Big shoes to fill

If you’ve been an avid reader of Ecolibrium over the past decade and a half, you’ll notice that, for the first time in 160-odd issues, there’s a new editor. It’s with a mixture of excitement and nervousness that I take the reins from the inimitable Matt Dillon.  

Matt is the manager who showed faith in me nine months ago and accepted me into the AIRAH publications team. It’s a job I’ve cherished and one that continues to both challenge me and encourage my creativity. I expect nothing less from editing Ecolibrium. 

If you’ve met both Matt and myself, you’ll know that we’re of a similar height and build. We’ve both played plenty of basketball in our time, but I daresay we’re better at writing three-pagers than we are at shooting three-pointers. 

All of which is to say that there are some pretty big shoes to fill – both metaphorically and literally – at the Ecolibrium editor’s desk.  

It’s hard to quantify the amount of knowledge and experience you lose when someone of Matt’s ilk leaves. He’s like an encyclopaedia of Australian HVAC&R. I could spend an hour on Google looking for the perfect person to interview for a story and thinking of the appropriate questions to ask them, or I could turn around and ask Matt. 

As Matt once told me: “A good magazine is actually several magazines rolled into one.” 

One reader might be a 30-year AIRAH member who is across all but the most cutting-edge developments in the industry. The next might be someone with no formal HVAC&R training who works in a related field and wants to get a fresh perspective on sustainable building. Ecolibrium needs to cater to both those readers, and everyone in between.  

My colleagues and I have the skills to cover news, tell important stories, and present case studies. But one thing we can’t do is write the peer-reviewed Forum technical papers that form the backbone of Ecolibrium’s offering.  

That’s where we need your input. If you have an idea for a Forum paper, please reach out to the email address at the bottom of this column.  

This issue’s Forum paper comes from reigning James Harrison medallist Stefan Jensen, L.AIRAH, and focuses on dry expansion ammonia refrigeration. Our cover feature is a fascinating insight into the importance and benefits of biophilic design from Jane Toner, an architect and PhD candidate at Griffith University.  

Our other features include a case study of the high-spec geothermal HVAC system at the Australian War Memorial in Canberra, a deep dive into the new air filter standard by members of AIRAH’s Indoor Air Quality Special Technical Group, and a wrap of the Institute’s recent IAQ24 conference.  

We also speak with Rula Karali, M.AIRAH, who has recently taken over as chair of the Victorian division committee, and Abraham Corona, M.AIRAH, who in July began his tenure as AIRAH’s Industry Impact Manager. 

I doubt I’ll ever be able to fill the hole left by Matt Dillon. But I hope I can put together a magazine that caters to Ecolibrium’s full spectrum of readers, just as he always did.