Max Kimber, ‘a boy from the bush’, was brought up in South Australia’s Eyre Peninsula and went on to study engineering under a Commonwealth Scholarship at Adelaide University. After his first year, he won a cadetship with the Post Master General’s Department, completing an Electrical Engineering degree as a cadet engineer over the next three years and graduating with Honours in 1964.

Max immediately started work with the Post Master General’s Department in the Radio Section, building and maintaining long-distance, state of the art, microwave communication systems in remote areas throughout South Australia and the Northern Territory.

When construction of the systems ended, he started looking for the next challenge, and in late 1973 applied for the position of Communications and Control Systems Engineer with The Pipeline Authority (TPA). Max said: “I got the job, along with Ted Davis and Trevor Bird, and we were the nucleus of the operations, engineering and design group of TPA. We undertook a training program which included fifteen months in Britain, Canada, the US, France and Germany.”

On returning to Australia, Max worked with Williams Brothers-CMPS Engineers on the design and construction of the Moomba – Sydney pipeline. He also worked very closely with Harry Butler on environmental matters, and built a long-standing relationship.

A stress corrosion cracking (SCC) failure in the Moomba – Sydney pipeline encouraged Max’s interest in pipeline research, and the CEO, Tom Baker, decided that TPA was going to research the cracking problem thoroughly. “I convinced Tom that there was a great body of useful information on SCC available through the American Pipeline Research Committee. We joined immediately, and became a very significant member. That was another formative part of my career – developing pipeline research.”

After filling various roles within TPA, including Manager, Planning and Development and Engineering Manager, Max moved to the role of General Manager Technical, or Chief Operating Officer, for the last three years of the TPA’s life from 1991 to 1994. He says: “It was an interesting time because we were being privatised and we were the first government-owned pipeline company to be privatised in Australia. During that time I also worked closely with ICI and Santos, to put together a deal to build the ethane pipeline from Moomba to Botany, parallel to the Moomba – Sydney pipeline.”

With the privatisation of TPA, Max went into the consulting business. “I set up my own company called MJ Kimber Consultants. My first job was with the South Australian Government for the sale of the Moomba to Adelaide pipeline system. I helped put together a detailed package of what was really being sold. The easement in some sections of the pipeline had not been terribly well defined. I worked quite closely with Barry Maloney to re-establish the easement,” he says.

Max was then invited to join the board of the Gas Transmission Corporation – a development in his career that saw him learn the requirements of board directorship. This led to involvement with PG&E, and eventually to a strong association with Duke Energy when it bought the Queensland Gas Pipeline and subsequently began a series of expansions within Australia.

Max encouraged PG&E, and subsequently Duke, to be great proponents of coal seam gas before it became popular. “This led us into to the construction of the first pipeline developed explicitly by a pipeline owner for coal seam gas transport to a major market,” Max says.

“Later, Duke purchased BHP’s conceptual plans for the Eastern Gas Pipeline. I helped Duke deal with the details of the purchase – in particular, the gas transport contracts and gas demand forecasts.

“The National Competition Council (NCC) insisted that this pipeline should be regulated, despite our strong protestations to the contrary. Duke took the NCC to the Australian Competition Tribunal and I was appointed as the project manager of the legal case. The Australian Competition Tribunal agreed that the pipeline should not be regulated. It provided a benchmark case for the whole regulatory scene. It became known as ‘The Duke Case’ and it meant that gas pipelines need not be regulated if their owners provide access on reasonable terms.

“Lately I’ve been working on financial and technical issues for clients and do a lot of work with bankers and lawyers on matters such as gas pricing, economic regulation and gas supply and transport. So I’m still closely involved with most sectors of the industry.

“Along with all of that is a strong and abiding interest in – and loyalty to – APIA, where I’m a Board member. I have chaired the Research and Standards Committee since its inception in 1996. It’s a group of kindred spirits, including the likes of Leigh Fletcher and Phil Venton. We work closely together as colleagues on the development of ideas that make our pipelines cheaper and safer to build and operate. We are committed to passing this knowledge on. But we must also try to pass on the passion and keenness that we feel for our industry.

“My career has spanned thirty years in the pipeline industry, and it’s been incredibly rewarding for me. I’ve also got a very supportive wife who understands and knows the industry very well. We have been married 42 years and she’s travelled around the world with me and seen lots of pipelines.”

Max finished by saying: “My problem, of course, will be to confront retirement. I’m not quite sure how I’m going to do it, but that’s for the future.”