No 153: Water or Films? Which gives the best return? Maybe just write a children’s book instead.

I don’t normally mix with people from the film industry, but this week was an exception. Yesterday I had coffee with a man who has managed to forge a career investing in the somewhat quirky mix of blockbuster movies and, separately, water technologies.  Indeed, the meeting my friend was having directly after our meeting was with Barbara Broccoli, daughter of Albert Broccoli and the current producer of the James Bond films. One of the many interesting facts I gleaned from him was that Idris Elba is ‘a shoe in’ for the next 007 role. You heard it here first.

I couldn’t help but ask my new-found friend which gave the best returns to him as an investor: water technology or films? Before sharing his response I should tell you that his water technology investments include a rather clever sensor for the water network that provides early warning signals of contamination. It is very neat and has applications in a variety of countries and industries.

In answering he looked me straight in the eyes and without hesitation or embarrassment confidently asserted that he has ‘not made a penny’ out of his water investments. A little bit of me died.

Other celebrity moments from this week include me having breakfast with David Beckham. And when I say ‘having breakfast’ what I actually mean is I was sitting in a café having a breakfast meeting with the CEO of PA Consulting, Alan Middleton when David entered the café behind me. Alan, quick as a flash, got out his phone and managed to capture a picture of me with the sporting hero (see attached). David might not remember meeting me, but I will never forget our special moment together. Last night I shared the photo with the youngsters in the scout group I help run. They already see me as a hero (obviously) and this photo of my celebrity connections merely confirmed my status as someone they would love to emulate. (As a complete aside, one of the children last night guessed my age as 26. I felt superb for all of 10 minutes, until I realised that if you are 13 then 26 is probably seen as positively ancient. It was their way of simply saying ‘you are very very old’)

Back to my water/film investor friend, I asked him how his film investments were going. He was more positive about these, saying he typically made a 10-15% return. He then gazed into the distance and said, somewhat wistfully ‘I have actually started writing a children’s book. I think that is what will make me really happy’.

Personally, I am sticking with water technology. 

No 152: My urine is green. That can’t be good.

This week I have been in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, a city where size matters. They have the biggest flag pole in the world (170m), the tallest water fountain in the world (260m) and are currently constructing the tallest building in the world, Jeddah Towers. At 1km high Jeddah Towers will be just 49cm taller than the current tallest building in the world (the Burj Khalifa in Dubai). If you are going to spend $5bn then you really don’t want to be ‘the second tallest’ so those extra few centimetres truly matter. We drove past the construction site (see photo below). It doesn’t look overly impressive at first glance but look closely and you get a sense of the scale; those tiny objects on the side of the picture are massive cranes. See also attached the artists impression of the final structure. Oh yes indeed. Jeddah is a city where size matters.

Towers in Aug 2016                                            Artists Impression of final Towers

We are about 10 miles from Mecca and, as luck would have it, our trip coincided with the Hajj, the annual Muslim pilgrimage. It was suggested that we could perhaps visit the holy site disguised in a burka. We sensibly rejected this offer on cultural sensitivity grounds. Also my colleague, Dutchman Erik Driessen, is 7 foot tall and likely to attract attention. Whilst abandoning him to explain himself to the Saudi authorities would be mildly amusing it would have created unpleasant amounts of paperwork.

If you head 60km south of Jeddah into the desert you will come to an Industrial Zone. Between here and the Yemen border is 500 miles of hot, unforgiving desert. This is where we have spent the week, undertaking a technical audit of, yes you guessed it, the biggest soft drinks facility in the world. It is run by a fantastically dedicated team from Sibco, one of the largest Pepsi franchisees in the world, and it is, quite simply, staggeringly enormous. The $0.5bn+ plant is going through commissioning but when fully operational will consume over 500,000,000 litres of water every hour. A giant sized lorry packed with 7Up, Pepsi, and all the other delicious Pepsi brands will leave the site every 4 minutes (there is a taxi-rank type car park for 100 such lorries). The sheer scale of it is awe-inspiring. It knocks spots off the big flagpole, bigger fountain and biggest building as a tourist attraction.

It is however ridiculously hot. Step outside the air conditioned office and, literally within seconds, you are pouring with sweat. After just 3 minutes you are soaked to the skin in your own perspiration. Our days have involved spending a couple of blisteringly hot hours on-site, returning to the safety of our temporary office to write up our notes/re-hydrate/dry. We then repeat this until the day ends.  Shirts dry quite quickly but once your underpants are soaked through they tend to stay wet all day long. Having constantly wet nether-regions is a special feeling I have not encountered for perhaps 45 years.

Some water issues are common the world over (leakage, energy control, sludge). Some are region specific (unusually high manganese levels in the Red Sea feed water, climatic conditions which cause rapid corrosion of all metal components). Everyone we have met, from the local desalination operators Sawaco to all Sibco staff/subcontractors has welcomed us and is working tirelessly to get the facility up and running on time. After all, there are 28 million thirsty Saudi’s out there and they need their Pepsi.

