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In this month’s issue of Supply House Times, you’ll notice quite a bit of attention being given to the next generation of leaders in our industry. This goes to show just how important a topic this is and will continue to be.

In my report on the recent winter PVF Roundtable meeting in Houston, Supply House Times columnist and ASA Industry Analyst Morrie Beschloss used the signature sign-on line from World War II-era radio commentator Gabriel Heatter to describe the outlook for the industrial PVF industry.

This year was billed as the largest AHR Expo in the Northeast to date. The impressive turnout to the Javits Center occurred despite the record cold and snow that brought New York City to a virtual stop on the second day of the show.

It’s certainly no secret that I’ve been active in this great industry for a number of years, and over those years I’ve seen tremendous changes.

Although hydraulic fracturing (fracking) has engendered the possibility of shale-produced oil and natural gas, vaulting the United States into the world’s No. 1 spot in fossil-fuel production (oil, coal, natural gas), prestigious financial weekly Barron’s now estimates up to $1 trillion in capital-goods spending will be generated to make this happen by 2025.

Since I am now officially old, I get to pontificate on things that I have come to believe are always true in the hydronic-heating business, probably true in the rest of the heating business and certainly true when it comes to wet heat.

As I write this letter, our industry has already entered into the busy buying group season. Next will be the summer months and soon after NetworkASA 2014, ASA’s annual convention, will be upon us.

The purpose of an A/C “preventive maintenance” or “tune-up” call is to clean up a system after a year of wear and tear, and to make sure it is working at peak efficiency.

We’ve all said it, or at least found ourselves thinking about it: the Empire State Building managed to get built without OSHA and it turned out just fine.

Not current events. Those are easy to find. These are more difficult to find, but worth the trip. I hope they fill you with wonder and make you appreciate how far we’ve come in this fascinating industry.