Meet the Team

Paul is the founder of Gavin and Doherty Geosolutions (2011) and currently sits as an executive director on the board of GDG, where he provides technical and commercial oversight and support to the leadership team. Paul is also the EVP for Engineering for the Venterra Group where he manages the synergies across all the Venterra group companies contributing to the development phase of offshore wind projects.

Paul is a geotechnical engineer and offshore foundation designer by background, he grew the team in GDG from 2 people initially to a team of 130 experts in 2022, before handing over the reigns to the senior leadership team as he moved into his current group role. He is a Chartered Civil Engineer, a Ph.D. qualified Geotechnical Engineer, and a fellow of the Association of Consulting Engineers in Ireland as well as an active member of the Deep Foundation Institute (DFI) technical committees for “Marine Foundations” and “Driven Piling”.  With an extensive career background in offshore wind projects and renewable energy developments, where he has worked on over 35GW of offshore wind projects in countries around the world. His focus has primarily been related to mitigating ground risk and the design/optimisation of offshore foundations and cable installations.

Jonathan is a seasoned Chartered Engineer with a 27-year track record in the renewable energy sector. His approach to leadership is based on a team-first attitude, where he brings together diverse skill sets to achieve collective goals.

As a strategic thinker, he possesses a keen commercial awareness, allowing him to navigate market dynamics effectively. Jonathan’s commitment to a collaborative work environment, strategic outlook, and commercial insight make him an invaluable asset. His leadership drives successful outcomes and fosters a culture of inclusivity and shared success, positioning him as a leader who is as invested in people as he is in results.

Prior to GDG, Jonathan held senior roles at Atkins and Royal HaskoningDHV.

Dr Thusyanthan (Thushy) is a Fellow of the Institution of Civil Engineers (FICE), Chartered Engineer (CEng) and Chartered Marine Engineer (CMarEng) with over 20 years’ experience in the energy sector. Thushy has extensive offshore project experience around the world (UK, Southeast Asia and Middle East), working with clients, contractors and designers in conceptual to detailed design stages. With excellent interpersonal and team building skills, he has successfully delivered complex multi-disciplinary projects around the world. He also has expert witness experience in international arbitrations. He has authored over 75 technical publications in journals and conferences and is recipient of “John Henry King Medal” and “Bill Curtin Medal” from the Institution of Civil Engineers (UK).

Thushy’s technical expertise covers geotechnical site investigations, soil characterisation, ground model, windfarm foundations & pile designs, pipeline and cable installations, offshore trenching, geohazard identification and risk assessment, seismic designs, liquefaction assessments, pipelines, offshore platforms, tank farms, soil improvement and finite element assessment.

Jeannine is as an experienced professional with over 20 years’ experience in areas including policy analysis and the provision of policy and legislative advice across both terrestrial and marine areas. Jeannine has a proven track record in leading multi-disciplinary teams and delivering robust consents and infrastructure in the Foreshore area. She also has extensive experience in relation to reducing the risk of judicial review and other legal challenges in a constantly evolving legal environment.

Jeannine has experience of working within the complex legislative system, ensuring compliance with both EU and National legislation in the environmental area. She has previously led on drafting legislation (Waste Management Collection Permit Regulations, transposition of the 2014 EIA Directive) and provided strategic advice on reforming primary legislation (Maritime Area Planning Act 2021). She has undertaken assessments of EUSF funded infrastructure projects ensuring compliance with all relevant legislation.

As Head of Marine Advisory, Jeannine leads the planning and advisory team working with clients across a broad range of projects ranging from provision of strategic development advice, various marine consenting applications including documentation under EIA and other environmental legislation, planning and environmental due diligence, assessment of judicial review risk on consents, to providing advice on environmental constraints for strategic infrastructure projects.

Paul is a Chartered Engineer with over 25 years’ of experience in geotechnical engineering and a UK Registered Ground Engineering (RoGEP) Adviser.

He has worked on a wide variety of projects for employers, contractors and third parties gaining a range of experience including earthworks for major infrastructure schemes in Ireland and overseas, roads, tunnelling projects, flood protection schemes, retaining wall and basement projects, ground investigations and forensic reviews of failures.

Paul is adept at designing creative solutions for difficult problems and has published numerous peer reviewed technical papers. He has also acted as an independent expert for a number of legal disputes centred on ground related issues.

He is a reviewer for the ICE Geotechnical Engineering Journal, a member of Eurocode 7 review panel at NSAI and a former Chairman of the Geotechnical Society of Ireland.

Brian is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Waste Management (FCIWM), a Chartered Resource and Waste Manager (CRWM) and a Practitioner Member of the Institute of Environmental management and Assessment (PIEMA). He has a proven track record in the environmental and sustainability sectors and more than 25 years’ environmental compliance experience.

He has worked on a variety of renewable energy, infrastructure and waste management projects across the UK, Ireland and Sweden. Project responsibilities have included both lead consultant and technical authority for screening, scoping and environmental assessments across a variety of sectors managing multidisciplinary teams.

