Energy Digital - January 2018

Ja nua r y 2018

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DRONE MAJOR GROUP EMBRACING OPPORTUNITIES FOR SMART CITIES

HYPERLOOP: WILL IT LIVE UP TO THE HYPE?

TOP 10 ELECTRIC VEHICLE MANUFACTURERS IN THE WORLD

SOLAR AT SCALE TODAE SOLAR’S LANDON K AHN REVEALS HOW THE COMPANY IS RIDING THE SOLAR WAVE

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FOREWORD HELLO AND WELCOME to first issue of 2018.

First up, with over 6,216MW of installed photovoltaic (PV) solar power, Australia is experiencing quite the solar-coaster. We speak with the award-winning commercial solar installer Todae Solar as it has played a key role in the rapidly growing solar power space in the country.

What will come from the rise of smart cities? A growing reliance on drone technology to cover a wide range of municipal duties. “Whether we like it or not, drones will play a crucial role in the smart city environment,” says Drone Major Group, as we look at the smart cities of the future.

We also look at the four major global developments where dreams of sustainable energy look set to rise from the volcanic dust, as the possibilities that geothermal energy present could potentially bring are beginning to be explored.

Also, does the Hyperloop represent the future of public transportation?

Energy Digital takes a closer look at Elon Musk’s vision.

We also have exclusive features on Thames Water and supply chain transformation, the provision of clean and sustainable water with Lilongwe Water Board and defining the Iranian oil and gas sector with Tehran Energy Consultants. This is on top of interviews with Sarawak Energy, Schneider Electric and NAES Corporation.

We sincerely hope you enjoy the issue, and as always, please tweet your feedback to @EnergyDigital

Enjoy the issue!

www.energydigital.com www.bizclikmedia.com

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8 THE PERFECT STORM – DYNAMIC FACTORS IN SOLAR SMART CITIES

ENERGY 4.0

S U S TA I N A B I L I T Y

24 16 Drone Major Group Embracing opportunities for smart cities 4

January 2018

FROM ASH TO CASH

The future of geothermal energy

TOP 10 T R A N S P O R TAT I O N

HYPERLOOP:

WILL IT LIVE UP TO THE HYPE?

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TOP 10

ELECTRIC VEHICLE MANUFACTURERS IN THE WORLD

52 Events

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THE PERFECT STORM – DYNAMIC FACTORS IN SOLAR TODAE SOLAR’S HEAD OF MARKETING AND STRATEGIC INITIATIVES, LANDON KAHN, REVEALS HOW THE COMPANY IS RIDING THE SOLAR WAVE Writ t en by N I K I WA LD EG R AV E

ENERGY 4.0

ENERGY 4.0 AS OF JULY 2017, Australia had over 6,216MW of installed photovoltaic (PV) solar power, of which 814MW were installed in the preceding 12 months.

Award-winning commercial solar installer, Todae Solar, has been a significant conduit in this, boasting an 80% increase in the last 12 months. The company has the most experience of multi-site tenders in the country and has rolled out more than 50MW of installation across various industries and companies of all sizes since its inception in 2003.

“In the last three months alone, we’ve been responding to numerous multi-site tenders,” says Todae Solar’s

Head of Marketing and Strategic Initiatives, Landon Kahn. “They’re from tier one organisations, with three to 10 sites and between 5-9MW. “It’s the perfect storm for organisations to really look at solar on a larger scale.”

The company was formed in 2003 when CEO Danin Kahn acquired a smaller sustainability company.

With a strong ethos to sustainability and delivering innovative solutions, the company has grown from a team of three to over 75.

Some of Todae Solar’s multi-site projects span healthcare, social assistance, aged care, agriculture,

manufacturing and retail – including a mammoth installation for aged care provider Aegis Care, with 3.2MW installed across 26 sites.

The solar giant has also rolled out 2.6MW for Aldi Stores, 2.8MW across 16 sites for St Vincent’s Health and almost 2MW across two sites for Australian Vintage.

Todae Solar has carried out thousands of installations across the country and Kahn says with the increase of energy costs, plus the decrease in solar costs, it’s a no-brainer for businesses with numerous locations to get in on the action.

“The Australian market is growing significantly,” he says, “and the main reason why large organisations are choosing multi-site projects is because of that cost reduction.

“Solar components have come down so dramatically – 90% in the last 10 years – so there’s been a whole shift in thinking from organisations, from saying ‘we’ll do one site and see how solar goes’, to ‘what is going to be the best return for the organisation? Let’s do 20 sites?’”

The first commercial solar system Todae Solar installed in 2006 was at AU$12 ($9.19) per watt and now,

“COMPANIES ARE LOOKING AT MULTI-SITE ROLL-OUTS, BECAUSE IT’S JUST GETTING A BETTER BANG FOR THEIR BUCK” LANDON KAHN Head of Marketing and Strategic Initiatives, Todae Solar

depending on the path of installation, area etc, it’s anywhere between AU$1.30-AU$1.60 ($1.00-$1.23) for a roof mount installation.

“Because these costs have come down so considerably, basically what you’re finding is soft costs,” Khan adds. “So: installation, engineering, project management. Those costs are now taking up a greater portion of the total overall project value.

“And when you can leverage those costs across a portfolio, you’re able to bring them down, and therefore get those economies of scale. That makes a very big difference, and that’s why the companies are looking at 11

ENERGY 4.0

multi-site roll-outs, because it’s just getting a better bang for their buck.”

Khan says businesses now investigate the levelised cost of electricity (LCOE) over 20 years, which is how the actual cost per KW/hour of electricity is delivered, and how the larger, sophisticated, international markets like the USA, UK and Europe look at solar.

Australian organisations are now following suit because it gives a more sophisticated understanding of what the actual costs are going to be, and compares them to 12

January 2018

the current and future costs.

Of course, with all these major shifts, for companies to go down the multi-site route they need ‘safe hands’, and Kahn says that’s where Todae Solar differentiates itself.

“Multi-sites can be particularly difficult because you might have installations in Western Australia, Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria,” he explains. “All of them have different costs associated, different requirements, and you’ve got to manage installations concurrently. So, you need a lot

“WE’VE ALWAYS ENSURED THAT WE WANT TO GIVE THE BEST VALUE TO OUR CLIENTS, BUT WE ALSO WANT TO BE A SUSTAINABLE BUSINESS AND GROW ORGANICALLY” LANDON KAHN Head of Marketing and Strategic Initiatives, Todae Solar

of experience and capability.

“But we’re more advanced than the majority of the market, and that’s our point of difference.”

He claims another growing trend is storage, and cost in the last 12 months is coming down as much as 60% percent for certain manufacturers, which means that within the next 18 months to two years, business cases for storage will completely change.

“It will be much more viable,” he adds, “and that will see solar shift again, because you’ll be able to look at certain things that solar couldn’t

do before, like in terms of things affecting network charges, which was traditionally very difficult to forecast what that would look like.

“We envisage a progression to small scale behind the metre ‘utility projects.’ We’re already talking with organisations about aggregated systems between five to 20MW systems. This will become more common (as we’ve seen internationally) as organisations max out the capacity of their property portfolio and still have significant energy usage remaining.

So, we’ll see a shift towards (potentially 13

‘TODAE SOLAR, HAS BEEN A SIGNIFICANT CONDUIT IN THIS, BOASTING AN 80% INCREASE IN THE LAST 12 MONTHS’

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ENERGY 4.0 aggregated) small-scale utility projects to cover the rest of their usage.”

Because Todae Solar is enjoying a major growth phase, and is set to see it continuing over the next few years, it can throw up resourcing challenges, and sometimes be a gap in the skill sets. Todae Solar has addressed these challenges by encouraging staff development up-skilling employees and potential hires from other industries in a similar curve.

“We have had internal staff that when they first started working with us, were working on the smaller projects, so 30KW, 100KW,” he says, “and we’ve worked at developing their expertise and skills.

“Now, they’re project managers and engineers, with experience in delivering megawatt scale projects across the country, and we’ve ensured they’re able to now deliver those projects effectively.”

The business has won more Clean Energy Council (CEC) Awards for Best Design and Installation than any other installer and has been awarded Largest Commercial Installer nationally for the last two years.

While Todae Solar prides itself on having “the biggest and best

client portfolio in the country,” Khan says it’s rewarding to still be acknowledged by the industry body for the quality of the work.

“It shows testament that we are leading the industry,” he says.

“Solar systems are meant to last 25 years, but a lot of companies said, ‘well, we’re just going to sell solar as cheap as possible and we’ll reach scale and then we’ll be okay’.

“But because of the solar coaster, that just wasn’t a realistic possibility.

It’s about getting the best solution and the quality solution, and being recognised and awarded for that, for us, really exemplifies that it’s important to focus on quality, and ensure that you are providing that to clients.”

While many commercial solar companies have failed in the last few years, Kahn says that this quality, and investment in staff, are the reasons Todae Solar has outlasted many rivals.

“We’ve always ensured that we want to give the best value to our clients, but we also want to be a sustainable business and grow organically,” he reveals. “In the last 12 months, we’ve more than doubled in terms of size, maybe an 80% increase, and I can see it more than doubling again.”

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SMART CITIES

Drone Major Group

Embracing opportunities for smart cities Founder Robert Garbett discusses how drones will form a major part of the smart cities of the future Written by JULIETTE WILLS

SMART CITIES SMART CITIES ARE going to be ever more reliant on drone technology to cover a wide range of municipal duties, according to a 2017 report.

