2024: A look back

As we come towards the end of 2024, we take a look back at some of the highlights from a busy and exciting year for the Queen Elizabeth Prize for Engineering.

In early February our 2024 QEPrize Laureates were announced. In the presence of HRH The Princess Royal, then QEPrize Chairman Lord Browne of Madingley revealed that Andrew Garrad CBE and Henrik Stiesdal would be awarded the prize for their achievements in advancing the design, manufacture and deployment of high-performance wind turbines, allowing wind energy to make a substantial contribution to the world’s electricity generation. Read more about this incredible innovation in our blog.

In March, our team members visited Washington, D.C. to attend a panel discussion titled Engineering the Future: The Role of AI and Biotech, co-hosted by the Queen Elizabeth Prize for Engineering and the US National Academy of Engineering. The event was held both in-person and virtually. Topic experts discussed "Revolutionary AI Innovations and Their Impact" and "The Evolution of Biotechnology: Lessons Learned from a Global Pandemic".

It was brilliant being able to collaborate with the NAE on such a thought provoking event.

In April, the Board of Trustees of the Queen Elizabeth Prize for Engineering Foundation appointed Lord Vallance of Balham as the Foundation’s next Chair. Lord Vallance succeeded Lord Browne of Madingley who had served as Chair since the inception of the QEPrize in 2011 and whose Term of Office ended in April.

In the same month, we announced the appointment of three new Trustees to our Board: Yewande Akinola, Dr Robert Langer, and Dame Anne Richards.

In celebration of International Women in Engineering Day (INWED) on 23 June, the QEPrize held a speed mentoring session at the Science Museum where women QEPrize Ambassadors spoke to school girls about the amazing places a career in engineering could take them.

The QEPrize Ambassadors shared a range of first-hand experiences and offered really valuable advice, including which subjects to choose for GCSE, and the different routes to becoming an engineer. The session left all the students excited about the possibilities ahead and very keen to find out even more about becoming an engineer.

You can watch the highlights from the day on our YouTube channel.

In September, we launched our annual Create the Trophy competition, open globally to young designers aged between 14-24. The winner of this competition has the opportunity to see their design come to life as it is 3D printed ready to be presented to the 2025 QEPrize winner/s in London.

Find out who won our competition on 4 February 2025!

To celebrate National Engineering Day on 13 November and it's theme of 'engineering role models', one of our QEPrize Ambassadors Emily Backhouse wrote a blog for us about her route into engineering and how she found her own role models along various stages of her career.

Earlier this month, some of our QEPrize Ambassadors attended the Science Museum's STEM Skills Fair to help to boost young people's STEM skills through hands-on activities. The groups got to speak to our ambassadors about the QEPrize, our Create the Trophy competition, as well as ask them any questions about a career in engineering.
It was brilliant to see so many young people getting involved and using our 3D Design Studio app to try and replicate a trophy design.

This has been a fantastic year for the QEPrize, and we are looking forward to delivering even more impact in 2025.