The Water Guy

My name is Steve — and I'm NOT a water salesman.

As a young man I graduated from the University of Arizona in Tucson with a BS in Engineering Physics — with more than enough credits for a Minor in Mathematics, more physics credits than required of BA Physics majors, plus all the engineering credits required of a BS Engineering degree. I cannot say enough good things about this program — it taught me how to think and solve problems in my own unique way.

My first job was with Public Service Company of New Mexico, an electric utility, where I started as an Energy Conservation Engineer and later supervised a team of 4 engineers and 4 technicians. I'm proud of what we accomplished there and grateful for the many remarkable people I worked with and met along the way.

If I could highlight just two things from those years:

The first was working with Los Alamos National Laboratory to develop "super insulation" and "passive solar" home guidelines and standards for my utility's 7 New Mexico service territories. That work led to teaching vocational students in Las Vegas, NM how to design passive solar homes — designs eventually adopted by local builders, resulting in over 30 all-electric homes with average heating bills of just $10 a month. No wood burning stoves. In a cold climate.

The second was helping my employer become the first utility in the country to comply with the then-new federal Residential Conservation Service law requiring utilities to provide free energy audits and identify cost-effective energy-saving home retrofits. I wrote the training curriculum, provided the training to large groups of people that allowed my company and other companies to certify their energy auditors, and watched the program get adopted in other states.

After 12 years I left the utility industry, moved to Tucson, and became a Licensed Residential and Small Commercial General Contractor — complementing my Professional Engineer credentials by actually building spec homes in the Tucson market.

Then in 1998, I stumbled onto a sleeper product that almost nobody knew about.

It was a water-cooled automatic electric steam distiller unlike anything else on the market. Instead of blowing heat around your kitchen or utility room like every air-cooled distiller did, it sent the heat down the drain. It installed under the sink — right where the water supply and drain were already located, and right where you'd mount a pure water tap. The storage tank never needed sanitizing like air-cooled distillers do. And a special boiler feature reduced descaling from once a month to once a year. What's not to like! Right?

I used it for a year and couldn't believe nobody knew it existed. I felt an obligation to change that — so I started selling it.

I repeated this process over and over for 28 years — always testing first, always on myself, always for at least a year. It took me a long time to find a whole-house water softener that didn't deliver slimy water. When I finally found one I believed in, I added it. That's how I've always operated. Find something I genuinely believe in. Use it myself for at least a year. Only then offer it to others — not by repeating marketing claims, but by reporting what actually holds up in real life.

I used that incredible water-cooled distiller for 15 years. Then one day the manufacturer simply disappeared. No parts. No service. No replacement.