The Cloud Security Alliance (CSA) and Securing Smart Cities, a joint not-for-profit global initiative, released a report pointing to drones playing a key role in the running and securing of smart cities. As cities become smarter, the need for drone technology and connectivity is set to hugely increase.

For the successful deployment of drones across smart cities, the report focuses on the need for multiple drone platforms – most probably clouds – that will allow for simultaneous control of connected devices, which are safely deployed and protected against compromise.

“Whether you are a fan of them or not, it is becoming increasingly evident that drones will in fact play an important and even critical role in the smart city environment,” Brian Russell, co-author of the report and chair of CSA’s IoT Working Group, explained in a statement.

Drones are big business: the enhanced capabilities of drones for the military combined with the increasing demand in domestic and 18

January 2018

commercial applications is driving a massive predicted industry growth.

The market intelligence firm Tractica predicts that the interest in utilising unmanned aerial vehicles for commercial applications will drive commercial-grade unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) shipments from 80,000 units in 2015 to more than 2.6mn annually by 2025. Predictions

by Interact Analysis in ‘Drones in 2022’ predicts industry revenues will reach $15bn by 2022, up from just $1.3bn in 2016. This includes revenues from hardware, software/ analytics and drone services.

Robert Garbett, an ex-British Army Major, has launched a new group of companies which is the first to focus on bringing together a number of complementary businesses to provide this vital connectivity to the everexpanding global drone industry.

Garbett, Founder and CEO of Drone Major Group (DMG), built on his expertise in systems engineering, aeronautical engineering, airworthiness, aviation risk and technical authorship gained during his time in the military to develop three companies at DMG’s core: Software Major, a software development

“Systems are being used to scan the condition of crops in order to allow for targeted use of crop treatments. This significantly reduces the cost for the farmer and also reduces risk of such treatments entering the food chain�

ROBERT GARBETT CEO, Drone Major Group 19

SMART CITIES company, Cyber Major, a fast growth risk assessment and resolution consultancy and SUAS Global (Surface, Underwater, Air, Space), which is currently the world’s leading online network for the drone industry.

The security sector is one in which drones are becoming more commonplace, with deployment of permanent, tethered drones to scan for movement at sensitive locations such as airports and railway stations, particularly at a time of increased terror threat at a global level.

“Drone use has increased exponentially across a wide range of applications,” says Garbett, “and security is definitely one of them. In the UK, the Maritime Coastguard Agency has implemented the technology in support of the Border Force to scan some of our coastline.”

Indeed, some police forces in the UK have begun to adopt drones during operations – they’re particularly handy when searching for on-the-run criminals or for deploying in particularly violent situations such as riots. Search and rescue missions are also a fast-growing sector, as drones are able to drop urgent medical supplies where needed within minutes, 20

January 2018

and search for people trapped on mountains or in a building after an earthquake. Copenhagen’s fire service is currently being taught how to use drones to combat fires and chemical spills arising from traffic accidents.

Right now, what really excites Garbett about drone technology?

“For me, it’s the integration of drone systems with each other through the Internet of Things,” he explains. “For example, the idea of being able to

“The transport application for this technology is inevitable in the long term and we believe that it will save a number of lives currently being lost on our roads” ROBERT GARBETT CEO, Drone Major Group

have a car turn up at exactly the right time to get me to my destination for a meeting scheduled in my diary via a fusion of surface and air drones is amazing. I remember waiting patiently for someone to introduce a phone that could merge my mobile and PDA, being frustrated at having to type numbers into my phone from another device. Of course, we now all have smartphones and these days many would not even know what a PDA is!

I feel the same way now about the possibility of being able to get from one side of London to the other safely, quickly and on time using integrated, driverless surface and air drones.”

With a rapidly rising population squeezed onto an already crowded planet, we’re going to need all the help we can get to sustain ourselves in the future. Drones are increasingly being introduced into agriculture to do just that – but 21

SMART CITIES

can UAVs really help to sustain our population with a forecasted 9.7bn people sharing the planet’s resources by 2050? According to Garbett, drones are already having a huge impact on farming.

“Systems are being used to scan the condition of crops in order to allow for targeted use of crop treatments,” explains Garbett. “This significantly reduces the cost for the farmer and also reduces risk of such treatments entering the food chain. We recently discovered a drone system being used to great effect detecting disease in crops before it was visible to the human eye. All of these innovations are 22

January 2018

amazing and are set to develop further as the agriculture industry wakes up to the potential of these systems.”

With traffic congestion causing huge problems for today’s big cities, does Garbett believe that flying cars will follow, hot on the heels of the drones, for the smart cities of the future?

“Of course, there are a number of issues to overcome,” he states, “but we firmly believe that in cities such as London, we’ll see small nodes operating between fixed points across problem areas within 10 years. Indeed, this is already the case in Dubai where such technology is being embraced fully. Beyond this, we

“If we look at how drones are being used now, they are generally carrying out tasks that are impossible or too dangerous for humans to undertake” ROBERT GARBETT CEO, Drone Major Group

believe that systems will continue to develop and interconnect with other systems and as the safety case is proven, resistance to implementation will reduce. The transport application for this technology is inevitable in the long term and we believe that it will save a number of lives currently being lost on our roads.”

All of this is well and good, but are we simple humans at risk from drones and flying cars connected by common platforms? Should we be concerned about computers beginning to replace police, firemen, paramedics, delivery drivers and pilots? Will humans actually be of any use by 2040 or will

we be a redundant pile of bones and organs just waiting for our demise?

“There are so many stories of new and innovative technologies creating irrational fears,” says Garbett, “such as the introduction of the first automobiles when people thought that going over 25mph would result in death. Irrational fear is normal and is to be expected but if we look at how drones are being used now, they are generally carrying out tasks that are impossible or too dangerous for humans to undertake. In essence, we believe that drones will, as they do currently, augment our capabilities and capacity – not replace them.”

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S U S TA I N A B I L I T Y

FROM ASH TO CASH

The future of geothermal energy Writ ten by DA N B R I G H T M O R E

Energy Digital looks at four major global developments where dreams of sustainable energy look set to rise from the volcanic dust

GEOTHERMAL ENERGY HAS traditionally lagged behind the supply generated from solar and wind technologies, but that could all change. Recent advances in exploration and drilling techniques, combined with the willingness of countries to explore the potential for renewables, are delivering exciting developments in the excavation of geothermal wells near tectonic plate boundaries and into the heart of simmering volcanoes.

The Earth’s geothermal resources are, in theory, more than capable

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of supplying global energy needs.

Here’s the catch: only a fraction of these opportunities may be profitably exploited. This issue explains why geothermal energy produces less than 1% of the world’s electricity, according to the World Energy Council.

However, according to Professor Yan Lavallée, a volcanology and magma research chair at Liverpool University, the potential for geothermal energy to harness the power of volcanoes is enormous: “Even a small body of magma in the order of a fraction of a cubic

S U S TA I N A B I L I T Y kilometre could power a whole country the size of the UK.” Currently, four countries hope to release that potential volcanic power.

Montserrat If ambitions to deliver a significant percentage of its electricity supply from geothermal sources are to be achieved, it will represent a ‘phoenix from the ashes’ moment for the Caribbean island. A modern Pompeii, its capital Plymouth still remains buried in volcanic dust following a series of eruptions in 1995 which led to it being abandoned completely in 1997.

The UK’s Department for International Development (DFID) is at the helm of the continued geothermal development project on Montserrat, having invested just under $24mn. During summer 2017, drilling work began on a third and final test well which has not been without its problems, says DIFD rep Martin Dawson: “With the technical expertise from the specialists on site, we were able to make the decision to use bentonite slurry, a mud slurry, to secure the well. These efforts seem to have worked. The well is safe, but the slurry must now be

cleaned out before we can go into the stimulation short term testing phase.”

With temperatures of 250°C already recorded at 1.7km depth there is potential for each well to deliver 1.5MW to make this the little island that could. The test phase of the project is due to end in December 2018.

Iceland It might sound outlandish but plans to harness geothermal energy from Iceland’s magma lakes to supply the UK and Europe are on the boil.

Scientists working on the $100mn Krafla Magma Testbed project are set to drill over 2km below the Earth’s crust in northern Iceland, boring their way into a molten magma chamber. As part of an experiment due to commence in 2020, researchers will drill a primary borehole through which water can be pumped via reinforced U-shaped pipes. The resulting ‘supercritical steam’ could potentially be used to power turbines with the energy generated distributed across the North Atlantic via underwater cables.

Icelandic energy company Lansvirkjun discovered the magma chamber by chance while deep drilling 27

S U S TA I N A B I L I T Y on another project in 2009. “Utilising geothermal energy from the near magma environment is a very exciting next step for the geothermal industry.

Understanding where the magma is, how to locate it and the properties of the fluid, is very relevant to developing the concept of near-magma geothermal energy in volcanic areas all over the world,” says Landsvirkjun’s project manager, Sigudur Markusson.

The project’s first phase is being coordinated by Iceland’s Geothermal Research Group and the British Geological Survey involving 38 other institutes and companies from 11 countries around the world. These include the Norwegian oil and gas giant Statoil, Canadian mining firm Falco Resources and US-based Sandia National Laboratories

‘Plans to harness geothermal energy from Iceland’s magma lakes to supply the UK and Europe are on the boil’ 28

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– a nuclear contractor to the US government on-hand to assess the processes for dealing with magma hitting temperatures of 900°C. Hawaii Plans to further harness the power of the island’s five active volcanoes (Loihi, Kilauea, Mauna Loa, Hualalai and Haleakala) are gathering a head of steam in a bid to create a 100% renewable-sourced electrical grid – something no other US state has yet managed to achieve. Governor David Ige signed a bill in 2014 pledging that Hawaii will become completely energy self-sustaining by 2045. It is a much-needed goal as Hawaiians currently pay two to three times more for their electricity than the national average and, according to the US Energy Information Administration, the state spends around $5bn per year importing enough oil to meet energy demands.

