January 2008 Issue
newsmakers
Carbon Capture Report Nets Nobel Prize
COMPILED BY FRANCINE MAXWELL
The PEGG
Stefan Bachu, P.Eng., and Bill Gunter, P.Geol., are keeping well-known company these days. Both have been named Nobel Peace Prize laureates for their work on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and they share Nobel honours with none other than Al Gore, former vice-president of the United States.
The two Edmonton members worked on a report on carbon dioxide capture and storage, which looks at essentially turning smokestacks upside down to send emissions into pipelines. From there, carbon dioxide can be injected into the ground to remain safely for centuries or even millenniums, the report suggests.
About 3,000 scientists — involved in this and other reports — make up the climate change panel.
Company Awarded
For Business Excellence
ASRC Energy Services Tri Ocean Engineering Ltd. of Calgary is making waves in
business. The company, better known as simply Tri Ocean, has received the National
Quality Institute’s Canada Award of Excellence Bronze Recognition for Quality.
In 2006 Tri Ocean developed an operational excellence program. It’s a guideline for improving the balance between leadership, planning, process management, business excellence and customer, supplier and partner focus.
Engineer Inducted Into Railway Hall of Fame
Ron Bailey, P.Eng., a CN retiree, spent 38 years at railway engineering, developing
his expertise from a passion begun in his childhood. Now, the
Canadian Railway Hall of Fame has decided to honour his many contributions with
an official induction.
Mr. Bailey, along with the late J.E. Schwitzer of Canadian Pacific Railway, was inducted under the leaders category.
In the 1970s and 1980s, with Mr. Bailey directing the engineering, CN’s Mountain Region improved its infrastructure to handle growth in coal, sulphur, grain and potash traffic.
To combat wear and tear on the lines, self-steering trucks were added to the railway’s coal fleet and heavy-duty alloy steel was placed in curves. CN used new technology for high volume areas and maintenance, including rail grinding and rail lubrication. CN systems continue to benefit today from Mr. Bailey’s foresight.
Before his induction, CN had already named a traffic control point near Wainwright after Mr. Bailey. Transcontinental and local trains pass the Bailey Station every day.
“I grew up in the days when the railroads ran on coal, steam and tobacco juice — with perhaps the odd drop of Irish whisky thrown in,” Mr. Bailey wrote in a September 2005 PEGG feature. Visit The PEGG Online at www.apegga.org for that story, and for more about the Railway Hall of Fame, visit www.railfame.ca.
University Order
Adds APEGGA Member
Kiran Dave, P.Eng., has been awarded the prestigious Order of the University
of Calgary. Mr. Dave, now employed by the City of Calgary, worked for the university
for some 27 years as an engineer and grounds manager. The award recognizes exemplary
and distinguished service to the university.