Pipes VII Conference features top South African and international speakers

MIDRAND, South Africa - Aug. 5, 2013 - PRLog -- The Southern African Plastic Pipe Manufacturers Association (SAPPMA) has released an exciting line-up of local and international experts who will be presenting papers at its seventh annual conference that will be taking place on Tuesday, 10 September 2013 at the Bytes Conference Centre in Midrand.

“The focus on this year’s event will be on the challenges and opportunities facing the industry, as well as looking at the trends that influence the direction the industry is taking on a local and global scale”, explains Jan Venter, Chairman of SAPPMA.  “To this end, we have secured speakers who will be able to share their insights and comment on latest trends and developments from around the world, including Europe, America, India and the Far East,” he says.

Dr. Roelof Botha, recipient of Finmedia’s Economist of the Year Award and a well-known economist and commentator on macro-economics, will be delivering the opening address as keynote speaker.  Botha’s address will be followed by a variety of local and international speakers who will address various topics related to pipe quality, design, materials, energy conservation, installation, costing, specific projects and infrastructural development from a local and international level.  These speakers include:

·         Peter Fischer of Royal HaskoningDHV (South Africa) who will be presenting a paper entitled, ‘HDPE Pipe Systems: Some Technical Caveats for Designers and Contractors’;

·         Steven Tan of PVC4Pipes (Brussels) about ‘Long term behaviour of PVC Pipes in infrastructure’

·         Ulrich Schulte (Frankfurt) about ‘HDPE for pressure pipes – A never ending success story’

·         Mike Smart of Genesis Consulting (South Africa) has entitled his paper ‘On-site Quality Management’

·         Mohana Murali of Borouge Petrochemicals (Abu Dhabi), ‘PE pipes in the oil and gas industry in the Middle East’

·         Jeff Schell of United Pipeline Systems (Colorado, USA) will be taking a closer look at ‘Internal Corrosion and Abrasion Protection of Steel Pipe Using HDPE Tite Liner’

·         Marco van Dijk of the University of Pretoria’s Department of Civil Engineering will be talking about ways to improve system efficiency, ‘Utilizing infrastructure for conduit hydropower generation’

·         Delanie Bezuidenhout, CEO of the Southern African Vinyls Council will take environmental approach by taking a closer look at the sustainability of PVC with her talk entitled, ‘Reaching for sustainability’

·         Ian Venter of Marley Pipe Systems (South Africa) will be presenting an ‘Analysis of Infrastructure Pipe Materials’

·         Johann Bryan of Rollepaal Engineering (India) will present a paper on the latest developments in pipe extrusion

·         Faith Mkhacwa of the CSIR will present a case study of a recent ‘Industrial Energy Efficiency Improvement Project’

·         Niccolo Gericke representing Georg Fischer (Switzerland) will present on ‘Innovations in large bore pipe fittings’

“The annual Pipes Conferences have gained a reputation for being the plastic pipe industry event of the year and we believe this year’s line-up of speakers and topics will once again raise the bar,” Venter says.  

CONFERENCE REGISTRATION DETAILS:

·         Registration forms to attend the conference can be downloaded from SAPPMA’S website on  http://www.sappma.co.za/downloads/PIPES-VII-Registration-Form.pdf

·         Attendance costs R1 700 per delegate for non-SAPPMA members and R900.00 for SAPPMA member companies.  There is also a special discount structure in place for group bookings of 4 delegates or more.

·         CPD points are available for professional engineers who are attending.

SPONSORSHIP DETAILS:

This year’s Pipes VII Conference is made possible thanks to the financial assistance of Fibrepipe, Protea Polymers and DPI Plastics who have come on board as main sponsors.  However, additional sponsorship and exhibition opportunities are still available for companies wishing to make use of this opportunity to promote their brand to a distinguished and targeted audience.  For more information, please contact Louise Muller via email at admin@sappma.co.za or (011) 314-4021.

ENDS

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