Geothermal currently produces less than 1% of the world’s electricity Hawaii’s geothermal Puna plant currently generates in excess of 38MW, tapping into the hot rocks in the eastern rift zone of the Kilauea to provide over 25% of the island’s electricity by directing steam from underground wells to a turbine generator. Research suggests planned expansion of the plant could help provide up to 50% of the island’s power.

Renewable energy companies are also keen to tap into the geothermal potential of Mauna Loa, a giant volcano at the island’s centre near

several volcanic hot spots. However, construction of a new plant here has stalled, meeting with opposition from some locals who believe the mountain, which last erupted in 1984, is home to the deity Pele.

New Zealand Dating back hundreds of years, the first use of geothermal energy in New Zealand was by the central North Island Māori for heating, cooking and therapeutic purposes.

The Kiwi nation’s first geothermal plant, and the world’s second ever, 29

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S U S TA I N A B I L I T Y FACTS & FIGURES The global geothermal market is at 13.3GW of operating capacity spread across 24 countries.

Traditionally geothermal taps into the steam from underground hot water reservoirs, but plans are afoot to harness energy from molten magma in volcanic regions.

Geothermal heating is currently employed in 70 countries.

According to its most recent report for 2016, the Geothermal Energy Association puts planned global geothermal capacity at 12.5GW spread across 82 countries.

The global geothermal industry is expected to reach 18.4GW by 2021. If global goals are met the market could reach 32GW by the early 2030s.

‘The Earth’s geothermal resources are, in theory, more than capable of supplying global energy needs’

was opened at Wairakei in New Zealand’s Taupo volcanic zone in 1958. The Taupo zone still produces most of the country’s geothermal electricity, contributing 750MW (13%) of the New Zealand’s supply.

The main operators here are listed company Contact Energy Ltd and Mighty River Power, a 51% stateowned enterprise. A significant factor in recent geothermal projects has been the high level of commercial participation by Māori-owned enterprises. The nation’s newest plant was delivered by Contact Energy at Te Mihi and went online in 2014.

Global positioning satellite and satellite radar interferometry measurements indicate the birth of a new magma chamber along the Taupo Volcanic Zone. Geophysicists noted geodetic measurements which highlighted widespread subsidence, suggesting the cooling and contraction of magma within the shallow crust. This large body of magma, found at depths of 6-10km below the Earth’s surface in the Taupo geothermal zone, could be further exploited via drilling at new plants to push the nation towards its increased target for renewable energy.

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HYPERLOOP:

WILL IT LIVE UP TO THE HYPE? As Elon Musk and Richard Branson face off in a quest to establish the future of public transportation, we get you up to speed on Hyperloop Writ ten by DAN BRIGHTMORE

T R A N S P O R TAT I O N

T R A N S P O R TAT I O N THANKS TO THE rise of hybrid vehicles and electric cars, we can now choose our own more efficient and sustainable modes of transport that aim to put the environment first. But what is Hyperloop and what is all the fuss about?

Hyperloop is a high-speed train system championed by Tesla’s Elon Musk. In 2013, Musk published a white paper calling for an open-source

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approach to realising the technology needed to create Hyperloop. Likened to a vacuum tube system in a building used to move documents from floor to floor and touted as a “fifth mode” of transport, Musk describes Hyperloop as “a cross between a Concorde, a railgun and an air hockey table.”

Hyperloop is based on the ‘very high-speed transit’ (VHST) system first proposed back in 1972, combining a

magnetic levitation train with a lowpressure transit tube. With the potential for speeds in excess of 700mph, the subsonic transporter is being touted as a credible, cleaner alternative to short-distance flights and would be much faster than existing rail networks.

There are, of course, challenges to overcome with Hyperloop, such as the high G-force which could be felt during turns and the practical

implications of the acceleration and deceleration sensation passengers would experience on stop-start journeys, but we are edging closer to a transportation system that could totally transform the way we travel.

From A to B Hyperloop Transportation Technologies (HTT) is working to realise Elon Musk’s original vision for

‘Touted as a ‘fifth mode’ of transport, Musk describes Hyperloop as ‘a cross between a Concorde, a railgun and an air hockey table’’

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T R A N S P O R TAT I O N Hyperloop by removing the problems associated with the friction of wheels at high speeds and replacing them with air bearings so transportation pods can float on air through the tube.

The idea is similar to maglev trains in Japan, where electromagnetic levitation can allow speeds of up to 500km/h by eliminating the friction associated with traditional trains running on tracks. Propulsion would be delivered via linear motors, but as the vehicle would coast for 90% of the route, these motors would only be installed in short stretches near stations, and at regular intervals in longer stretches, to maintain speed.

Hyperloop One – now rebranded Virgin Hyperloop One following Richard Branson’s recent investment

‘Recent tests at the company’s Las Vegas track have clocked speeds of 200mph so there’s still work to be done to realise Musk’s 700mph Valhalla’ 36

January 2018

in the company – is taking a slightly different approach by using passive magnetic levitation, where the magnets are affixed to the trains that zip along an aluminium track to “deliver airline speeds for long distances due to ultra-low aerodynamic drag.” Recent tests at the company’s Las Vegas track have clocked speeds of 200mph, meaning there’s still work to be done to realise Musk’s 700mph Valhalla.

Both systems plan to use low pressure tubes which could tunnel underground, lessening their environmental impact, or alternatively be built on columns. These tubes would mimic high-altitude flying which offers less resistance against the pod moving through the tunnel, allowing for high speeds combined

with optimum energy efficiency.

Devised as an ecosystem, Hyperloop would include sources of renewable energy - so expect to see tubes plastered with solar panels, with wind and geothermal energy being sourced along the tracks and within the tubes themselves.

The target is to generate more energy within the ecosystem than the Hyperloop will consume.

When will it be operational?

Musk has yet to give a date when he expects to see Hyperloop services up and running, with his focus trained

on his SpaceX and Tesla businesses.

However, last summer he pledged that his business The Boring Co. will build the world’s longest tunnel running from New York to Washington DC via Philadelphia and Baltimore, utilising his Hyperloop technology in a bid to connect the Big Apple with America’s capital in a journey time of just 29 minutes. For now, a one-mile test track has been built by SpaceX next to Hawthorne, its California headquarters, where some of the first successful tests were carried out.

Shervin Pishevar, co-founder and chairman of Virgin Hyperloop One, 37

T R A N S P O R TAT I O N

aims to shuttle both passengers and cargo in its high-speed pods, which will be designed to depart as often as every 10 seconds. In an interview with CNBC, he said that “Hyperloop will be operational, somewhere in the world, by 2020,” and maintained that it was now the dawn of the commercialisation of the Hyperloop, with his company in dialogue with governments around the world on the scope of its routes.

Where will it run?

Musk has completed work on the first test section of a tunnel to serve a proposed route between Los Angeles and San Francisco which could rack up a $6bn construction bill for a passenger-only model or up to $7.5bn for a system that could also carry 38

January 2018

vehicles, and therefore offer larger returns, on the 354-mile journey. HTT is also investigating opportunities across Eastern Europe in a potential bid to link Slovakia, Austria and Hungary.

Meanwhile, Musk’s plans to create

‘Musk claims Hyperloop pods will be faster than trains, safer than cars and much less damaging to the environment than aircraft’

a five-mile test loop in California by the end of 2018 are nearing fruition.

Working with partners such as the engineering and construction multinational AECOM, Virgin Hyperloop One plans to link cities across North America and will include these proposed routes: Cheyenne-Denver-Pueblo; Chicago-Columbus-Pittsburgh; Miami-Orlando; Dallas-Houston and Toronto-Montreal in Canada.

In the UK, routes are planned for Edinburgh-London and GlasgowLiverpool. Mexico will be connected via Mexico City-Guadalajar and India will feature two routes: BengaluruChennai and Mumbai-Chennai.

Environmental Impact Musk claims Hyperloop pods will be faster than trains, safer than cars and much less damaging to the environment than aircraft. With his focus on changing the world’s energy systems, Hyperloop fits in with Musk’s aim to shift transport away from carbon to renewables.

A feasibility study by the US Department of Transportation (DOT) estimates Hyperloop routes could be up to six times more energy efficient than air travel on short routes while delivering speeds three times faster than the world’s fastest high-speed rail system.

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TOP 10 ELECTRIC VEHICLE MANUFACTURERS IN THE WORLD Forbes recently published the Q1 figures for global makers of battery-electric vehicles – here is a closer look at the top 10 manufacturers and how many cars they shifted in January to March 2017 Written by ANDREW WOODS

T O P 10

10 JAC The Chinese JAC J3 EV all-electric car was launched in 2010 with a range of 130km. The J3 EV went on to become the highest selling pure battery vehicle in China. Volkswagen China’s Chief Executive said the company was preparing to produce EVs in China next year, together with Anhui Jianghuai Automobile (JAC Motors), one of VW’s joint venture partners in the country; and for good reason. Last year, China bought more EVs than anywhere else (300,000).

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09 GEELY China-based Geely first unveiled its Emgrand EV on 18 November 2015 and it has since gone on limited sale in China to fleet buyers in certain larger cities such as Beijing. The Emgrand EV is capable of traveling 253km on a single charge and when using rapid speed charging it can be charged to 80% capacity in just 30 minutes – on a slow charge it will reach full capacity in 14 hours.