Above the urinals is a little sign with colour chart for you to compare with your urine. It ranges from light yellow (‘good’) to dark yellow (‘drink more’) to green (‘drink more now’) to red (‘Something is seriously wrong. Find a hospital and find a psychiatrist’). No matter how much I drink I can’t seem to shift from light green. I feel (and no doubt look) like a shrivelled prune. Yet our main client contact, Duncan Munro, has been here almost 3 years and looks suspiciously younger than he did when he worked in London for Fullers Brewery.

Perhaps it’s a Soft drink vs Beer thing? Perhaps it is due to the sunshine? I hope not, either way I am in trouble. Next week I am on holiday in Southwold, UK. I intend to spend the week enjoying the balmy 20 degree C temperatures, sitting on the painful gravel beach next to the deliciously grey and cold North Sea drinking copious amount of the local Adnams ale. It is a classic Englishman’s holiday. I might not end the week looking any younger but my urine will at least be back to normal.

These Notes, and previous editions, can be found at http://notesfrompiers.blogspot.co.uk/

No 151: Dance like no one is watching

For the past week I have been in Singapore. I have not been here alone. About 20,000 other people from across the global water sector are also here as it has been Singapore International Water Week (SIWW). With me on this trip are colleagues from Isle Australia, Isle Asia and Isle Europe. Son No 2 is also here, having foolishly returned home from university early. He is enjoying the life-affirming experience of zero-contract hours employment with his father. Child labour is so much more acceptable when it is kept in the family.

Isle has been here in force because we were responsible for delivering the TechXchange and the Innovation Pavilion. The TechXchange was a 1 day technical conference for 250 delegates that formally kicked off SIWW last Sunday. The Innovation Pavilion was a designated area within the (awe inspiringly massive) exhibition hall where c20 novel and disruptive technologies from around the world were being showcased. As outlined in Note 149, Isle had boldly designed an event that included an array of innovative and daring modifications to the usual conference format. These ideas had seemed inspired during the planning phase but as we got ever closer to kick-off these same ideas appeared wildly ambitious and destined to fail. Panic is an interesting emotion. It doesn’t bring out the best in me.

With just hours to go we found ourselves with an array of last minute hiccups. Key note speakers with delayed flights and lost luggage is one of those problems you can’t do much about. My offer to buy a spare pair of knickers was politely declined. I can’t think why. Is it not charming to have a strange man buy your underclothes? (I may have lost track of the fine line between what is acceptable and what is just plain creepy). Anyway, my fears were misplaced. It all eventually fell neatly into place.

The TechXchange flowed like a dream. The interactive debate session, complete with a real-time monitor showing which side was winning, had the audience spell-bound. Almost 2000 votes were submitted to the Voting App during the 45 minute debate period, with the winning side chopping and changing as the debate progressed. Slightly worryingly whenever I spoke my side seemed to lose votes. There is a lesson in there somewhere. This was followed by a high-energy Innovation Competition, which borrowed heavily from X factor. We stayed just about on the right side of any copyright claims. I can confirm that at the time of writing no threatening letters have yet been received from Mr Cowell.  

Our post-event celebrations somehow culminated in us gathering en masse in a nightclub in downtown Singapore. The beer, the live band, the great company and the relief that things had not blown up in our faces meant that we spent Sunday night dancing with abandon. Until this week I have never been ‘out clubbing’, let alone stayed out until the clubs close at 3am. Returning to my hotel room to find Son No 2 with a ‘And what time do you call this?’ look on his face is humbling, but not enough to stop you doing it again. And again.

Such was the success of SIWW that as the week progressed, so did our celebrations. We tried the various delights that Singapore has to offer, including a 4 hour karaoke session where I discovered both that Son No 2 is a rapper and that the future Water Minister for a local Asian country (name retained to protect her) is living reincarnation of Carol Carpenter. Our planned evening of salsa dancing was abandoned after just 2 minutes. Having seen the skill and coordination required to earn a place on the dance floor we decided to return, like dogs to proverbial vomit, to our beloved nightclub and dance until they shut the place.

On one occasion I looked around the dance floor to realise that there was just myself, Professor David Lewis (CEO for Muradel, an Australian tech company that can convert sludge to crude oil), Mr Wolfgang Vogl (GM for VWM Technology from Vienna, they have an on-line monitor that won the above mentioned innovation competition) and Adam Lovell (CEO for the Water Services Association of Australia). With a collective age north of 200 the four of us ripped up that dance floor. The faces of the beautiful young things standing on the side-lines were captivated by our skill and prowess. Dad-dancing is a talent every young person aspires to possess and we were there to teach. Despite what you might hear from other sources, they were not watching us with shame and pity. It was envy at our gay abandon. Why else would they eventually join us such that we became a throbbing mass of human energy, pulsating as one to the rhythm.  

