Manzoor Sheikh:
Assalamualaikum welcome to Engineering Review. We have with us. Dennis Knight, he’s president of ASHRAE. Thank you so much. Mr. Knight, you took time to talk to us. I would like to start that. How do you feel be in Pakistan You are for the first time you have been visiting Pakistan.
Dennis Knight:
This is the second or third time I’ve been to Pakistan. This is the second time I’ve been the HVAC and our trends. I visited chapters in Karachi, Lahore, Islamabad and made a little trip up to Muree one time. So pakistan’s not new to me. I enjoy coming. I enjoy visiting with my friends in the HVAC. Our industry.
Manzoor Sheikh:
So you are the person who can tell us what the change is coming in this sector in Pakistan.
Dennis Knight:
Oh, the change is coming. Not only here, it’s coming all over the world but especially in Pakistan. I mean your po is to grow. Your population growth over the next 20 years is going to be tremendous. You’re going to triple the number of tons of HVAC system as more and more people begin to well as we feel the effects of climate change and as more and more people get access to HVAC, you’re going to triple the size of this business. So it’s more important than ever that we get manufacturing brought to Pakistan. We get young people involved and we get to build a very large HVAC in our workforce in Pakistan.
Manzoor Sheikh:
This sector is huge. You know millions of companies are doing business, millions of engineers, millions of tacticians. I mean a lot of people are involved. You know the more huge is in sector, the more other challenges in the background of climate change. Yes, what do you think? Are we on the right direction?
Dennis Knight:
We are on the right direction, but we’ve got to change the way we talk about our industry. If we’re going to bring enough young people, you say there’s millions of people. If there’s millions.
Triple that make that three times that in just 26 years and we don’t have a lot of young people coming into the industry right. So we got to change the way we talk about our industry. We’ve got to talk about our industry, not about the technology and how to put things in. But we’ve got to talk to young people about the impact of our industry on climate change, on sustainability, on human health and well-being and why this is an important career and why a young person should should consider it as a career. You can do no matter what degree you have. No matter what discipline you’ve studied in there’s a place for you in HVAC&R and an ASHRAE In this industry, we need experts from every discipline.
Manzoor Sheikh:
Why is it so young people are not coming? What? What are the bottlenes?
Dennis Knight:
Well,Population is not growing as fast as our middle class, so our population, the number of people that we’re growing is not growing as fast as our industry and we’re all IT. Industry, the manufacturing industry, the engineering industry.
The private sector they’re all pulling from the same pool of people that graduate every year. And if we do not have a compelling message as to why some young person should choose this career, why they can come into this career, have passion, have purpose, have a family sustaining and upwardly mobile career path. We want at track them and they’ll go to other industries. So it’s very important that we talk about our industry and what we’re doing now and having an impact and how we since we consume 40 percent of or we our systems produce 40 percent of the world’s carbon emissions. How we are a vital player in reducing that.
Manzoor Sheikh:
Then I’ve been talking to just 5 ten minutes before you. I was talking to Sarah, you know, ask that whatever we are doing, you, there are many things that we have to do. But the thing is, is it enough that we are doing in the context of climate change so that mitigate the impacts of climate change?
Dennis Knight:
Well, we have to step up our game. We have to begin talking to our clients, convincing them that it’s important to convert from fossil fuels or by-materials that have low embedded carbon. And we’ve got to do that faster than we’re doing it now if we’re going to meet the targets we’ve set and and as we said last year you hit the challenges we’ve accepted, we have got to move forward faster if we’re going to eliminate carbon emissions by 2050.
Manzoor Sheikh:
Business is you know, from one respect is about profits, profit earning. You think it’s a greed of profits that is hindering and maybe one of the reason.
Dennis Knight:
Well, maybe I mean, maybe pushing for more and more profits and focusing on the bottom line is’t necessarily always the best solution for the environment. Best solution for the employees, best solution for the communities I think we’re going to see as the world of finance, the world of insurance and the consumers become more and more aware of how important having a low impact on the environment is in the decisions they made. The products they buy, the systems they buy, the more and more you see that i think you’ll see that profit. The bottom line for profit to be less important, maybe be than environmental and social justice.
Manzoor Sheikh
Thank thank you.
