INNOVATION January-February 2015

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Envisioning Change R.A. McLachlan Award Recipient Champions Energy Efficiency in Industry

Tom Ruffen

opportunities in putting in more efficient components,” says Willis. “The prime focus was on the cheapest capital cost for large industrial equipment and there wasn’t much thought being given to the lifetime cost. I felt that if we spent more time designing a fan or a pump and getting a more efficient one, the cost and the energy savings over its life would be cheaper in the long run.” A Vision for the Future Throughout his career, Willis has been helping industries find energy savings and look for opportunities to produce their own power; sometimes using waste materi- als as a resource. “I met Paul when I was the manager of Strategic Planning at BC Hydro,” says Conrad Guelke, P.Eng., now an independent

consultant. “He was technically competent and very respectful of everyone, but was also quietly determined. Paul had a vision of how things ought to be done.” The 1970s were a time of tremendous industrial growth for BC, particularly in energy-intense industries like pulp mills and mining. Recalls Willis: “We were having phenomenal load growth— we needed more and more power. BC Hydro’s power demand was increasing by about 7% per year, so there was a press- ing need to get new power projects built and put in operation.” Willis developed the air compres- sor program at BC Hydro and promoted innovations such as turbo generators in the pulp mills and condensing boilers to capture waste energy in various industries.

In the early 1970s, Paul Willis began a long and storied career in the energy sec- tor in British Columbia. The young me- chanical engineer was hired by BC Hydro and soon made an impact on the utility’s industrial customers. “I was a gas utilization engineer, work- ing with customers using electricity and natural gas,” says Paul Willis, P.Eng., this year’s recipient of the R.A. McLachlan Memorial Award, and one of the pioneers of the clean energy industry in BC. “I would visit industries and talk about the latest technologies and what their energy efficiency options were.” Willis had begun his career in his native Ontario, working on boiler design for util- ity plants. “Early on, I realized that when equipment was designed there were missed

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