460 Building Boiler Talent: Fundamentals, Online Training, and Better Partnerships with Eric Johnson
Scaling UP! H2O
Boilers can feel intimidating the first time you step into a boiler room—the heat, the noise, the pressure gauge, and the weight of knowing that mistakes can be costly. Trace Blackmore opens with a reminder that boilers deserve respect, not fear—and that learning fundamentals is how you replace mystique with clarity. The talent gap behind the boiler room door , Founder and CEO of , explains why boiler expertise is becoming harder to replace. He points to the shrinking pipeline of boiler-trained technicians—historically strengthened by Navy steam...
info_outline
459 From Wastewater to Resource: Water Reuse with Dr. Veronika Zhiteneva
Scaling UP! H2O
Industrial water professionals are increasingly pulled into conversations about scarcity, resilience, and “where the next gallon comes from.” , CEO and Co-founder of frames water reuse as an implementation challenge more than a technology gap—and explains where the practical starting points are when the scope feels overwhelming. Moving reuse forward when the technology already exists Waterloop Solutions was founded to accelerate implementation: clarifying end-use quality, identifying post-treatment needs on the back end of...
info_outline
458 Hiring Olympics and High-Performance Culture with J.D. Roth
Scaling UP! H2O
"Stay curious. And you only have one reputation. Guard it with your life." Hiring for judgment, not just rehearsed confidence Industrial water treatment is full of decisions made with incomplete data—on sites, with customers, and inside the business. (Managing Director and Co-owner of ) builds his hiring around that reality. His aim is straightforward: protect the team and the culture by selecting people who can think, collaborate, and lead under pressure. JD frames the organization as a group of people choosing to work toward a common goal: building a better future for...
info_outline
457 2026: A New Year with New Intentions
Scaling UP! H2O
Trace Blackmore opens 2026 with a practical reset: how to plan with urgency, sharpen the fundamentals that make troubleshooting easier, and use the tools around this podcast to keep your development moving all year. The 12-Week Year: urgency you can use Annual goals often feel “far away” until December forces focus. The 12-week year flips that dynamic by treating each quarter like a year—creating urgency sooner and giving you four chances to reset and improve. Trace walks through the structure: start with a vision (he uses a three-year example), then choose 3–5 tactical...
info_outline
456 The 12 Days of Scaling UP! H2O 2025
Scaling UP! H2O
A year-end recap is more than a highlight reel—it’s a practical reset. In this New Year episode, Trace Blackmore walks through 2025 using a “12 Days of the Scaling Up Nation” format, tying together performance, community growth, listener engagement, and the sponsor support that keeps the podcast and its companion tools available at no cost. Year-end by the numbers Trace explains how he used to track every stat closely—and how that shifted into an unhealthy measure of self-worth—so the team now uses numbers as feedback, not validation. He notes the...
info_outline
455 Mentors, Mindset, and the CWT: Owning Your Water Career with Nella Fergusson
Scaling UP! H2O
“So one thing I never do is try to start giving remediation or advice before I truly have understood and diagnosed the problem.” Mentorship and certifications don’t replace experience—but they can accelerate it when paired with the right mindset and a disciplined approach to learning. (District Manager, Southern California, ), lays out what “growing up” in industrial water treatment actually looks like: repeated exposure to real problems, strong diagnostic habits, and a willingness to keep learning long after year one. Learning that keeps...
info_outline
454 Water Recycling, Innovation, and Industry Wisdom with Dr. Kelle Zeiher
Scaling UP! H2O
Industrial cooling is one of the biggest levers industrial facilities can pull on water use—and it’s getting harder to ignore as data centers and other high-heat operations grow. Returning guest (Project Manager at ) breaks down what water reuse looks like when you move past slogans and into the realities of pretreatment, concentrate management, footprint, and cost. Cooling water reuse: the scale of the opportunity Dr. Zeiher reframes “drought” beyond rainfall, emphasizing aquifer recharge and the limits of focusing only on household restrictions. She...
info_outline
453 Water Risk, Governance, and Community Engagement with Dr. Annette Davison
Scaling UP! H2O
Industrial water professionals sit at the intersection of risk, regulation, and community trust. In this episode, (“the water risk doctor”) joins Trace Blackmore to show how disciplined governance, clear supply chain thinking, and community engagement can turn fragmented water systems into coherent, defensible risk management frameworks. Water risk from source to customer Annette starts with a simple question most customers never ask: “Where’s your water coming from?” She walks through a conceptual supply chain from source to end point—collection, transfer, treatment,...
