President's Column

Last year, I underlined the great strides we have made over the last 3 decades in developing the world’s most powerful power system grounding and EMI analysis and design tool, with your loyal support and steady stream of comments. We continue to build on this experience and look to the future, perfecting and enhancing the software at every opportunity. As of late, a growing number of your comments have been related to the need for training, in order to make full use of the power of the software, which has been evolving at an ever-growing pace. This year, SES will address this need by offering focused training seminars directly related to software use at its conference facility in Laval, which will soon offer meals and overnight accommodations in one single flexible and economical package.

SES is now delivering on a number of promises made over the years. These include a true 3-D EGM lightning shielding program, making use of your computer’s graphics card to provide extremely rapid and clear interactive rendering of the performance of a shielding system as you design it. SES is also well on its way to provide you with a more intuitive Right-of-Way interface with more power, as we will discuss during the conference. Other items of interest include 64-bit versions of MALT, MALZ, HIFREQ, which can handle up to 20,000 conductor segments and 1 million observation points, the ability to install different versions of the software side-by-side, no longer making use of the Program Files folder, further acceleration of the software and yes, support by SESCAD of your mouse wheel for zooming and panning!

I would like to stress again this year that your input is not only welcome, it is essential. It is the driving force behind the evolution and improvement of the software, and is of capital importance. In order to better serve your needs we need to know what you would like the software to do, what you like about it, and any modifications you would like or need. The staff of SES has already provided a lengthy list, however the needs you have and the challenges you face are likely to be unique. Please continue to provide us with a steady stream of constructive comments! It is thanks to you that the software has continued to evolve in a useful direction.

In a related vein, I would like to emphasize SES’s enduring gratitude to YOU, our legion of loyal users who, year after year, have renewed your technical support from SES, thereby sustaining the pioneering R&D efforts at SES that will ultimately benefit every user of SES software packages and services.

Finally, I would like to express my gratitude to all those present at this conference for making it a valuable forum for the exchange of knowledge and opinions on SES Software and related applications. On behalf of the staff and all the participants, I would also like to thank those users who have generously contributed to this handbook despite their very busy schedules. We express particular thanks to Deepak Mankar, the user’s group chairman for this year’s meeting, and to Carl Moller and Ernest Middleton, this year’s treasurers, for their hard work.

It is my pleasure to welcome you to the 20^th annual CDEGS Grounding and Electromagnetic Interference Conference, hosted this year in the natal city of SES ltd, Montreal, Quebec, as is our decennial custom. I am delighted that so many of you have been able to attend as this promises to be a fruitful and productive meeting with exciting contributions from SES staff members and users like you. Indeed, SES users who are periodically checking to see if their ongoing challenging projects have been tackled by someone already are likely to find them in this and previous Conference Proceedings. Finally, as usual, it will also be a great pleasure to see how this year’s group measures up to SES’s volleyball team on Monday and Wednesday evenings.

Farid Paul Dawalibi