Mehmet Hilmi Güler (born 15 July 1946) is a Turkish politician and metallurgical engineer. He was the Energy and Natural Resources Minister of Turkey in 2002–2009. He served as the general director of the Machines and Chemical Industries Board (
MKEK) and
Etibank
Etibank A.Ş is a defunct Turkish bank. Founded in 1935 as a state bank focussed on financing the electricity sector, it launched commercial banking activities in 1955. The commercial banking division was separated out in 1993 (from what would bec ...
. He was a founding member of the currently ruling
AKP.
Education
Güler graduated from the Department of Metallurgy at the
Middle East Technical University
Middle East Technical University (commonly referred to as METU; in Turkish, ''Orta Doğu Teknik Üniversitesi'', ODTÜ) is a public technical university located in Ankara, Turkey. The university emphasizes research and education in engineering ...
and worked as a project engineer and group chairman at
TUSAŞ Aerospace Industries (
TAİ). He went on to an academic career as deputy chairman of the
Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey
The Scientific and Technological Research Institution of Turkey ( tr, Türkiye Bilimsel ve Teknolojik Araştırma Kurumu, TÜBİTAK) is a national agency of Turkey whose stated goal is to develop "science, technology and innovation" (STI) policies ...
(TÜBİTAK).
Political career
As energy minister as well as the day-to-day running of this important department dealing with Turkey's gas, electricity requirements he has had to deal with a number of issues including:
* Privatisation of Turkey's energy sector
* Enquiries into the corruption allegations against the previous (
ANAP) government concerning the deal it made to purchase natural gas from Russia, the
Blue Stream
Blue Stream is a major trans- Black Sea gas pipeline that carries natural gas to Turkey from Russia. The pipeline has been constructed by the Blue Stream Pipeline B.V., the Netherlands based joint venture of Russian Gazprom and Italian Eni. Th ...
agreement.
* Negotiating other natural gas purchases with countries including Iran.
* Plans, sponsored by Güler, to build three nuclear power stations in Turkey.
* Continued oil exploration and investment in hydro-electric power.
* A strategy for the mining of
boron
Boron is a chemical element with the symbol B and atomic number 5. In its crystalline form it is a brittle, dark, lustrous metalloid; in its amorphous form it is a brown powder. As the lightest element of the '' boron group'' it has t ...
, of which Turkey is the world's largest producer
Personal life
He is married and has two children.
References
''Biography of Mehmet Hilmi Güler'' at Who is who database
External links
*
Living people
1946 births
Justice and Development Party (Turkey) politicians
Government ministers of Turkey
Ministers of Energy and Natural Resources of Turkey
Members of the 23rd Parliament of Turkey
Members of the 22nd Parliament of Turkey
Members of the 60th government of Turkey
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