Brian has taken projects from feasibility through the planning process and into construction. His clients include private companies, local authorities, regulators and government departments. He has also provided expert witness services in both prosecutions and tribunals.

Richard is a geotechnical engineer with extensive experience of major marine, offshore and onshore geotechnical projects in the UK and overseas. A chartered Civil Engineer with over 25 years of varied experience, which spans site investigation and characterisation, engineering design, site supervision, construction, project management and technical team leadership.

He has a proven track record of delivering large and complex geotechnical marine projects for major offshore wind developers, oil and gas operators, utilities companies, port operators, government bodies and contractors. His broad range of worldwide geotechnical experience includes projects in Europe, Asia, Middle East, Africa, South America, Caribbean, Caspian, and Black Sea.

John is a Chartered Accountant (FCA) and a Business Studies graduate (BBS) from Dublin City University. John trained & qualified at KPMG in Dublin and most notably spent 8 years working with Kingspan Group Plc, initially in Internal Audit and subsequently in several FC roles in the UK, Central Europe & North America.

John also worked as Financial Controller with the Irish Aviation Authority (IAA) which has responsibility for the management of Irish controlled airspace and the safety regulation of Irish aviation. John joined the GDG business with +15 years PQE working in both public & private sector environments and has broad experience in multiple industries, including manufacturing, healthcare, aviation, tourism & renewables.

Diarmuid is a specialist in marine civil engineering design with over 30 years’ experience. He has a wide range of involvement in concept and detailed designs, project management and contract administration as well as geotechnical assessment, inspection of maritime projects and temporary works. He also has extensive experience in port planning, environmental management of port upgrade works and in heavy marine civil design.

His experience encompasses designs for harbour layouts, new quay walls (incl. the first use of Ruukki piles in the UK at Peterhead), refurbished suspended decks, marine renewable energy projects (incl. LIMPET on the coast of Islay), breakwaters and coastal defence structures, fender design and berthing assessments, capital and maintenance dredging projects, pontoons as a cruise berth (Greenock Ocean Terminal), general marine infrastructure and marina developments. His projects have been generally located throughout the UK and Ireland but he has experience further afield.

During his career, he has acquired extensive technical design experience and team management skills and is responsible for project management and day-to-day management and coordination of multi-disciplinary teams and site supervisory staff in the marine civil engineering sector.

John O’Donovan is a chartered engineer with 10 years’ experience. He is the head of the Onshore Renewables sector and leads the soil-structure interaction team. John specialises in the design of complex foundation systems, temporary works and retaining systems.

In recent years, John has been responsible for the design of over a hundred foundation projects. John has completed forensic engineering projects investigating failures and issues related to retaining wall systems. This work has included an ultimate limit state failure of a Diaphragm wall and a serviceability failure of a Diaphragm wall in Abu Dhabi. John also acted as lead author on CIRIA C794 “Grouted anchors and soil nails: inspection, condition assessment and remediation”.

John is familiar with a wide range of retaining wall designs from contiguous, secant piled walls, king-posts, reinforced earth, soil nailed solutions, and diaphragm walls. From a design perspective, John is intimately familiar with analytical, empirical, and numerical design approaches. John is currently acting as Temporary Works Engineer on a number of large-scale civil engineering projects utilising his expertise in piling platform design, trench box design and cofferdam design.

William is a Chartered Engineer with Engineers Ireland and has over 15 years’ experience in the design and delivery of a wide range of marine civil engineering projects, including expertise in the areas of port master planning, planning applications, preliminary and detailed design, temporary works design, project management, cost management, contract administration and site supervision.

He is the Head of the Ports and Harbours sector, based in Belfast. Throughout his career, William has both led and provided technical input for publications within the maritime and renewables sectors. During his career, William has gained experience in working with almost all of the major commercial ports in Ireland.

Some notable projects which William has helped deliver have included Greenock Ocean Terminal, Dublin Port RoRo Jetty and Crossberth Quay projects, SR2000 Foundation Installation, Foynes East Jetty Reclamation Planning, Ringaskiddy Container Terminal Planning, Rosslare Europort Maintenance Dredging, Loch Ryan Port Detailed Design, Masterplanning of Jaigarh Port (India), to name a few.

Tim is a civil and structural engineer with over 18 years’ experience. He is a Chartered member of Engineers Ireland and is the Head of Infrastructure at GDG. Tim is experienced in the design and delivery of infrastructure projects with an emphasis on the renewable and transport sectors.

Tim has led the tender and detailed design (civil and structural) for a number of windfarm developments both in Ireland and the UK, specialising in HV substation and wind turbine foundation design.  He has also led the design of numerous road and bridge schemes.  In addition to his design experience, Tim has regularly acted as PSDP.  Tim has substantial expertise in design team management, tender preparation and evaluation, Value Engineering, road and bridge works supervision and contract administration (FIDIC and Public Works Contract).

Tim leads the Infrastructure Team in delivering the geotechnical and civil design of a range of projects, such as flood defence schemes, residential developments and road schemes.