SIWW held its Closing Dinner last night and the exodus from the city began. There was a feeling  that SIWW had provided a brief respite from a world in ever-increasing financial, political or environmental turmoil. Delegates returning to Britain for example are going back to a country with a different Prime Minister from that who was in power when we left. This week has served to remind us of some of the truly great things happening across the water sector. Everyone celebrates in their own unique and special way. We chose to do it by dancing; dancing with complete and utter abandon. Dance like no one is watching. It is truthfully life affirming (and I am told that with good therapy your children will eventually recover from the mental damage inflicted). 

This blog and previous editions can be found at: http://notesfrompiers.blogspot.co.uk/

No 150: Forget the Oscars

Tonight I hosted the 6^th annual Thames Water Health & Safety Awards. You might think that a H&S award ceremony would be dull, but you could not be more wrong. 200 of London’s hardest working contractors and utility-people gathered in the Millennium Mayfair hotel, previously most famous for being the venue at which the ex-Russian KGB agent Alexander Litvineko was poisoned with Polonium 210 by two of his former colleagues. From tonight onwards it will be famous for having hosted one of the best award nights ever held by a water utility.

Like all good award ceremonies there was a common theme running through the event:  a celebration of the Queens 90^th birthday. There was a throne, crowns, Bulldogs and Corgis (plastic not real), life-sized cut-outs of the Royal family (sorry Ma’am). There was even a house-sized Union Jack that, if size mattered (I assure my wife regularly that it doesn’t) would have deserved a prize. In keeping with the royal theme I was dressed appropriately enough as Medieval Court Jester. This was not my choosing and it is not a look that I will repeat any time soon, but I confess to hugely enjoying spending an evening holding sway as the Lord of Misrule.

As host one might think my role was simply to ensure things ran smoothly; to make sure that the right people got the right awards and that everyone got home on time. Give credit where it is due, Thames Water actively encouraged me to expand this scope. A free rein was given and I ran with it. If you are ever given the freedom to break the rules then I encourage you to embrace it wholeheartedly.

I honestly can’t pick my favourite moment. Was it the ad hoc juggling competition between some game senior managers I had coaxed (bullied?) onto the stage? Or perhaps it was when we persuaded the 8 award winners to participate in a (car-crash) display of Morris Dancing. It raised both a laugh and almost £1000 for WaterAid. I am so hoping the videos go viral. Actually I know my highlight. It was getting an MD from a one of the Contracting Partners to deliver a genuine Medieval Jestering talent and, standing proudly on stage in front of his peers, competitors, clients and subordinates,  fart-on-command. Glorious. There is little the British like more than a good bit of toilet humour. Worth noting that that particular part of the evening wasn’t meant to be high-brow.

We didn’t mention the football, and Brexit was temporarily forgotten (5 days on I am still in mourning) .

Despite the above antics, tonight was a serious celebration of some truly stellar performance. The night was all the more meaningful as it represents Martin Baggs, my former boss, last time at the helm for this annual celebration. Later this summer he will stand down from his post as CEO of Thames Water.

Martin’s personal leadership and commitment to H&S has led to a staggering, jaw-dropping improvement in almost every H&S statistic that is used to measure performance. Achievements like this can only be delivered by a wide team not an individual, but it is the leadership that sets the goal and keeps the vision focused. We finished this evening with a heart-warming video of staff thanking Martin personally and recounting some of the key achievements from the past 7 years since he took over as CEO. The roll-call was impressive. This is Martins legacy.

I trust he will sleep soundly tonight, proud of that legacy.

These Notes and previous versions can be found at  http://notesfrompiers.blogspot.co.uk/

No 149: Sunday 10th July is going to be SPECTACULAR….

I am experiencing excitement levels akin to those of an 8 year old boy just before Christmas. Sunday 10^th July is only 35 ‘sleeps’ away (not that I am counting). It is going to be utterly awesome. There are, of course, many reasons why this date is important. For example, this date marks the birthday for Nikola Tesla, the Serbian inventor who, around 1900, invented 3 phase electric power and the induction motor. He is not alone in having this as an important anniversary. A quick google search informs me that this date is also Jessica Simpson’s birthday. You know her. She is buxom actress/pop star best known for her role in the (dubious) movie remake of The Dukes of Hazzard. This year she will be 35. Again.

Important those these anniversaries undoubtedly are, these are not the reason for my excitement: Sunday 10^th July 2016 marks the start of the Singapore International Water Week. My enthusiasm is because as part of the opening celebrations for the week there will be a TechXchange forum where the brightest and best water and wastewater technologies from across the world will be showcased and glorified. It is going to be terrific.

