July 2014 BCBusiness 23 PETER HOlST
David Demers
Having preached the gospel of natural gas for nearly
20 years, Westport Innovations
CEO David Demers
believes his told-you-so moment has finally arrived
by David Jordan
A
fter Westport was spun
out of
UBC research in
1995, David Demers had a
vision of natural gas dis-
placing oil as the world's
transportation fuel—not as the
solution to climate change or
dependence on a finite resource,
but as a transition fuel. (Sure, he
says, fuel cells, or solar-powered
jet packs would be nice, but
how do we get there from here?)
Since then he has overseen the
company's growth from five to
more than 1,000 employees as
it develops and manufactures
components for natural-gas
engines. With markets awash in
cheap natural gas, and even the
president of the U.S. extolling its
virtues, Demers believes patient
investors still waiting to see a
profit will finally be rewarded.
Westport got a lot of publicity
in 2012 when President Obama
announced his support for
truck fleets converting to
natural gas. Did that have an
impact on Westport?
We're always happy to hear sup-
port from the president of the
United States, but has there been
any tangible change? No. I've
seen lots of technology transi-
tions that get really messed up
when governments jump on the
bandwagon and then they jump off the
bandwagon. I have no doubt we're going
to see a massive changeover from oil to
natural gas in the transport sector. It's
going to happen; let's just let it be driven
by economics.
Would the development of an
LNG
industry in B.C. have any impact on
Westport?
That's exactly what I'm talking about.
China is building
LNG infrastructure
like there's no tomorrow, so should
B.C. be moving quickly to look at the
E n E R g y
p020-029-FL_july.indd 23 2014-05-29 10:12 AM
