Day 14: Meeting a Fellow Texan Down Under!

This morning I was able to sleep in until 9:30am or so at which time I got up to get ready for the coming day. Today’s agenda includes a meeting with FLUOR Enterprises, Inc. For those who have never heard of them, FLUOR is one of the largest international construction companies! They have offices in numerous cities around the world, but today we would be visiting their office in Brisbane.

After ironing and putting on some khaki pants and button-down shirt (Got to look sharp!), I headed downstairs with my laptop to the small coffee shop next to the hotel in hopes of doing some research about FLUOR before our visit in a few hours. I ordered a muffin and a coffee, then sat down and tried to connect to Gloria Jean’s (the coffee shop) Internet. After several attempts, my computer finally connected, though the connection never lasted longer than a couple of minutes before having to reboot, so I really got nothing productive done over breakfast.

I packed my laptop up and went back upstairs to drop it off in the room before we departed for the meeting. The group left soon afterwards and we were able to take a bus most of the way there. After hopping off the bus, we made a short walk over to the Christi Centre where FLUOR rented a floor (wow those words are almost the same). We got to their front door and were met by a man who said “Auburn - Welcome!” This man’s name was Joe Harris, who, judging by his accent, I could tell was a fellow American living in Australia. (Later he would tell us he had only been in Australia since last May and is usually stationed in FLUOR’s office in Sugarland, Texas. He also mentioned that he has a farm in Panola County, Texas – not too far from Tyler! The world gets smaller and smaller every day!)

We signed in and put on visitor tags, then proceeded to a conference room where chairs had been sat out in front of a screen, with some refreshments off to one side. Another man, Ralph Gunnis (not sure if I spelled his name correctly), joined Joe and they introduced themselves. Come to find out, Ralph is a professor at 4 Universities and is an Environmental Manager at FLUOR. Joe, from Texas as previously mentioned, is the Director of Construction Support at FLUOR. Joe and Ralph were curious as to what we (the 18 Auburnians) were interested in, so each of us (including the professors) took turns giving our names, where we were from originally in the U.S., and also the topic of our thesis research papers (or title and teaching responsibilities in the case of the professors.).

With introductions over, Joe and Ralph took turns telling us about FLUOR as a company and also went into a detailed presentation about the SANTOS Gladstone LNG Upstream Project. Basically, LNG stands for Liquefied Natural Gas and FLUOR was part of the construction team building two hub stations to develop a coal seam gas production expansion for SANTOS. They provided many details about coal seam gas, but perhaps the most interesting is that coal seam gas is the world’s cleanest burning fuel, as it is a form of natural methane gas trapped in coal beds. A fraccing system is used here that is different than the technique used in the states. In the U.S., a fraccing fluid that has chemicals in it is used in a similar process. In Australia, sand is used in the fraccing process to break through the coal formations and pump pure coal seam water and natural gas to the surface without any potential to harm the coal or any naturally occurring acquifers.

Ralph, a native Australian, provided commentary about several interesting legal and environmental pieces of legislation that are in place in Australia. He went into great detail, though I found two things particularly interesting about his presentation. The first is that a construction company has 3 months to show the government how a project will comply with every single one of 1,100 items in order to get a social license to build. Once underway with a project (social license in hand), the public regulates whether or not the construction company continues to comply with the 1,100 items. It seemed super tedious and complicated, especially the part about how the public enforces what the government licensed. Stuart made note of this in a question he asked Ralph, to which Ralph thoroughly agreed! Another interesting thing Ralph mentioned, which I think reflects and helps to explain the cultural mindset of Australians (and how it differs from Americans), is that each project has what is called “triple bottom line reporting.” This method of reporting shows how the community, environment, and business (or dollars spent) all win within the confines of the project. He went into much more detail, but I thought it was intriguing that the folks here are concerned equally with other costs of a project outside of the overall dollar amount; which I think reflects a general cultural awareness and agreement that projects have costs (both positive and negative consequences) that must be addressed, for which the Australian people are more than willing to spend a few extra dollars.

After a great meeting (which lasted several hours – the exact timeframe during which the national championship was played), we shook hands, making sure to get a business card so that we can keep in touch with Joe and Ralph once we return to the states. Shortly after leaving the Christi Centre, we learned of Alabama’s apparent annihilation of LSU and could not help but be thankful for several more weeks in Australia and New Zealand. However, congratulations to Alabama for a great season, but, most importantly, War Eagle!!

I returned that afternoon to do some more blogging and research at the State Library of Queensland. I had not taken any photos yet today (I left my camera at the hotel for the meeting), so I decided to snap a few shots inside the library. The inside is quite nice! Here’s a look:

2nd Floor of the State Library of Queensland

Great outside seating for after-hours Internet usage!

I finished up my work for the evening just after 7:00pm, and took the benefits of the early evening hour to take a stroll back to the hotel instead of riding the bus. I stopped about halfway and bought dinner at a Subway along the South Bank area and ate next to a fountain and pool. Properly nourished, I continued walking back to Woolloongabba. The walk was quite nice (the temperatures had cooled down significantly from their 90 degree onslaught) and I made it back safely to the hotel. I took a few pictures along the way. Here's a look!:

"The Wheel of Brisbane" - Nighttime

The Treasury of Queensland

Asian Temple

Brook where I sat and ate dinner

Back in the room, I used a 2-hour internet code Anoop gave us and did some research on the website of the Green Building Council of Australia. I found many wonderful case studies on buildings that have great innovative energy saving techniques that would work perfectly in my research paper. Three such buildings are here in Brisbane! The only drawback is that I am looking to incorporate case studies of buildings I actually visit, not just read about online (There has to be a reason to actually visit Australia evident within the paper), so not just any selection from the Green Building Council website will suffice. I reached my maximum data usage fairly quickly, but I was looking forward to my 9:30am meeting with Professor Hein to further discuss my thesis topic. Hopefully tomorrow will bring good tidings and great joy!