Singapore International Water Week, like the mating pattern of a blue whale, occurs only once every 2 years. It is arguably the biggest and most important event in the Asian water calendar, and it sends ripples around the world. PUB (the Public Utilities Board of Singapore, who host the event) have succeeded in establishing a brand that is known and respected over the globe.

This year, Isle Group will be organising the TechXchange forum and what a treat we have in store for the delegates! There will be the usual mix of important and informed speakers sharing pearls of wisdom (as a particular coup, we even have someone from Microsoft speaking). However, the highlight, and the core reason for my excitement, will be the panel debate session. This is being sponsored by XPV and will be different to anything ever seen at a water conference before. Gone is the staid format of a panel of talking heads. At TechXchange there will be a proper old-style blood-and-guts debate, complete with a huge dollop of innovation and audience participation. We have identified a suitably contentious issue which will be vigorously debated by teams of panellists. They will (metaphorically) slug it out in-front of the (baying) audience. There will even be an interactive App which will show in real time how the audience is responding. Who is landing the killer blows? Who is being defeated?

It will be just like an election night….. with the added twist that this will actually be interesting!

As you can see from the above, everyone should be in Singapore on July 10^th. Even if you are not ‘watery’ you would still find it fascinating (my mum reads these Notes, and I am fully expecting her to attend). If you are already attending the main event then click here to book your ticket to TechXchange too (http://www.techxchange2016.com/#!buy-tickets/z49gr). If you are not yet attending can I politely suggest you sell your car/pet/beloved possessions and book your flight so you don’t miss out. I look forward to seeing you there.

(For more details on the Singapore International Water Week ‘TechXchange’ please see below).

Piers Clark

Chairman, Isle Group

Tel +44 7976 344233

Do you want to receive the semi-regular blog ‘Notes from Piers’? If so click here: http://notesfrompiers.blogspot.co.uk/

Bringing new Technologies to Life!  View this email in your browser We are pleased to announce the confirmed short-list of innovative water technologies who will present as part of the TechXchange Innovation Showcase taking place on 10th July at SIWW. The TechXchange Innovation Showcase will feature short presentations from each of the companies followed by a detailed Q&A session from a distinguished panel of judges. The audience will also have the opportunity to vote for their favourite technology via our customised TechXchange app, sponsored by XPV Water Partners. Click here to reserve your delegate place NOW! To view the full agenda please click here Subnero is a Singaporean start-up company aiming to offer high-performance underwater Communications, Navigation, Monitoring & Sensing solutions for commercial deployments.  Syrinix is an award winning leader in providing intelligent pipeline monitoring solutions. Combining high-resolution data with automated analysis and alerts, Syrinix’s solutions are transforming utilities’ ability to reduce leaks, breaks and costs. Nanostone Water is leading development efforts for the next generation of ceramic membranes with a high surface area ceramic monolith UF membrane intended to provide well-recognized benefits of ceramic membranes at a price point competitive with polymeric membranes.  Lighthaus photonics is a Singapore based high-tech start-up focusing on advanced photonics, specifically with its laser vibrometry and hyperspectral camera technologies. These technologies significantly reduce costs for cost-sensitive industries.  CITIC Envirotech is a company offering technologically advanced membrane-based water and wastewater treatment solutions. Their innovation is a pressurised membrane module, which is manufactured with high-performance PVDF hollow fibre UF membranes.  Century Water specialises in process water, clean water, and wastewater treatment technologies. The supply and operation of the Fluidised Bed Crystallisation technology for waste water treatment distinguishes Century Water from their competitors. OxyMem solves energy intensive wastewater treatment with an innovative ‘Drop in’ solution for wastewater aeration, the Membrane Aerated Biofilm Reactor (MABR). OxyMem MABR can complement existing treatment systems and deliver up to 50% additional biological capacity in an existing aeration or alternatively replace a legacy systems. Arvia Technology designs, manufactures, supplies and installs tertiary or advanced wastewater treatment systems to reduce hard COD, remove colour and treat organic micro-pollutants. Arvia’s ODC™ System brings you the next generation of clean water and wastewater treatment.  Utilis have developed a unique technology for leaks detection in urban/rural drinking water distribution networks. Using technology that is used to look for water on other planets, Utilis analyzes satellite imagery to detect leaks in underground infrastructure. Aerofloat specialises in the treatment of greywater and industrial wastewater from a wide range of industries. Aerofloat designs, manufactures and installs simple, affordable wastewater treatment systems using its patented Dissolved Air Flotation (DAF) products and patent pending MBBR systems (Moving Bed Biofilm Reactor). TechXchange 2016 is sponsored by:     Copyright © Isle Utilities Ltd 2016, All rights reserved. www.isleutilities.com  www.techXchange.com  Want to change how you receive these emails? You can update your preferences or unsubscribe from this list