President’s Column with Terry Palisch: Creating Our Energy Future (December 2023)
Authors: Palisch Terry 
Published: December 2023

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In this episode and transcript, Terry Palisch is joined by Simeon Eburi, an SPE Regional Director of North America, to discuss connecting members to technology and each other, and the importance of local sections. This transcript is an excerpt from the podcast episode. Listen to the full episode here.

Simeon:
I’m Simeon Eburi, an SPE Regional Director of North America and reservoir management advisor with Chevron. I’m pleased to join SPE President Terry Palisch to talk about the benefit of joining and being involved with your local SPE section. Thank you for inviting me to join you. As a regional director, I’m passionate about the sections and the work they do, as I know you are, Terry.

Terry:
Thank you, Simeon, for joining me today and being part of the episode. I asked you to join because I know your passion and your experience with the Gulf Coast Section, and my goal today is to ensure our members recognize how being active in their local section can help their professional development. I thought you would be the perfect host.
I believe that when most people, both members and external, think about SPE they typically think about the local section. That is what most are exposed to, so I consider the local section the front lines of our Society, the key to SPE’s mission of connecting. I want to focus our members on how they can benefit by connecting with their local section or student chapter because I think the local sections can impact not only their education and career but also their energy future.

Simeon:
I agree with you Terry, sections are the front lines. I was very involved with my local section in Houston before I was a regional director on the SPE Board of Directors. For people who do not know about SPE sections, let’s start there. What are sections and what do they do?

Terry:
Let’s start with statistics. We have over 200 sections worldwide located in 85 countries, so wherever you are there should be a section near you. The first section was the Mid-Continent Section in Tulsa in 1917 over 100 years ago; it was established before SPE was incorporated. The first international section was about 40 years later, the Western Venezuela Section in Maracaibo. One of the most recent sections is the Ukraine Section in Kiev established in 2022.
We continue to add sections and at times reinstate sections that may have fallen behind. This year we reinstated the Libya Section and the Tunisia Section. Our sections are wide-ranging in size. The two largest sections are the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the Gulf Coast Section with well over 8,000 members. What is interesting is that the average SPE section size is over 300 and the median is under 150 which means we have a lot of sections that are smaller than 150 members, which illustrates the idea of the sections being grassroots. Each section operates independently and somewhat autonomously; they are local in their local area. Each is unique in that they respond to the needs of their members, providing technical exchange, networking opportunities, and engaging with the community. They really are the face of SPE at the local level.