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T O P 10

08 HYUNDAI Hyundai’s all-electric Ioniq Electric features a 28 kWh lithium-ion polymer battery (LiPo) that delivers an EPArated all-electric range of 200km. At the 2016 LA Auto Show, the South Korean car manufacturer announced plans to extend the electric range of the Ioniq EV to more than 200 miles by 2018.

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07 CHEVROLET The Chevrolet Bolt or Chevrolet Bolt EV is a front-engine, five-door all-electric sub-compact hatchback marketed by the American manufacturer, developed and manufactured in partnership with LG Corporation. A rebadged European variant is sold as the Opel Ampera-e.

The Bolt has an EPA all-electric range of 383km.

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T O P 10

06 BMW The German car manufacturer describes its BMW i range – featuring the BMW i3, BMW i3s, BMW i8 Coupe and BMW i8 Roadster – as ‘the reinvention of sustainable mobility’.

An all-electric BMW i3 will take you up to 201km on a single charge, or even 312km when using ‘range extender’.

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05 ZD Zhidou’s all-electric vehicle (Zhidou) has a range of 160km, with a top speed of 80kmph and a 0-45km of eight seconds. Zhidou Electrical Vehicle Sales is a Chinese manufacturer co-funded by Geely Holding Group, XDY and GSR Capital. The company claims to have produced the world’s first urban micro. 2015 saw the company awarded top spot in the ‘top 10 green brands awards’.

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04 ZOTYE Launched at the 2015 Shanghai Auto Show, the Chinese-produced E30 EV has a central console reportedly inspired by the Tesla Model S. The electric drive is built around a 17.6kWh battery and an electric motor that provides up to 18kW of power and 83NM of torque. Zotye claim that the E30 has a top speed exceeding 80km/h and a driving range of 150km.

Zoyte also produces the E20 EV.

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03 BAIC BAIC Group is a Chinese state-owned enterprise and holding company of several automobile and machine manufacturers located in Beijing.

BAIC has four EV vehicles. The E150 EV is powered by an electric engine with an output of 61hp and a 25.6kWh lithium-ion battery. It has a top speed of 125kmph, a range of 150km, and charging on 220V takes eight hours.

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02 TESLA The Californian company’s Model S was the world’s best-selling plug-in electric car in 2015 and 2016 and its owner Elon Musk was proud to announce that Tesla topped Consumer Reports’ Annual Owner Satisfaction Survey at 91%. Tesla’s recent Model 3 boasts a range of 310 miles and a top speed of 140mph. The founders were influenced to start the company after GM recalled and destroyed its EV1 electric cars in 2003.

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01 RENAULT-NISSAN Signed on March 27, 1999, the Renault-Nissan Alliance has seen both companies, which combined, represents the world’s largest car maker, excel at producing electric vehicles. The French-Japanese business has also joined forces with China’s Dongfeng Mototr Group to form eGT New Energy Automotive, a 50:50 joint venture. The Nissan Leaf has two battery options of 24kWh and 30kWh that have ranges of 199km and 249km. Renault’s Zoe was named ‘Best used green car’ by What Car? in 2018 and has a range of up to 402km per full charge and a real-world range somewhat of 297km, depending upon temperature and climate control use.

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Events The biggest and best events and conferences from around the world‌ Writ te n by A N D R E W WOO DS

E V E N T S & A S S O C I AT I O N S

CES 2018

Las Vegas, USA 9-12 January At CES, you will experience the entire ‘connected ecosystem’ that brings together the technologies, solutions, players and audiences in the smart city sector, with discussions on IoT, 5G connectivity, transportation and smart automotive, energy and utilities, health and public safety, artificial intelligence and data analytics. With global spending on smart cities projected to reach $34.35bn by 2020, CES has a dedicated conference program and exhibition focused on this global initiative. Discussions will centre on how this explosive growth will influence policies, transportation, cities and towns, industry and the planet. www.ces.tech

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Middle East Electricity 2018 Dubai World Trade Centre, UAE 6-8 March

Middle East Electricity is the largest meeting place for energy industry professionals from over 100 countries worldwide, involved in sourcing, installing or purchasing products/services for the power, lighting, renewable or nuclear sectors.

With its carefully focused profile and highly targeted audience, Middle East Electricity allows you to direct your sales and marketing effort accurately and cost-effectively.

‘Put your company at the forefront of this rapidly developing market and expose your brand to over 20,000 senior-level decision makers.’ www.middleeastelectricity.com

SEPA Utility Conference Rancho Mirage, CA, USA 23-25 April

This isn’t a trade show as such, but an event where ‘utilities go to share with other utilities on how they get things done in a confidential, intimate environment’. From issues like how to speed up your solar interconnection queues or how to best determine the locational value of your DER assets, there’s a utility expert at this conference who has the answer. www.sepapower.org 55

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ASEAN Sustainable Energy Week (ASE) BITEC, Bangkok, Thailand 6-9 June

This massive show expects 27,000 visitors, over 1,500 brands and over 80 seminars tackling renewable energy sources and the latest technology in this area. Wind and solar power are among the many systems and programs featured and discussed along with thermal and waste-to-energy, hydro-powered programs, bio-mass and other green technology. Renewable energy and energy efficiency clinics staffed by experts are also conducted at the show. www.renewableenergy-asia.com/AbouttheShow

Intersolar Europe 2018 Messe München, Munich, Germany 20-22 June

Intersolar Europe is the world’s leading exhibition for the solar industry and its partners and takes place annually at the Messe München exhibition center in Munich, Germany. The event’s exhi­ bition and conference both focus on the areas of photovoltaics, solar thermal technologies, solar plants, as well as grid infrastructure and solutions for the integration of renewable energy. Since being founded 26 years ago, Intersolar has become the most important industry platform for manufacturers, suppliers, distributors, service providers and partners of the solar industry. www.intersolar.de/en/home.html 56

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Ees North America 2018

Moscone Center, San Francisco, CA, United States 10-12 July Celebrating its 10th anniversary, Ees will welcome hundreds of 530 exhibitors and 15,000-plus trade visitors. The conference features 40 sessions and 25 workshops with more than 200 speakers. With over 20 years of experience, Intersolar brings together members of the solar industry from across the world’s most influential markets. Intersolar exhibitions and conferences are also held in Munich, San Francisco, Mumbai, Beijing and São Paulo. www.ees-northamerica.com

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POWER-GEN & DistribuTECH Africa Sandton Convention Centre, Johannesburg, South Africa 17-19 July With 3,000 attendees, 100-plus speakers and 70-plus exhibitors, POWER-GEN is Africa’s premier electricity industry forum that brings together international business leaders and technical experts committed to powering up a continent. www.powergenafrica.com

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Intersolar South America 2018

Expo Center Norte, José Bernardo Pinto St, 333, São Paulo, Brazil 28-30 August With 11,500-plus visitors, 1,500-plus conference attendees and 180 exhibitors, Intersolar has become the most important platform for manufacturers, suppliers, distributors, service providers, investors and partners of the solar industry. Intersolar South America takes place at the Expo Center Norte in São Paulo, Brazil on 22-24 August, 2017 and has a focus on the areas of photovoltaics, PV production technologies, energy storage and solar thermal technologies. www.intersolar.net.br

Offshore Wind Executive Summit

Norris Conference Centers, Houston, TX, USA 13-14 September

Bringing together decision makers from wind and offshore oil and gas, both from the US and Europe and – using many of the same technologies – design, foundations, vessels, cabling and a highly skilled workforce –the Offshore Wind Executive Summit provides the forum to establish new business relationships. Discussion points include project development, important policy issues and supply chain. www.offshorewindsummit.com

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MANAGING ENERGY THE SMART WAY The CIO of NAES has spent a hectic couple of years getting the company ready for a future defined by growth and efficiency Written by John O’Hanlon Produced by Andy Turner

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n 2001, NAES was acquired by industrial giant Itochu, a Global 250 trading company – second in size among Japanese companies only to Mitsubishi.

Energy is one of its key sectors, which made NAES the leading independent operator of powergenerating facilities, a strategic target for the company. Today, NAES is recognized as the go-to partner across the industry, providing clients with operations, maintenance, fabrication, construction, engineering, asset management, technical/financial advisory, energy management and technical services.

With the financial backing of its parent company, NAES has pursued an aggressive program of acquisition during the last five years.

Recent additions include Gridforce Energy Management (July 2017), which ensures that clients’ power flows reliably while enhancing their profitability and reducing their risk exposure; and PurEnergy (June 2016), an asset management firm that frees power plant owners and lenders from day-to-day operational

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duties while optimizing the economic performance of their assets.

These and three other acquisitions have helped to expand the Issaquah, Washington-based company into a $750mn enterprise. As CIO Jim Dionisio sees it, NAES cannot merely keep pace with the digital world; it needs to be led and enabled by IT at every stage, from its office infrastructure right though to customer relations. “If you don’t have a strong relationship with technology in your business, you are probably going out of business,” he says.

In his 30-year career, Dionisio has created IT solutions for Fortune 500 companies and many state and local government agencies. When he joined NAES in July 2015, he found that the infrastructure was not entirely ‘enterprise standard.’

The relatively new leadership team presented him with the challenge of transforming NAES into a leaner, more agile organization while retaining the core values that had made it the industry leader – and not forgetting today’s top businesscritical concern, cybersecurity.

