Paul Choules

1960–
Senior Vice President, Commercial, Water Standard

Desal's great traveller, building equipment on every continent (apart from Antarctica). Strong contender for 'most plants visited worldwide' title.

Paul Choules – Paul Choules
Paul Choules – Paul Choules

Paul started in desal as a service technician with Specific Equipment. From 1983 to 2001, he was with MECO, and spent half of that time in Abu Dhabi, supporting over 250 Middle East installations in all technologies. He covered a wide range of locations – from camel farms to oil rigs, sheikhs' palaces to US Navy ships.

In 1993, he moved back to the USA to become an international sales manager, joining Weir Techna in 2001 as VP for the Americas. His initial remit focused on his MECO experience, supplying desal to the oil and gas industries. He continued in that role when the company was taken over by Veolia in 2005. Paul became Senior Vice President, Commercial, of Water Standard, in December 2011.

 
One project always sticks in my mind because I was involved in all aspects, from selling and negotiating the contract to construction on a remote Persian Gulf island in 14 weeks. The project was awarded in 1991 and was for a 1,300 cubic meter single pass SWRO unit operating on an open seawater intake on Das Island, UAE.

The plant was supposed to be temporary and only used for the construction of a new LNG terminal on the island, but was still operating in 2000.

It was the first commercial installation to use DuPont B10 twin membranes and ERI turbochargers.
In the 1980s in Musandam, Oman, then one of the most remote locations in the world, the only way to get to the remote villages where we were working was by fishing dhow or a government landing craft. The villages had no electricity so the desal plants were diesel engine driven.

Paul is keen to acknowledge his mentors: Len Maliszewski at Specific Equipment, and Ollie Drewitz, Jim Stewart, George Gsell and Sharif Disi at MECO.