctor of Philosophy A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, Ph.D., or DPhil; Latin: or ') is the most common Academic degree, degree at the highest academic level awarded following a course of study. PhDs are awarded for programs across the whole breadth of academic fields ...

by the

University of Gloucestershire , mottoeng = In Spirit and Truth , established = , type = Public , endowment = £2.4 m (2015) , chancellor = Rennie Fritchie, Baroness Fritchie , vice_chancellor ...

Personal life

He is a

vegan Veganism is the practice of abstaining from the use of animal product—particularly in diet—and an associated philosophy that rejects the commodity status of animals. An individual who follows the diet or philosophy is known as a vegan. Di ...

. While studying, Vince met and married Kathleen Wyatt in 1981. The couple subsequently became New Age travellers together, and had a son in 1983. They separated some years later, and Wyatt subsequently raised the couple's son alone. They divorced in 1992.

Divorce and financial claim court case

After Vince had made his fortune, Wyatt, who had lived what was later described in court as "16 years of real hardship", lodged a financial claim of £1.9 million against Vince in 2011, nearly 20 years after their divorce. The

Court of Appeal A court of appeals, also called a court of appeal, appellate court, appeal court, court of second instance or second instance court, is any court of law that is empowered to hear an appeal of a trial court or other lower tribunal. In much of t ...

rejected the claim, stating it had "no real prospect of success" and was an "abuse of process". However, in March 2015 the

Supreme Court A supreme court is the highest court within the hierarchy of courts in most legal jurisdictions. Other descriptions for such courts include court of last resort, apex court, and high (or final) court of appeal. Broadly speaking, the decisions of ...

set aside this decision, ruling that there was no time limit in law for claims for financial provision, and the claim could progress in the High Court. Lord Wilson said the court must have regard "to the contribution of each party to the welfare of the family, including by looking after the home or caring for the family", but the claim only had a prospect of "comparatively modest success" with a £1.9 million payout "out of the question". In a statement, Vince branded the court's decision "mad": "I feel that we all have a right to move on, and not be looking over our shoulders. This could signal open season for people who had brief relationships a quarter of a century ago." Prior to the case settlement, Vince paid the legal costs for both parties, of over £500,000, as divorce law permits costs to be charged to the combined resources of both parties. In 2016, the case was settled when Vince agreed to pay £300,000 to Wyatt. He commented that the case had been "a terrible waste of time and money" and the settlement barely covered Wyatt’s legal fees. He then repeated his opinion that he was "...disappointed that the supreme court decided not to throw out the case, given it was brought over 30 years since the relationship ended" before adding, "There clearly needs to be a statute of limitations for divorce cases – a time limit beyond which a claim cannot be made. Such a thing exists in commercial law for good practical reasons."

Politics

Vince has made donations to both the Labour Party and the

Green Party A green party is a formally organized political party based on the principles of green politics, such as social justice, environmentalism and nonviolence. Greens believe that these issues are inherently related to one another as a foundation ...

. Prior to the 2015 UK general election, he was one of several celebrities who endorsed the parliamentary candidacy of the

Caroline Lucas Caroline Patricia Lucas (born 9 December 1960) is a British politician who has twice led the Green Party of England and Wales and has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for Brighton Pavilion since the 2010 general election. She was re-elected ...

. He endorsed the Labour Party in the 2019 general election.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Vince, Dale 1961 births British chief executives in the energy industry English businesspeople English football chairmen and investors Green Party of England and Wales people Labour Party (UK) people Living people Officers of the Order of the British Empire People associated with the University of Gloucestershire People associated with wind power People from Great Yarmouth