info_outline
452 UV Innovation and Whole-Building Water Safety with Ron Blutrich
Scaling UP! H2O
Entamoeba histolytica nearly ended Ron Blutrich’s scientific career. Instead, it pushed him to rethink how we protect people in multi-family buildings, senior facilities, and dense urban centers from invisible microbiological risks in their drinking water. In this episode, he joins host Trace Blackmore to unpack what whole-building UV can (and can’t) do for Legionella, biofilm, and real-world water safety. When One Bad Cup of Water Redefines a Career In the middle of his PhD in molecular genetics, Ron drank from an under-sink reverse osmosis tap at an Airbnb and...
info_outline
451 Building a Culture of Innovation and Customer Service with Frank Lecrone
Scaling UP! H2O
What happens when you build a company around one niche, listen obsessively to customers, and never stop improving? In this episode, host Trace Blackmore finally sits down for a full-length conversation with , Founder, President, and CEO of . What started in a small 60' x 60' space in Hanover, Pennsylvania, with three employees, maxed-out credit cards, and endless Staples runs has grown into a 300+-person organization serving industrial water professionals around the world. Frank shares how AquaPhoenix became “the booth everyone wants to be next to” at...
info_outline
Boiler rooms reward clarity: how many BTUs from the flame actually arrive in steam—and stay there to do useful work? For Boiler Tuesday, Trace Blackmore, CWT, treats boiler care as heat-transfer management across the full train, from feedwater and deaeration to distribution and condensate return, with dry steam as the operational benchmark.
Heat Transfer Is a Leadership MetricDry steam isn’t a detail; it’s throughput. Steam on its worst day carries ~1,150 BTUs while hot water on its best day carries ~180 BTUs. When carryover creates wet steam, production loses energy at the point of use. Treating “BTUs-in-steam” as a shared KPI aligns maintenance, operations, and finance around the same outcome: efficient work.
The Steam Train: Protect the Interfaces
Trace maps the sequence—pretreatment → feedwater/DA → boiler → steam lines → condensate return—and explains where heat transfer is taxed when fouling or poor practices creep in. Recover condensate BTUs, verify deaerator performance, keep tube interfaces clean, and protect dryness at end users. Each interface preserved is energy returned to work.
Field Perspectives & Safety
Concise greetings from global practitioners reinforce fundamentals and vigilance. Barry Higgins underscores soft, high-quality water for “fluffy steam.” Ivan Morales contrasts OTSGs with conventional boilers and the implications for steam quality. Ben Frieders offers a memorable safety reminder: disciplined restarts and gasket integrity are non-negotiable in steam environments.
Boiler Tuesday is a call to manage heat-transfer efficiency, not just chemistry. Protect interfaces, speak in BTUs, and make dryness measurable where the work happens.
Stay engaged, keep learning, and continue scaling up your knowledge!
Timestamps
02:20 — Welcome and IWW25 context; Boiler Tuesday focus (why: frame the professional lens for the week).
03:46 — “Heat transfer efficiency managers”: defining the water treater’s job (why: reframes role beyond chemistry)
08:13 — Technology parity; execution and knowledge as differentiators (why: invest in people and practice).
09:59 — The train: feedwater/DA, boiler, lines, condensate return (why: systems thinking prevents local optimization)
12:52 — Guest greetings begin: international and cross-industry viewpoints (why: broaden operating context).
14:04 — Barry Higgins: soft water for “fluffy steam” (why: pretreatment quality → steam quality).
16:18 — Ivan Morales: OTSG vs conventional cycles and steam quality differences (why: choose tech with eyes open).
17:36 — Ben Frieders: post-inspection restart incident and safety lesson (why: operational discipline in steam).
20:19 — Detective H2O: The Case of Having The Blues
25:07 — Boiler Tuesday call to action: share photos, use IWW25 hashtag (why: community and practice sharing).
Connect with Barry Higgins
Phone: +353 87 987 8606
Email: bhiggins@aquachem.ie
Website: www.aquachem.ie
LinkedIn: in/barry-higgins-bagrsc-59030225
Connect with Ivan Morales
Website: www.ecolab.com/nalco-water/
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/ivan-morales-mba-06793b5/
Connect with Ben Frieders
Phone: (317) 719-1452
Email: bfrieders@zinkan.com
Website: https://www.getchemready.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/benjaminfrieders/
https://www.linkedin.com/company/getchemready/
Links Mentioned
AWT (Association of Water Technologies)
Scaling UP! H2O Academy video courses
Industrial Water Week Scaling UP H2O Resource Page
353 Steam Boilers: Essential Checks, Part 1
354 Steam Boilers: Essential Checks, Part 2
366 Produced Water: Expert Perspectives and Practical Tips
420 Tapping Into Tech: How Ben Frieders Uses AI to Elevate Water Treatment Marketing