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James ‘Jim’ Dionisio CIO

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This was no small ask. “It required serious agility from an IT perspective to reform the business in short order and bring people up to speed,” Dionisio says, “so I’ve been very busy.” He started by replacing an aging infrastructure, working with key business partners to standardize things corporate-wide. For basic

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but essential document copying and control, he called in Pacific Automation as part of a complete top-to-bottom update. For the infrastructure rebuild, he partnered with Cisco to support the growth that was taking place.

Considering how small and lean a team he was working with, Dionisio knew that routine business processes

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should not be managed in-house.

The people he hired needed to focus on strategic management of data – not back office maintenance.

“Key to my success here is having great people managing the data,” he says. “That’s been critical.”

Since he can’t afford dedicated people for functional roles such as web development or IT procurement, he now turns much of this work over to third parties like CDW. He hired

a few essential people: a project manager, a database administrator and someone to manage the critical SharePoint platform that supports all of NAES’s power plants. A business intelligence analyst will complete the team for the time being.

“I brought in people who understood what building an enterprise business is all about,” Dionisio recalls. “I now run the smallest IT shop I have ever had, but we do more with less. I’m a big

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“Key to my success here is having great people managing the data” – Jim Dionisio, CIO, NAES

believer in surrounding yourself with the brightest people you can find.”

With his team in place, he set about shifting platforms such as MS Office, Email, SharePoint and Storage onto the cloud. His vision was to add hyper-convergence across NAES’s subsidiary firms to ensure that all the back-end systems would be easy to manage as resources expanded. To help achieve better tracking of incidents, tasks and changes, he brought in cloud computing specialist ServiceNow. Dionisio took a moment to enthuse about the current cloud-based Office suite. “Microsoft has done an

excellent job on the cloud services side, and we consider them a strong partner,” he says. “We love tools like Skype for Business, which is great for videoconferencing and IM’ing. I can be on a call at my desk, transfer to mobile and continue it on a train if I have to.”

The bread-and-butter business for NAES is still its work in the energy sector, in which it operates and maintains some 160 power plants.

Because these facilities are spread across the United States, Mexico and Canada, robust communications is a key enabler for the enterprise and its 4,200 employees.

Acquiring a new company and its

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Explore Real Stories of Digital Transformation In a cloud-first world, do you know how to succeed in: Empowering employees?

Engaging customers?

Optimizing operations?

Transforming products?

Adopting new technologies can be a daunting task. Hear from others who are leading their industries in digital transformation.

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staff, in Dionisio’s view, should never be just a matter of absorbing it. “We give them time to settle in,” he adds.

“My job is to manage migrating them into our systems, moving them into our domain, getting them onto our e-mail system, and so on.” While every acquisition is unique, the process has gotten smoother, he believes, because he’s had his team write and discuss lessons learned after each one. They then do a gap analysis to improve their next migration. “The excitement of IT,” Dionisio adds, “is that there’s always something new and positive from which you can learn.”

Analytics and business information will be his team’s main concerns going forward. It is currently working with company leaders to select a single ERP platform to replace the assorted systems used by various units across the enterprise. “We need to be on a unified system rather than continue to manage the legacy systems our acquisitions bring with them,” Dionisio says. “For example, we’re currently managing six different accounting systems that we want to consolidate into one centralized ERP.” A vendor

will be chosen shortly, with the implementation slated for Q1 of 2018.

Dionisio is also moving NAES from the Salesforce CRM platform to Microsoft Dynamics. He has no basic criticism of the existing system except that it takes too big a bite out of his budget. “Since we’re doing so much of our work on the Microsoft cloud already,” he explains, “I was able to bundle MS Dynamics and get my costs down to almost a quarter of what a Salesforce renewal would have cost me.”

Migrating to the cloud in itself has yielded a direct saving of more than $2mn. “I like saving money – that’s the other half of the CIO hat,” he quips. “To keep doing that, we not only have to continue to innovate, we must consolidate. Every part of the business depends on technology to make it as effective and as affordable as it can be.”

A case in point: NAES recently changed over to Gensuite as its dedicated program for managing safety, training and compliance across its extensive fleet of plants.

This replaced a motley assortment

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“I need the wherewithal to know the business and identify the problems. If I kept my head in the sand, I’d miss the next new thing that’s just around the bend” – Jim Dionisio, CIO, NAES

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of products, each of which needed to be supported separately. “I was faced with having to hire another person,” says Dionisio, “but by consolidating everything into Gensuite, I avoided increasing my headcount.” While the new program has brought immediate benefits by standardizing training, he points out that change has to be managed sensitively. “Nobody likes being asked to abandon the thing they’re used to, even for a better system!”

Jim Dionisio loves his work, regularly arriving at the office at 5:30am and often extending his workday even beyond his 7:00pm arrival home. He’s a great believer in reading the latest literature and attending as many conferences as he can. “As CIO, my job is to understand how IT tools can solve problems,” he says. “So, I need the wherewithal to know the business and identify the problems. If I kept my head in the sand, I’d miss the next new thing that’s just around the bend.”

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HOW SCHNEIDER ELECTRIC’S DIGITAL TECHNOLOGY

IS POWERING THE MINES OF THE FUTURE Rob Moffitt, Schneider Electric’s President – Mining, Minerals & Metals Segment – reveals how the business is leading the digital transformation of energy management and automation Written by Niki Waldegrave Produced by Bryan Giles

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tudies indicate that the world needs to cut CO2 emissions by 50% by 2050 to avoid drastic consequences from climate change.

However, due to population growth and increased urbanisation, at the same time, the world will require twice the amount of energy as today.

To meet that challenge, Schneider Electric is developing intelligent energy management solutions to help businesses and consumers monitor and control energy usage efficiently.

The global energy management, automation and industrial software specialist has 144,000 employees in

more than 100 countries and creates products and solutions to ensure ‘Life is On’ by helping its customers manage their energy and processes in ways that are safe, connected, reliable, efficient and sustainable.

Its integrated solutions combine energy management, automation and software through EcoStruxure™, its Internet of Things (IoT) enabled, open and interoperable architecture.

EcoStruxure™ leverages the latest advancements in digital technologies, such as cyber security, analytics, cloud, and mobility to deliver real-time control and operational efficiency, and

Alliance Partner Sydney 2017

Schneider Electric’s Mining, Minerals & Metals Segment President, Rob Moffitt, reveals how the company is leveraging solutions from its primary domains of expertise – IT, buildings, industry and infrastructure, and utilities – to help companies in the mining sector achieve new levels of efficiency and productivity.

“We see enormous potential in terms of plans for the year ahead and growth,” he says. “From a product and solution perspective, we are a leader in industrial software, power management,

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which includes medium voltage, low voltage and secure power, and in industrial automation and control.

“In 2018, we see a return to favourable conditions, in which we expect to see a cyclical upturn and continuing recovery in mature economies, plus accelerated momentum in developing economies that will allow for growth in the segment.

“Our focus is around two main areas – customers and technology.

On the customer side, we want to expand our presence in certain

geographies and increase our partnerships with strategic customers. For technology, our focus will be to support and develop solutions based on digitalisation.”

Enter EcoStruxure™ Schneider’s competitive advantage is its open EcoStruxure™ architecture, underpinned by an enviable combination of people and technology, and the segment team within the organisation dedicated to partnering with strategic customers to harness its potential.

Moffitt explains how EcoStruxure™ is redefining automation and power connectivity, and adds an unprecedented layer of software applications and services to help companies improve shareholder value by increasing productivity, reducing costs and improving safety.

And by bridging IT and OT, EcoStruxure™ lets customers maximise the value of data, which translates into actionable intelligence for better business decisions.

“EcoStruxure™ is an open, interoperable, digital, and IoT-enabled

Rob Moffitt President – Mining, Minerals & Metals Segment

Rob Moffitt, who joined Schneider Electric in 2016 as President of the Global Mining, Minerals & Metals segment, has had a career spanning 32 years in the global mining industry. He started his career in deep level gold mining before working with various multi-national organisations supplying a range of innovative products, technologies, services and solutions into the industry.

Moffitt has formal qualifications in Metalliferous Mining and a MBA from Henley Business College in the UK. He is a Fellow at the Institute of Quarrying, Australia and was previously Chairman of the Institute of Quarrying South Africa, and has served on the boards of several companies.

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Schneider Electric Global Family Leave

“We see enormous potential in terms of plans for the year ahead and growth” –Rob Moffitt, President – Mining, Minerals & Metals Segment system architecture that combines our broad range of solutions across connected products and edge control, and leverages them through our industry leading suite of industrial software, apps and analytics,” Moffitt says.

“Few other companies in the world have such a complete portfolio of integrated products, and our main differentiation is to bring an open

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and integrated architecture from sensors to business applications that addresses the multitude of challenges our customers face each day. We go beyond applications focused solely on just process or asset performance.”

Master of mining Another competitive advantage is Schneider’s dedicated segment approach, having built an entire

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organisation dedicated to mining, and investing significantly over the years to increase its competence in the industry from an application standpoint, helping it to solve its customers’ challenges. In fact, to that end it has developed specific expertise around process control, mineral processing, energy optimisation, and supply chain efficiency.

Mining is facing significant challenges but the fundamentals are sound, and Moffitt says Schneider expects increased demand for mined raw materials will be driven by population growth as well as rapid and increasing urbanisation.

“The resources industry is constantly challenged by market volatility, grade decline, regulations,

social license, skills gaps and workforce demographics,” he says. “This puts a premium on operational and business efficiency – something we’re well-positioned to help our customers with.

“Of all the trends impacting the industry, none will be as critical as digitalisation. It will impact every aspect of the industry operation and provide the greatest potential for improving business and operational efficiency.”

