Water Online Radio: Layne Brings Water Treatment, Water Supply, And Pump Repair To All Sectors

Joe Tirreno discusses Layne Christensen’s capabilities and the important emerging markets that can benefit from Layne’s versatile product line.

Todd Schnick: We are coming to you live from Dallas, Texas. This is day one of AWWA ACE 2012 and Water Online Radio. I am your host Todd Schnick joined by my friend and colleague Todd Youngblood. Todd I think we are in trouble with this next guy.

Todd Youngblood: You can tell when they are walking toward the booth if they are going to be trouble or not, and there is not much doubt about this guy.

Todd Schnick: It is my great pleasure to welcome to the show Joe Tirreno who is the General Manager of Business Development for Layne Christensen. Welcome to the show, Joe.

Joe: Thank you, Todd.

Todd Schnick: Before we get into it, take a few seconds and tell us about you and your background.

Joe: I have been in the water business for over 30 years. I started out in the water treatment business about 25 years ago and have been in water – whether it is pumps, water supply, water treatment, chemicals, or equipment – for probably the last 30 years.

Todd Schnick: Tell us all about Layne.

Joe: Layne interestingly enough has been in the business for over 100 years. They started with water supply and drilling wells for local municipalities and it has grown since then to include pumps and pump repair; also we have a mineral division, a water treatment division, and a division that is responsible for energy.

We are doing water treatment in the shale plays; we are doing pumping in the shale plays. We are also drilling.

Todd Schnick: What other markets are you geared towards? I know certainly water treatment is the long-term traditional one. What other markets are you looking at?

Joe: Let me tell you a little about the market from the standpoint of municipal versus industrial and private versus public.  We have been very strong in the municipal markets for decades. We are starting to shift our focus a little and some competencies, products, and services for the industrial markets.

Specifically, our strategy is to go after the power markets and the food and beverage markets. Power, electricity – you can’t store it, you can’t import it, and there is a safe bet that it will still be around. With food and beverage, you know a lot of the food that comes into this country has been tainted, so we think that agriculture is going to be a real strong market for us in the years to come.

We are not so much trying to refocus our efforts, but what we are trying to do is make sure that we are paying attention to those two very critical markets in all sectors; water treatment, water supply, pump repair – those are the three strongest offerings that Layne has.

Todd Schnick: You mentioned products and services. What are some of the unique products and services from Layne?

Joe: Especially in the water treatment marketplace right now we are developing some very strong and resilient membranes that can be utilized in both the municipal wastewater market as well as the industrial waste treatment market. These membranes are resilient to high temperatures. They operate in a very broad pH range. The tensile strength is probably 10 times what you are seeing today.

We are also evaluating desalinization techniques via membrane and via processes that we are looking at along with again, trying to develop answers for the shale plays which are very dependent on water management and water treatment.

Todd Schnick: Joe, water utilities are kind of notorious for being resistant to change and really reluctant to look at a new methodology or technology. What is your take on that?

Joe: When you are dealing with public water supply one of the things that these utilities want to make sure of is that they are providing the best possible product for their customer – you and me.

What occurs occasionally is that they are conservative as far as trying something new; however, if it is proven over and over again from a pilot, obviously they will engage in that product or service as part of their business.

Todd Schnick: Is Layne committed to sustainability?

Joe: Layne is. Actually we have a new CEO that started with Layne; Rene Robichaud started in the fourth quarter of last year. A few things that he started initially were: “One Layne” – we are one company with one culture; the second thing was sustainability.

We have different products and services, the reuse of water, recycling water; we have some of our drilling rigs that are electrically driven where most of them are diesel driven. From a sustainable perspective, we as a company have sustainable products and we believe in that moving forward.

Todd Schnick: I am all for sustainability. It is an important thing for everybody. When you boil it down people want to know about the dollars and cents, and I’m not really talking about low price of your product. Let’s talk about how you help customers and water utilities save money to be more efficient and productive.

Joe: A couple of ways. Number one from the perspective of your typical water utility – whether it would be an investor-owned utility or a public utility – one of the things that we do is pump testing to ensure that the wells and the pumps that they have had in place for many years are delivering the quality and quantity of water that is expected.

We run pump testing for those services. We want to make sure that they are energy efficient. We try to save energy whether it be repairing a pump, replacing a pump, or rehabilitating the well from other industries, like the pulp and paper industry. We are involved where water is at a premium and we are starting to utilize recycle technologies to ensure that they use less and less water.

The same is happening for a lot of the food processors, where they use a tremendous amount of water to wash the fruits and vegetables that you all eat every day. We have recycle techniques that we are utilizing there.

In the electric power industry, we are doing some things there with some of the scrubber systems that are regulated and also are evaluating some of the desalination techniques.

Todd Schnick: Let’s shift focus for a second and come up to 10,000 feet and look down on the industry. What trends do you see coming down the pike in the next 3 to 5 years?

Joe: We’ve all read that number one is the availability of good fresh water across the globe. We have seen it here in the state of Texas over the past year where they have experienced a drought and they are wondering what is the next aquifer that they are going to tap or where is the next gallon of water coming from. Number one I think the providing of clean and fresh water as the population continues to grow.

Secondly, I think that sustainability and energy efficiency are two things that are going to be strong in the marketplace moving forward. A lot of people now or in the past, the capital cost was the most important aspect of the purchase. I think that moving forward operational efficiencies are going to be more important than the capital cost of a product.

If you can make something that is more value – not necessarily less expensive – and saves you money over the long run, I think that is what our clients are looking for.

Todd Schnick: Joe, we are out of time. Before I let you go how can people get into contact with you and more importantly where can they learn more information about Layne?

Joe: Very simply – www.Layne.com – we just renewed our website. We put the “One Layne” culture within the website. You can learn a lot about our water treatment products and services, our water supply pump and repair products and services, our construction services, and our mineral and energy services. www.Layne.com

As far as getting into contact with me personally, I am on the website under water resource division. It will have my name and address where you can find me.

Todd Schnick: Outstanding. Joe Tirreno, General Manager of Business Development with Layne. It was great to have you. Thank you for joining us.

Joe: Thank you, Todd and Todd.

Todd Schnick: That wraps this segment. On behalf of our guest Joe Tirreno, my co-host Todd Youngblood, and all of us at Water Online, I am Todd Schnick. We will be right back with our next guest