Benoît Fourneyron

Who was Benoît Fourneyron?

Benoît Fourneyron was a French engineer, born in Saint-Étienne, Loire. Fourneyron made significant contributions to the development of water turbines.

Benoît Fourneyron was educated at the École Nationale Supérieure des Mines de Saint-Étienne, a nearby engineering school that had recently opened. After he graduated in 1816, he spent the next few years in mines and ironworks. Around this time, a number of French engineers—including some of Fourneyron's former teachers—were starting to apply the mathematical techniques of modern science to the ancient mechanism called the waterwheel.

For centuries, waterwheels had been used to convert the energy of streams into mechanical power, mostly for milling grain. But the new machines of the Industrial Revolution required more power, and by the 1820s there was enormous interest in making waterwheels more efficient.