He points out one of the main challenges has always been to make real-time decisions based on information that is spread across various databases and applications.

With that in mind, the company, which devotes 5% of sales to

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research and development, believes the technology that has provided the most value to its customers has been around the integration of mining operations from ‘resource to market’ or as it is sometimes expressed, from ‘pit to port’.

“It’s one of the industry’s most challenging problems,” explains Moffitt, “and AMPLA, our integrated mining operations software, has become somewhat of the de facto standard for this type of integrated solution.

“It’s a modular software suite with specific mining functionality that supports mine operations from extraction and processing, to blending and storage, all the way through to shipping logistics.”

The software enables value chain visibility and optimisation by collecting data automatically from multiple plant and business systems or through manual data entry, and establishing a single trusted source of information which can be collaboratively used to drive efficiency, reduce cost and make better business decisions.

“A case in point would be a recent

Jean-Pascal Tricoire CEO of Schneider Electric

implementation of Ampla across five mine sites at a major metal mining company. The system was used to monitor and capture real-time asset performance and condition data and to provide root-cause analysis when assets were being underutilised.

Globally across all five mines they improved capacity by over 10%.”

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“We go beyond applications focused solely on just process or asset performance” –Rob Moffitt, President – Mining, Minerals & Metals Segment “Our resource to market integrated solution consolidates and manages data from multiple mine, plant and business systems,” he adds. “This enables customers to identify production issues, manage inventory and quality, track and management production and asset performance, understand costs, and analyse business KPIs. “As another example, one of the biggest iron ore miners in

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Australia uses it to optimise their port logistics by predicting how each entity in the supply chain will operate – from mine to plant to rail and port – and has improved supply chain efficiency by 20%.”

Futureproof Remaining ahead of the curve is tough when it comes to market changes and advances in technology, especially in mining where change is constant, but

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Access to Energy: Our Ambition for Tomorrow

Moffitt cites open platforms, the IoT and digitalisation as good examples.

“We also see significant turnover at the engineering and technical levels in the industry,” he explains, “meaning we sometimes need to fill that void with our own project engineering or remote asset monitoring services, for example. It also means we need to partner with our customers over the medium to long term and not simply just sell them things.

“Now that the outlook has improved and mining operations are starting to make CAPEX investments again, they also need a workforce that can ramp up and become productive quickly, and much of our software and workforce enablement

solutions help them do that.”

Training solutions made possible by virtual reality or maintenance troubleshooting tools that utilise augmented reality are examples of the industry looking for new technologies to transform the way it operates in the future.

“To give another example, one of our customers in Canada has deployed our training and simulation solution at a groundwater treatment plant that had to meet critical environmental requirements, and was used to train new operators on how to prevent above-limit groundwater from being dumped into their outflow.”

Moffitt says the only way to achieve this ‘future state’ is to develop them

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jointly with Schneider’s strategic customers and partners and work closely to understand their challenges and find new ways to solve them.

There are going to be 50bn connected devices in 2020, and Schneider wants to help its customers succeed in their digital transformation and reap the rewards it can deliver in terms of energy, process, and business efficiency.

“The rewards are significant for those willing to try,” he adds. “It’s been estimated that in the next five years, mining industry leaders will achieve their most significant improvements by embracing digital technologies like the IoT and advanced analytics that

can harness the power of big data.”

Some reports indicate that digitisation could bring more than AU$470bn by 2025 in additional value to the mining, minerals and metals industries by means of productivity gains, cost reductions, and fuel and energy savings – but only if they are able to overcome some of the challenges.

“One of the challenges is in making technologies available in ways that are easy to implement and leverage,” Moffitt adds, “and that brings us back to EcoStruxure™ once again, because it provides that common open architecture on which everything can be connected.

Tehran Energy Consultants’ mission to transform the Iranian oil and gas industry Written by Dale Benton Produced by Robert Gray

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Tehran Energy Consultants continues to provide market leading consultancy services to the oil and gas engineering sector in Iran

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or more than 26 years, Tehran Energy Consultants (TEC) has been a leading consultancy, providing services to most of the biggest players in the upstream oil and gas engineering sector across the Iranian oil and gas industry.

Founded in 1991, the company’s main focus was to provide technical advice and assistance across the oil and gas space, covering exploration, exploitation, optimal reservoir development and management all while utilising state-of-the-art technologies.

For Dr Abolfazl Ghaemi, Founder and MD of TEC, the company was born out a desire to transform the oil and gas upstream sector in 1991, particularly an over reliance on foreign expertise.

“I come from a robust background in petroleum engineering, and so I feel I have a solid grasp of the Iranian oil and

gas industry space,” he says. “There was certainly a substantial reliance on international oil consultancy, especially if there was a certain degree of technical expertise that was required.

As an Iranian petroleum engineer, this was not acceptable to me. Not one bit.”

And so, TEC was established to localise the consultancy across the sector and to reduce that significant reliance on foreign help as much as possible.

“It’s main duty when established some 26 years ago was to develop static and dynamic models for the reservoirs and to forecast their production under different development scenarios and by conducting economic evaluations, to determine the optimal development scheme for the subject reservoir or field,” he says.

“The outcome of our studies serves

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“There was certainly a reliance on international oil consultancy, especially if there was a certain degree of technical expertise that was required.

As an Iranian petroleum engineer, this was not acceptable to me. Not one bit” – Dr Abolfazl Ghaemi, Founder and MD, TEC

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as guideline for our clients in optimal drilling development and production of its oil and gas fields. TEC services are now extended to supervision of field drilling development activities as well.”

TEC will forever hold the title of being the first of its kind in the country, the first consultancy that is geared towards the oil and gas engineering market. Ghaemi feels that with his own background, that has seen significant experience both locally and internationally in engineering, coupled with more than 26 years building and developing partnerships with key customers, TEC can stand tall against any new entrants into the market.

As the starter of upstream consultancy in the oil and gas private sector of the country and its commitment for rendering technical services of international quality, if not beyond that, TEC is known for its commitment to professional ethics with independency and integrity.

“The TEC ambition is to retain its good reputation and brand by offering world class services and aligning itself with the forefront of the technical knowledge and services in

the context of its scope and mission.”

“That means maintaining a leading role in rendering state of the art engineering consultancy services in domestic oil and gas upstream and midstream market and extending it to the international arena with emphasis on Middle East market,” he says.

Naturally, working as a consultancy, partners, clients, and alliances play a crucial role not only in the success garnered over the last two decades, but they will also continue to play a key role in the future growth and success of TEC. TEC has worked with some of the biggest companies in the world, including Total, Shell, BHP and Maersk to name a few.

Ghaemi stresses that the portfolio of work that the company can boast was only made possible through its approach to client relationships.

“They are relationships that we build around the commitment to quality and to the reliability of the services we provide,” he says.

As a consultancy, one of the key attributes that help enable this quality is rendering reliable

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services with a good level of agility and being able to respond to what the clients want without sacrificing the quality of our services.

“While keeping our independency and integrity we try in every way we can to listen to what the clients are saying and what they want without prejudice,” says Ghaemi.

“This collaborative approach allows us to be in the best possible position, not only in terms of our growth and success, but also from a service level that we are providing and we find it is right.”

Operating in a sector that is extremely centred on technology and technological processes presents a high degree of challenge, not only for TEC but the clients that it works with.

After all, prior to Ghaemi’s founding of TEC, the Iranian oil and gas upstream studies sector relied heavily on international expertise in order to navigate the ever-changing challenges that technology innovation brought with it.

“New technologies for increasing the recovery factor is the main challenge not only in tight carbonate and rather heavy oil reservoirs but also in our numerous fractured oil reservoirs as well ,” he says.

“The other main challenge is financing of the development of fields and reservoirs in the context of Iranian Petroleum Contracts (IPC) which is known as the fourth generation of the Buyback Service Contracts. Though as of this date, the Iranian oil industry has attracted billions of dollars

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Number of employees at Tehran Energy Consultants

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“These are technologies that are transforming the industry and so we must partner with the right people in order to expand our capabilities. We often work collaboratively with international partners who are active in oil and gas upstream consultancies which allow us to align that expertise with our services” – Dr Abolfazl Ghaemi, Founder and MD, TEC

MIDDLE EAST

for investment in Iranian oil and gas fields, and petrochemicals, under the prevalent international situation, financing of the projects appears to remain as an important challenge for the years to come.”

The recovery element is arguably the core value in the oil and gas sector and Ghaemi is fully alert of this. Enhanced Oil and Gas Recovery methods (EOR and EGR) such as, thermal methods, miscible injection and chemical flooding are but a few examples that he points to as crucial technology processes in the current industry, processes that the company and a lot of the sector does not have hands on experience with, as it has not yet been - implemented within the country.

To this end, TEC has continuously explored ways in which it can expand and enhance its services by engaging internationally renowned

partners which it has worked with across different sectors and working with these partners to bring new experience and new capabilities into its already diverse portfolio.

“These are technologies that are transforming the industry and so we must partner with the right people in order to expand our capabilities,” says Ghaemi. “We often work collaboratively with international partners who are active in oil and gas upstream consultancies which allow us to align that expertise with our services”.

As for TEC’s short and mid-range plans Ghaemi says that “Our motto from the outset has been to strive for quality and excellence. As ever, we will remain loyal to this motto and thus keep our excellence both technically and morally and doing so keep on with continuous and dayto- day progress of the company.”

