Energy twaddle

An article in Tech Central begins: “What if I told you that our energy crisis could be alleviated with one simple change? Sounds ridiculous, doesn’t it? But, as a professional, with almost a decade... 

Protect our heritage

Port, sherry, champagne, Melton Mowbray pies, Cornish pasty, Scotch Whiskey, et cetera, are products whose names are protected by international laws. The notional purpose of the laws is to (I... 

Seriously misguided again

I recently wrote about a court case between the National Regulator of South Africa (Nersa) and Eskom, which Eskom won. Nersa is a government body that is supposed to regulate the electricity,... 

Letter to the President

My editor has discouraged me from writing about politics in this column, and I think rightly so. My father and my mother were in the Second World War, in uniform, and both had a very healthy... 

The sublime to the ridiculous

Ah, let’s have a few trick questions: (Q) What is the difference between a Cape Town MYCITY Bus and a fire on Guy Fawkes Day? (A) The Guy Fawkes fire only gets burnt to ashes once a year. (Q) When... 

Nondirectional geese

I live in Pinelands, Cape Town. Somebody has to. Pinelands is dull. It is one of two suburbs in Cape Town that do not permit the sale of alcohol or the licensing of bars. If you want a good night’s... 

How to cure a hide

These days, tanning a hide is an automatic process that generally involves chromium sulphate, a kind of salt, as the tanning agent. However, back in the days when there was no chromium sulphate,... 

Substation Time Bombs

About five years ago, I made a policy decision that I would never go into an 1 000 V substation again unless it was maintained by a reputable authority. Most 11 000 V substations are worse than 400... 

Seriously misguided

One thing feared by all production businesses is a sudden change in profit. ‘Production businesses’ are businesses which take a lot of materials and convert these into something else  – for... 

While Rome burns

In 2019, commercial aviation used 90-billion US gallons of jet fuel, which is basically paraffin. This is 374 755 766 616 ℓ which, in Africa, is impela enkulu.   In November 2012, I wrote the... 

40 years on

Now it happens that, 40 years ago, I had just finished my university degree and was on my way to the South African Navy to spend two years as a guest of government. At that time, the state of the... 

Fantasy of the Greens

I regularly communicate with a group of engineering types who are all power-[Unknown A1]  generation minded and we regularly write about how misguided the green movement is regarding power... 

Splitting Eskom into three

On February 7, 2019, President Cyril Ramaphosa announced in his State of the Nation Address that State-owned power utility Eskom would be remodelled and split into three State-owned entities... 

The old blood

There is nobody who will say that the new CEO of State-owned electricity utility Eskom, André de Ruyter, is doing a bad job. When he took over, Eskom was in a bad way. It was rife with corruption... 

Same taxi, different driver

The following is from an article from the Seven Pillars Institute: “Some of the company’s personnel pocketed a brokerage percentage from suppliers, overloaded ships with personal cargoes for... 

All the help we can get

I own a small consulting engineering practice with a staff of five. Our work is consulting in acoustics and noise control. We are not considered essential to any project (as, for example, the... 

Icarus

In mythology, Icarus was the son of Daedalus. The latter wanted to escape from the island of Crete and so used wax and feathers to build some wings for himself and his son Icarus. Daedalus warned... 

Bowling for Michael Moore

Michael Moore is a famous film director, and one of the films he directed is Bowling for Columbine. The title refers to the true story that two students in their late teens – Eric Harris and Dylan... 

Prophets of doom

I have before me an article from a newspaper published in Cape Town. The headline is ‘Worst fire season feared’. It goes on to quote whoever who as saying we should be very concerned and uses words... 

Painting lines on the workshop floor

Sometime back, in 1994, when the new government had taken over, there was a great deal of backslapping and self-congratulation by new Parliamentarians and officials and settling in and stuff.... 

Virus stories

I did promise not to write about Eskom and the virus. I can leave Eskom alone but, as to the virus, it is a bit like saying to Samuel Pepys, who kept a diary in 1665, at the time of the great... 

Tapping into our readers’ minds

To write about State-owned electricity utility Eskom, the virus and government is boring. So, I am going to use this time to get our Engineering News & Mining Weekly readers to solve a few... 

Massive benefits of the virus

Some time back – more than ten years – the economy was swimming along. I had five staff and one of them stopped me in the office and asked if she could have a word with me. No problem. She said... 

The more seriously good aspects of Covid-19

A very good aspect about the coronavirus disease, or Covid-19, is that I need not go to those very tedious meetings, which last three hours, during which I will be asked to advise on the project... 

Open letter to South African politicians

Ah, yes, at last! When Martin Creamer agreed to publish this column, he requested that I avoid politics. And so I shall. This letter is addressed to all of you politicians, far left to far right.... 

The butterfly effect

The butterfly effect is a terribly sweet observation that the fluttering of the wings of a butterfly can be the trigger for a massive destructive storm. Taking the power generated by the wings of a... 

Cape Town saves Eskom

With regard to power from independents power producers (IPPs), Cape Town's acting mayor, Ian Neilson, is quoted in The Citizen newspaper as saying “The City is fighting for the right to buy cleaner... 

Climate change: Part 4

Summary of previous columns: climate change is real, if only because, in Norway, large patches of ice have melted and given up artefacts. This shows that Norway has become warm enough to melt ice,... 

Climate change: Part 3

Summary of previous columns: firstly, climate change is real, if only because, in Norway, large patches of ice have melted and given up artefacts. This shows that Norway has become warm enough to... 

Climate change: Part 2

In last week's instalment of this column, I wrote that climate change is real, if only because, in Norway, large patches of ice have melted and given up artefacts such as iron arrowheads and tunics... 

Climate change: Part 1

I have decided to write about climate change. I know that, even with that simple sentence, the knives come out, the pistols cock and an army marches against me. But do not fret, my merensky... 

Lies about Eskom and energy

A whole new culture of reporting on State-owned electricity utility Eskom, climate and energy has arisen. This country has a number of good-quality, intelligent energy experts but, deeply... 

The bus that Tesla missed

Every day, I read all the suggested stories from Google. I know that some story lines repeat day after day. There is always a story about climate change, Jacob Zuma, a bread recipe, living off the... 

Desirable school subjects

Last week, Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga said that select schools would be piloting subjects such as robotics this year and, if successful, the subjects could be rolled out to public... 

Becoming an acoustics engineer

I am a qualified electrical engineer. There were 105 students in first year engineering when I enrolled at university (if you ask my staff, they will tell you this was shortly after the Manumission... 

The idle thoughts of an idle fellow

There is a lot of gloom and doom about in this country. In the professional community of which I am a part (that is, architects, builders, engineers, developers, and so on) I ask: "How's business?"... 

Fake science

In the film A River Runs Through It, we see a young Brad Pitt, acting as Paul Maclean, being home-schooled by his father, Reverend Maclean. Brad is told to write an essay. He does and brings it... 

Staring you in the face

Wind power and solar power are not available all the time. Many assume that the interconnected power system it is some sort of system which has a huge storage dam full of electricity that is tapped... 

The World Cup

Years ago, Engineering News publishing editor Martin Creamer told me I could write about anything in this column, as long as it was not offensive. So, the World Cup rugby. Not the recent event, the... 

Hannover Fair

"Come on Terence," said Harry, "don't you know about the Hannover Fair ?" "In Hannover, Germany?" I asked.