{"id":740,"date":"2013-06-27T09:00:05","date_gmt":"2013-06-27T14:00:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/allenergyconsulting.com\/blog\/?p=740"},"modified":"2013-10-18T07:37:54","modified_gmt":"2013-10-18T12:37:54","slug":"term-limits-for-academia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/allenergyconsulting.com\/blog\/2013\/06\/27\/term-limits-for-academia\/","title":{"rendered":"Term Limits for Academia"},"content":{"rendered":"

As I begun to review the report <\/span>\u201cExamining the feasibility of converting New York State\u2019s all-purpose energy infrastructure to one using wind, water, and sunlight\u201d<\/span><\/a> I decided to get to know the authors of the report.\u00a0 To my shock and dismay, none of them has had any experience in the utility industry, much less any industry.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

There is no doubt in my mind, Academia represents an important part in society.\u00a0 Many professors have had profound impact on myself \u00a0Those include <\/span>Dr. Grant Wilson<\/span><\/a> and the late<\/span> Dr. David Himmelblau<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Though Dr. Himmelblau spent a majority of his life in Academia, he did serve in the army and a decade in industry.\u00a0\u00a0 He taught me a very important lesson that I continue to use till this day.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

He had a take home final exam.\u00a0\u00a0 The final exam involved finding the hydrogen values at various points in the process.\u00a0 Many points in the process were easy to identify.\u00a0\u00a0 However, there were a few points that no matter what, \u00a0one could not prove conclusively the hydrogen amounts.\u00a0\u00a0 Many in class were dumbfounded and turned in incomplete test.\u00a0 I spent an all-nighter trying to get it.\u00a0 Finally I decided to\u00a0write several reasons to support my assumption.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Dr. Himmelblau later told the class there was no way to conclusively get several points, and the key was to make an educated guess based on supporting assumptions.\u00a0\u00a0 In life there are many unknowns and you will have to make the best guess you can with all the factors you have at your disposal.\u00a0\u00a0 This advice probably allowed me to be a great forecaster.\u00a0\u00a0 This advice is so true when you attempt to understand the future.\u00a0\u00a0 You won\u2019t have all the facts and you can\u2019t always wait for them either.\u00a0 Operating with unknowns is a reality \u2013 learn to embrace it.\u00a0 I believe this is something that cannot come from just being in academia.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Dr. Wilson helped me out in many ways.\u00a0\u00a0 His ability to take things from a theoretical world to real life applications helped bridge my thinking on how to apply school work into life.\u00a0\u00a0 Dr. Wilson had a very impressive industry experience, which I believed allowed this lesson to be prominent in his teachings.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Back to the issue at hand, my google search on each of the authors show no industry experience.\u00a0\u00a0 This is not a personal attack. I am sure all of the authors are genuine decent human beings.\u00a0\u00a0 The fact is they are discussing about something very complicated and real.\u00a0\u00a0 No matter what you may say about the utility industry, there is one thing everyone should know, there are real hard-working people there who do their job out of true concern.\u00a0\u00a0 I have not met a planner in any utility who takes their job lightly.\u00a0\u00a0 They do deserve some credit for keeping the lights on over the past decades.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Yes there have been outages, but when those outages occurred did you think about your bill not being enough and how much more you would spend for those outages not to\u00a0occur.\u00a0\u00a0 Utility planning does include some social aspect.\u00a0 Reliability levels are set for the required masses not for those who COULD afford more.\u00a0\u00a0 There are many dimensions when setting a resource plan.\u00a0\u00a0 It is not just economic nor is it just a social cause nor is it just wishful thinking but significant applied mathematics with significant engineering calculations.\u00a0\u00a0 The fact that not one of the authors had SOME utility experience, therefore, in my mind it immediately reduces the value of the study.\u00a0\u00a0 It would be akin to having someone do surgery on your body without any experience other than from what one read.\u00a0\u00a0 Perhaps success is quite possible, but it would be beneficial if they actually built up some real experience in the real world where all the dimensions are taken into account.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

My quest to evaluate the study content quickly got diverted.\u00a0\u00a0 My quick author search got me thinking not of the study, but the thought of term limits for academia.\u00a0\u00a0 Many people point to the fact that a lifelong politician loses sight of reality \u2013 is this true for academia?\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 It would seem that more and more professors are taking the lifelong route versus the professors I had who had spent time in the world then came back to academia.\u00a0\u00a0 I hope institutions think about this as they look to build their staff.\u00a0\u00a0 Colleges should implement a term limit so that their professors do not lose sight of the real world.\u00a0\u00a0 This probably should\u00a0apply with your consultant.\u00a0\u00a0 Hopefully you don\u2019t have a consultant who has lost track of the real world.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Now back to reading the report\u2026..<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

A supporter of term limits for politicians, academia, and consultants \u2013 Your Energy Consultant,<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

David K. Bellman<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

614-356-0484<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As I begun to review the report \u201cExamining the feasibility of converting New York State\u2019s all-purpose energy infrastructure to one using wind, water, and sunlight\u201d I decided to get to know the authors of the report.\u00a0 To my shock and dismay, none of them has had any experience in the utility industry, much less any […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":216,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,6,17],"tags":[210,369,20,209],"class_list":["post-740","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-market-insights","category-power","category-renewables","tag-academia","tag-power","tag-renewables-2","tag-term-limits"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/allenergyconsulting.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/740","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/allenergyconsulting.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/allenergyconsulting.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/allenergyconsulting.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/allenergyconsulting.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=740"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/allenergyconsulting.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/740\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":742,"href":"https:\/\/allenergyconsulting.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/740\/revisions\/742"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/allenergyconsulting.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/216"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/allenergyconsulting.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=740"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/allenergyconsulting.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=740"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/allenergyconsulting.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=740"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}