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HARNESSING HYDROPOWER TO FUEL SUSTAINABLE GROWTH IN SARAWAK Written by Laura Mullan Produced by Marianna Lee

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HOW MALAYSIA’S SARAWAK ENERGY BERHAD IS UTILISING THE STATE’S HYDROPOWER RESOURCES TO PROMOTE SUSTAINABLE GROWTH IN THE REGION

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ransforming our energy system is not just about replacing fossil fuels with renewables, it’s also about promoting energy equality and the sustainable development of communities. This meaningful vision is one that unites Sarawak Energy Berhad, the electric utility company for the state of Sarawak in Malaysia.

“We aspire to achieve sustainable growth and prosperity in Sarawak by meeting the region’s need for reliable, renewable energy,” says Sharbini Suhaili, Group Chief Executive Officer.

“We have a goal that by 2030 the state will achieve developed state status. Therefore, we are using our energy resources to attract foreign investment and promote economic growth.”

Sarawak Corridor of Renewable Energy Blessed with high rainfall and an abundance of rivers, Sarawak is rich in hydropower reserves. By harnessing this, alongside the region’s indigenous coal and gas resources, the company provides competitive energy prices and attracts energy-intensive industries, such as the aluminum sector.

As part of this strategy, Sarawak Energy is working closely with the state government to embark on a huge programme of expansion known as the Sarawak Corridor of Renewable Energy (SCORE).

“We are blessed that we have quite a lot of hydropower resources on the island of Borneo,” explains Sharbini. “This allows

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“The pace at which we transition towards renewables depends on technology advancements. It will happen. It’s just a matter of timing” SHARBINI SUHAILI Group Chief Executive Officer w w w. e n e rg y d i g i t a l . c o m

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Dr Chen Shiun, VP for Research and Development

us to provide cost-effective electricity prices so, if you look in Southeast Asia, you will see that our tariffs are among the lowest the region.

As a result, we’ve been successful in attracting energy-intensive industries to the region.�

Sarawak Alternative Rural Electrification Scheme One of the core challenges facing Sarawak Energy is making sure that economic development is inclusive of the remote and dispersed rural communities in the heartlands of the state. Due to the extremely rugged and challenging terrain, some villages in the state cannot connect to the main electricity grid.

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$500 MN Sarawak Energy Berhad annual revenue

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The year that Sarawak Energy Berhad was founded

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However, this logistical challenge is not stopping Sarawak Energy. The electric utility company is determined to provide electricity to each and every Sarawakian where possible and advancements in alternative renewable technology are making it a reality.

Through the Sarawak Alternative Rural Electrification Scheme (SARES), the company will design, build, and install localised off-grid solar or micro-hydro systems in these villages before handing them over to the community to operate. With over 50 villages selected to be equipped with solar systems this year, this is a challenging feat, but it is one that the company is well-equipped to tackle.

“We see it as our moral obligation to make sure that everybody in the state has equal access to energy, whether it’s for their daily use or for business and development,” says Dr Chen Shiun, Vice President of Research and Development.

“It is a very important project to me because it is a basic right that communities should have access to a reliable electricity and water supply,”

adds Sharbini. “Energy equality is a very important issue to us. In 2009, we covered just under 70% of the state in terms of rural electrification and now we connect about 90% of the region.

“I predict that by 2025 we will provide energy to everyone. It’s a big task – the state of Sarawak is very big, sparsely populated, and there are still close to 2,000 villages that we still need to reach – but over the next five years we are planning to reach every single one.”

Technological ingenuity and expansion Innovation is critical in the energy sector and there is no lack of it at Sarawak Energy. With technological prowess, the company is able to run its rural systems autonomously and use satellite communication to monitor them and plan their maintenance. As well as this, the company is looking into initiatives to maintain and preserve boilers for longer. Sharbini says that innovation is crucial to the company’s success.

“We are in the middle of a digital

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“We want to achieve sustainable growth and prosperity for Sarawak by meeting the region’s need for reliable, renewable energy” SHARBINI SUHAILI Group Chief Executive Officer

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revolution and things are changing really quickly,” he explains. “This is impacting how we are using technology and so we recognise the need to advance and remain agile. I’d say it’s a challenge, but it’s also an opportunity for us to really make a difference.”

As well as this, the company also has big expansion plans on the horizon. It recently acquired the Bakun hydroelectric project from the federal government and it is also embarking on a stateof-the-art hydroelectric project in Baleh.

“There are always challenges,” notes Sharbini, “but these can also be opportunities. We have rapidly expanded over the last eight years and it has been quite a challenge for us as an organisation, but it’s also made us stronger. Now we are looking at future avenues for growth – for instance, the region of Kalimantan has a huge hydropower potential and so we’re pursuing a number of opportunities there.”

Sustainable, reliable energy Not only is the utility industry undergoing a digital transformation, it is also embracing a transition towards renewable resources. This is a shift that Sarawak Energy is well equipped for, says Sharbini. “It’s very certain that renewable energy is the way to go,” he notes.

“The use of fossil fuels will soon have to be very controlled and I think globally people will have to take a very hard look at their energy consumption.

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I think fossil fuels will still be the dominant energy resource in the next five years but it will be declining as the use of renewables grows.

The pace at which we transition towards renewables depends on technology advancements. It will happen. It’s just a matter of timing.”

Chen is also optimistic about the future of renewable energy, but he

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doesn’t underestimate the innovation it will require to succeed. “Renewable energy has its own challenges that we need to overcome,” he says. “For instance, in circumstances when there’s intermittence, what are you going to do for electricity? I think the answer to these issues lies in new technologies. The sector will have to create more advanced digital

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“We see it as our moral obligation to make sure that everybody in the state has equal access to energy” SHARBINI SUHAILI Group Chief Executive Officer

technologies to make renewable resources more efficient.”

With a well-educated, Englishspeaking population and a promising position next to the South China Sea (a lucrative trade route), the state of Sarawak is well-positioned to grow sustainably into a developed state.

Thanks to the technological prowess and committed dedication of Sarawak

Energy, the country is unlocking its energy potential and preparing for a greener and more sustainable future.

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Thames Water A supply chain transformation Written by Dale Benton Produced by Richard Durrant

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Thames Water, the UK’s biggest water and sewerage company, has undergone a radical supplier transformation of late, as the organisation looks to match the quality of its network with a level of service that delivers

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s one of the largest utility companies in the UK, serving more than 15million customers on a daily basis, Thames Water has a clear responsibility to provide essential services that are of the highest quality, and it can successfully do so through a strong and reliable supplier network.

However, managing a network of suppliers and contractors that encompasses around 12,000 people working directly for the organisation or as part of a thirdparty contract can prove difficult.

It was not so long ago that Thames Water was consistently ranked the lowest in the annual supplier satisfaction survey from British Water. Fast forward to 2017

however, and Thames Water now ranks within the top two and has won a number of major awards, (including Construction Client of the Year and the Supply Chain Excellence Customer Service award).

The reason for the historically low rankings, as Jon Loveday, Group Commercial Director explains, was a lack of any real commercial strategy, the supplier contracts and company goals were misaligned and there was a deep rooted belief that suppliers represented lowest cost and could not provide a value proposition.

“I wasn’t brought in to develop a strategy initially, I was tasked with managing Thames Water’s existing suppliers,” he says. “Thames Water was seen as an aggressive client

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and difficult to deal with. It was a contractual approach and disputes were commonplace that really didn’t leave room for developing any form of rapport or solid relationship between the organisation and the suppliers.

“It was really hurting Thames Water and all parties overheads were growing to deal with the mistrust”.

It was through Loveday’s role in managing that supplier network that he and the organisation identified an opportunity to create a transformation strategy, one that would significantly change the way in which Thames Water operated from top to bottom.

To put it simply, Loveday set out to create a standalone commercial function for Thames Water and in order to do so, the first order of businesses was to quickly settle a number of disputes between the organisation and its supplier network. This, Loveday points out, allowed the organisation to remove pain points in order to focus entirely on proper commercial management of key contracts.

One of the first transformations took place in the waste network, a

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contract which oversaw the crucial maintenance of all the sewers across London and the Thames Valley area.

“At the time he joined the programme had around 7,000 customer facing jobs in backlog, a significant level of distrust had built up between the contractors and the Thames Water employees meaning that not enough time was be focused on the problem at hand. Planning and execution was disjointed and too much time was spent on checking whether jobs were valued and paid for correctly rather getting the job done expediently for customers”.

For Loveday, the task was to realign the organisation’s approach to the supply network in order to establish a more mature, integrated contract.

This initially involved much closer and open working with the suppliers, creating a culture where challenges were approached together.

Performance management and subsequent actions were carried out jointly through tough weekly sessions. This established a sense of order and soon the operation got back to a managed level. Since then

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“It was critical in getting not only the Thames Water people aligned but more importantly, getting the suppliers aligned around one vision” – Jon Loveday, Group Commercial Director, Thames Water

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the Thames Water and supplier teams have become co-located in a purpose built centre. KPIs and the commercial model have been refined and aligned.

“We’ve got to a point now where we have a very mature contract and very, very mature commercial model which is the envy of the industry,” says Loveday.

It would be easy to suggest that the sole driving force behind the transformation of Thames Water’s whole approach to its supplier network is just improving the relationships and focusing on the bottom line.

Loveday, though, is keen to stress that the transformation was born out of a base level need to improve the company’s operational performance.

Thames Water, as noted previously, has more than 12,000 people working every day on its assets, including 5,000 direct staff, but with no commercial strategy in place it was clear that there was also something else missing: alignment.

“Previously there was a focus on the direct staff, despite the large numbers of contractors we

had working on projects for us,” says Loveday. “We just seemed to ignore them and yet many are in customer facing roles.”

