Engineer of Year : Unocal Chairman Honored
Fred L. Hartley, chairman of the board of Unocal Corp., will be honored Friday evening with the George Washington Award as Engineer of the Year by the Institute for the Advancement of Engineering.
Hartley, who holds a degree in chemical engineering, is being honored for his “industry leadership in the development and use of alternative energy resources throughout the world and his role in establishing California as the world leader in geothermal energy.”
He led his firm’s development of the geysers in Northern California into the world’s largest geothermal energy producers. Unocal also opened the first geothermal energy field in the Imperial Valley.
Companies Honored
The institute is also honoring “outstanding projects completed by regional companies,” including two major engineering developments in California, as well as one near the Dead Sea in Jordan and another in the oil fields of eastern Saudi Arabia.
Companies honored are the Bechtel Power Corp., Norwalk; Jacobs Engineering Group Inc. and Ralph M. Parsons Co., both of Pasadena, and Fluor Technology Inc., Irvine.
The California projects being honored are the Cool Water Coal Gasification Plant, operating for the past 18 months near Daggett, and the Space Shuttle Waste Management Facilities project, at Vandenberg Air Force Base in Santa Barbara County. The former was designed and built by Bechtel’s Western Power Division in Norwalk, while the latter was designed by Fluor Technology Inc., Irvine.
Potash Recovery
The Saudi Arabian Petromin-Shell Oil refinery was designed by a consortium that included the Ralph M. Parsons Co. Jacobs Engineering Group Inc., handled design and construction of the potash recovery project on the Dead Sea in Jordan.
In addition to its recognition of Hartley and his four projects at Unocal, the group will celebrate Engineers’ Week by recognizing other engineers at its banquet at the Hotel Bonaventure.
Receiving the institute’s Outstanding Engineer Merit Awards for career accomplishments in their respective fields will be:
Career Accomplishments
--Paul Leung of Bechtel Power Corp., Norwalk, for “distinguished worldwide work as a design engineer, lecturer, educator and technical author” over more than 30 years as a mechanical engineer.
--Dale S. Warren, director of design and technology for Douglas Aircraft Co., Long Beach, for many advances in aircraft structural engineering he has brought about during three decades at Douglas.
--Frederick T. Selleck, a senior research and development engineer with the Fluor Cos., Irvine, for his conceptual work in chemical engineering over a 40-year career.
--Thomas S. Maddock, president of Boyle Engineering Corp., Newport Beach, for his international work as a water resources authority. He served on the state task force that developed the California Delta water distribution plan.
--Daniel J. Love, an electrical engineer in Bechtel’s Norwalk engineering center, for his innovative work in developing electric fire protection systems for industrial installations and power plants.
Officials Commended
Joel Kitchens, president of the institute, said the organization is presenting Distinguished Service Awards to Orange County Supervisor Harriett M. Wieder and Assemblyman Leroy F. Greene (D-Carmichael) for “notable public service in areas of social concern to the engineering professions.”
Greene, a registered civil engineer, has sponsored legislation to upgrade professional engineering criteria and to improve the state’s building and construction standards.
Wieder will be honored for her influential role in bringing about action on such statewide and Southern California issues as air and water quality, hazardous waste management problems and flood control.
The institute is presenting its annual Frank E. Reeves Memorial Award to William B. Johnson, an engineering executive with the Rocketdyne Division of Rockwell International, Canoga Park, for his volunteer services to the institute and the region’s engineering societies.
New Fellows Installed
The institute launched the week’s celebrations last Friday with the installation of 118 new fellows--all members of Southland engineering societies--in ceremonies at the Quiet Cannon Restaurant in Montebello.
In other activities this week, the Los Angeles Council of Engineers & Scientists is joining with Town Hall to sponsor a luncheon Tuesday in the Hyatt Regency Hotel. Unocal President Richard J. Stegemeier, will deliver the Engineers’ Week address at the luncheon and high school and junior college science students will attend as guests of the sponsoring organizations.
Kitchens said that one goal of the week’s celebrations is to interest young men and women in engineering careers.
“Thousands of new engineers will be needed in the 1990s, a high percentage of them here in Southern California,” he said. “We hope to show our young people how rewarding and exciting an engineering future can be.”
