THE
REFRACTORIES ENGINEER
President’s Column Dear Members and Colleagues
Last time I complained about the summer weather, and indeed there was a slight improvement with the rare occurrence of having a brilliant summer bank holiday weekend! I know that many of you reading this in Australia, South Africa and some other parts of the world do not suffer from the same weather fever than those of us living in the UK, and therefore may not appreciate our obsession with the weather. All of you in the Southern hemisphere will be looking forward to the fast approaching summer, I guess? - whilst I will be installing a wood burner!
In the previous journal I touched on the aspect of incompetence (if I am allowed to use such a strong word) due to a lack of proper training. I suppose this has been an ongoing topic over the last two years. The fact that there are no fixed regulations around refractory design and installation (something we touched on during the 2018 conference as an open discussion), does not make it any easier to drive and implement training programs.
Soon we hope to have a plan on the table on how to approach training in a better way. It, however, does seem from preliminary discussions that there may be a need for changes in the structure and offering of the Institute. We are signing up new members every year, but so do we lose just about as many due to retirement. Without knowing the exact details, I would guess that the average age of the current members are most probably above 50. Could be an interesting exercise to actually calculate this even though it is mostly just for general interest. What we do know is about to happen, is that this average age will most likely stay there, or even slowly creep up, in the foreseeable future. Then there will be either a complete collapse of the Institute to the extent of non-existence or a complete change over in the way it operates as the remaining members will be young and from a different generation. This sounds familiar? It reminds me of the same discussions about climate change; we either going to destroy the planet and die or we will have to change the way we live.
The age distribution of refractory engineers has a somewhat odd shape and in some way this is going to influence the
way any change is going to occur. We have a gap with very little middle age people. In the make-up of refractory engineers, the industry as a whole (in the Western world for sure) has not had a regular intake of young engineers over time. A large number of refractory engineers dates from the 1950’s to 1970’s and that is clearly seen in the amount of research that was done during that time. However, the industry has changed and a large number of these people had to find other professions whereas at the same time it limited the prospects of undergraduates to be attracted to the life of a refractory engineer. This unfortunately created a bit of a gap in the age range of active refractory engineers.
I have asked some of the younger engineers involved in refractories why they are not interested in joining the IRE. The answers so far have been very vague, and I am not even sure they know the exact reasons. It is almost as if it is just not something that they even consider doing. Receiving a journal and attending a conference just do not seem to excite them at all. The world out there has a new face for the younger generation (the ones younger than 35 or is it even lower?) and it is all about information readily available in the palm of your hand. Do we as the Institute provide this kind of service? I had a look at Google, and you can find about anything there; how to pack and light a tobacco pipe, how to sharpen a knife on a wet stone, and the list goes on and on…. However, when it comes to refractory questions, the information is much less and more difficult to obtain. We have found a very old “Good Practices Guide for Installing Monolithics”, and the challenge is now to modernise it.
At the moment I have the privilege to work with a young graduate on a project involving lithium attack on refractories. Two things strike me, one is her enthusiasm for the subject and the other is how little is known about it. I could see the IRE being involved in these type of things, but it is the “how” that boggles my mind.
A few words about the conference in November 2019. We have a full program with interesting papers. A list of the speakers are given in the journal. Make sure you come join this event. It has always been considered a very sociable day and a good time to make a few new friends and learn a few more new things.
Until next time, take care.
Jan DuPlessis Theron President
Institute of Refractories Engineers September 2019 Issue 3
www.irengineers.co.uk www.ireng.org
President’s Column
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