Loveday set out to and rebranded all of the customer facing roles so that everyone wore the same uniforms and drove the same vehicles. It made commercial sense, but also from an operational and customer perspective is started to align behaviour towards customer service instead of the individual needs of companies.

Next up was alliancing, for Loveday, was very symbolic as it represented a new way of working, shared outcomes rather than traditional rate-based contracts.

“What we did from a behavioural standpoint is align people to a new vision for the organisation, a new set of values,” he says. “It was critical in getting not only the Thames Water people aligned but more importantly, getting the suppliers aligned around one vison.”

By establishing a more alliance based approach, this allows Thames Water to create more customer focused contracts that enables more

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effective and efficient suppliers, all team have created a suite of leading whilst critically reducing the amount analytics capability and tools. These of overhead that was historically include spend analytics with circa building up on both sides. £7bn of historic spend and £3bn of As a leading utility within the UK, future spend profiled and commodity Thames Water’s funding is regulated, price tracking. More and more of and so reducing overhead spending the frameworks are now procured and realising cost savings wherever and managed by the Thames team possible is crucial in the continued which its partners then use. success and transformation “We’re using this data of the organisation. along with some clever To that end, analytics. It’s helping Loveday’s us to understand our commercial spend now and how team has taken it is likely to influence procurement to our future spend, the next level. be that on future Number of employees at Thames Water Behavioural projects or even future procurement internal programmes,” techniques are now says Loveday. standard in much of Thames Water has also utilised what Thames Water do, this is a cutting-edge performance tool because having the right people called Pulse. Pulse provides realis in many ways more critical than time tracking of the organisation’s the right price. Thames Water performance and provides rightly focus on working safely Loveday with a clear picture as and creating an environment of to what the organisation is doing innovation as well as price. in terms of spend, project time, Data and analytics play an and more importantly, where important part. The commercial savings are being made.

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“Through the use of these tools, we are tracking every day just how well we are performing and how well we could perform,” he says. “They help us achieve what we want to achieve, cost savings, signing of contracts, but also we know if we don’t sign a contract exactly how much its going to cost us. They are really powerful tools.”

All of this granular data has enabled a level of understanding of the true cost of operations that only a short period ago was hidden. This has led to another of the major successes Loveday has overseen at Thames Water, the creation of the Logistics Management Centre, (LMC). The LMC now manages the majority of the supply chain operations for Thames Water and a number of its partners. With five warehouses, eight forward stock locations, stock is dynamically managed and distributed. Where is it beneficial to do so Thames Water buy, maintain and distribute their own plant. The function provides a 24/7 response to emergency bursts and floods across the patch. By cleverly utilising specialist vehicle assets to their full potential the LMC have delivered significant savings to the business (circa 15-30% across all activities). “the true cost of logistics was hidden with separate contracts, what we have discovered is that we can plan better, react quicker and run logistics vastly more efficiently by

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pooling resources across all the business units and supply chain.

We have plans to triple the size of this function next year”.

The transformation of Thames Water is an ongoing process. The organisation has already seen success, the very same survey in which it was failing has now ranked it within the top two utility companies in the country.

Loveday is all too aware that for any transformation of this scale, the real measure of any success, particularly one with a supplier network like that of Thames Water, is the response from those suppliers and contractors where the relationship was previously non-existent.

“We’ve had a real positive response,” he says. “We’re trying

to get people that are going to be compatible with our values and our goals and ways of working, and to make these alliances a success. So, it’s not just the clever commercial models, it’s actually taking it to a people level to try and give these things a head-start because any contract is only as good as the relationships you’ve got and those relationships take time to develop.”

And time it will take, but Loveday can already see a change in fortunes for Thames Water.

“There are a number of large suppliers that previously wouldn’t work for Thames Water, and now they do. This is because of our historic aggressive approach that we have worked so hard to transform,” he concludes.

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LILONGWE WATER BOARD

A STEADY SUPPLY OF PROFITABILITY

Written by Dale Benton Produced by Greg Churchill

In the small town of Lilongwe, Malawi, one water utility provider has turned around its struggling fortunes in order to serve a growing population

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he Lilongwe Water Board (LWB) is mandated to provide adequate water supply services to Lilongwe City (which is the capital of Malawi) in a sustainable, efficient and customer responsive manner.

That mandate covers over one million people across the city, and this is a figure that is expected to grow significantly with Lilongwe being identified as one of the fastest growing cities in the world. Come 2025, Lilongwe Water Board will need to provide water supply to more than two million people.

For Alfonso Chikuni, CEO Lilongwe Water Board, part of his own personal journey when entering the company back in 2008 was to oversee and develop a transformative strategy.

The goal? To create an organisation that could withstand this huge projected growth and grow as a customer oriented supplier of choice,

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“Our focus is aimed directly at customer loyalty, so that the customer should like us, we don’t want to force them to do that” ENG. ALFONSO CHIKUNI LWB CEO

Kamuzu dam 2. Water source for Lilongwe City

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but to do so against the backdrop of a struggling organisation beset by year on year financial losses.

“When I became CEO, the very first step was to develop a corporate strategy in order to enable the company to grow,” he says. “We identified gaps in the plan and we developed our interventions.”

This process saw the development of a transformative strategy centred A tour of the water treatment plant

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around key pillars in order to turn the business’s fortunes around and establish itself as a leading customer focused, nationally viable water board in Southern Africa.

The pillars include working on the reliability of the water, a customer loyalty focus that strives for customer satisfaction, a focus on investment in order to maintain a profitable business and performance

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“When I became CEO, the very first step was to develop a corporate strategy plan in order to enable the company to grow.

We identified gaps in the plan and we developed our interventions” ENG. ALFONSO CHIKUNI LWB CEO

improvement and developing the capacity of the institution and staff.

These pillars are the cornerstones of the business.

“They were formed to point out where each department of the organisation should focus on and improve,” says Chikuni.

“Each department throughout the business has developed its own

business plans off the back of these pillars, and already we can point to clear improvements at LWB.” Turning of the tide Prior to Chikuni’s role as CEO, LWB was a struggling organisation.

As it does not receive capital or operational grants from Government, with non – cost recovery tariffs,

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LWB was making year on year losses, hence the development of a new business strategy.

But in the bid to turn the company’s fortunes around, financial loss was not the only challenge that needed to be overcome.

“The people that work in the organisation, they have and have had a traditional way of working established over many years here,” Chikuni says.

“We have put a lot of effort in over the years in changing the mindsets, the culture and attitudes and drive the change management for efficiency.”

Chikuni recognises that it is not easy to transform an organisation from top to bottom and this is where key partnerships come into play. LWB has partnered with Vitens Evides International, a Dutch based water provider that works with colleague water companies in developing and transitioning countries to help expand and professionalise its operations.

“They have worked with us on the change management and changing of attitudes within the organisation,” says Chikuni.

A digital divide Part of this change management and transformation has been the implementation of technology into the LWB process - a strategy called Working Hard to Working Smart to address the digital divide head-on.

“With technology, we didn’t want to be too ambitious, so we started slowly looking

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550 The total number of Lilongwe Water Board employees

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Tree planting exercise in March 2017 as part of catchment management

at our plant and facilities and developing technology processes into those,” Chikuni says.

Vitens Evides International has played a key role in addressing this digital divide. LWB now has automatic processes in place and can access information at a single touch point, and Vitens has worked with employees to train them and adapt their way of

working to working with technology.

“Vitens has played a huge role in getting to where we are today from where we were,” Chikuni summarises.

That position today is one that Chikuni and the entire LWB organisation can be proud of. The organisation was recently named the African Utility of the Year at the African Utility Week 2017 – placing

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Best public service delivery award for 2016.

Eng Alfonso Chikuni holding the trophy

LWB not only on the same platform as leading African utility providers, but standing tall above them.

“It’s incredible and so much more than we could have ever imagined,” says Chikuni. “But, and this is important, it means we can’t go back. The effort to sustain this position should be so much more than what we did to get here. We should extremely hard to maintain the status quo and continue to improve.”

The award is a testament to the complete scale of the transformation

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of LWB, but it is also highlights the company’s focus on one of the four key pillars – customer satisfaction.

“Our focus is aimed directly at customer loyalty, so that the customer should like us. We don’t want to force them to do that,” he says.

Through this, LWB has created more opportunities for the customer to engage with the organisation. It has eased and minimised the effort for customers to access the company’s facilities, including electronic payments

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“We will see an organisation that is fully developed and achieving greater efficiencies.

We want to be a leading, customer focused, nationally viable water board not only for Lilongwe, but nationally across Southern Africa” ENG. ALFONSO CHIKUNI LWB CEO

through banks and mobile applications.

“We are changing our systems and thinking about how we can help customers come to us, but also how can we go to customers,” says Chikuni. “We are creating a 360-degree feedback loop, and through our work on the digital divide we will only continue to enable customers to be more in tune with the organisation and vice versa.”

The steady flow of success LWB has come a long way over the last three years, but the overall transformation strategy is still in its infancy – there is a long way still to go. For Chikuni, his eyes are well and truly on the present, continuing the hard work that has enabled the organisation to become the beacon of success it is today.

But he is all too aware, as a governmental organisation, that leadership will change and the strategy will change with it.

“In five years’ time, the water board will change. So, there will be new initiatives and new programmes,” he says. “We will see an organisation that is fully developed and achieving greater efficiencies.

“We want to be a leading, customer focuses, nationally viable water board not only for Lilongwe, but nationally across Southern Africa.”

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