Dr. Edmund O. Schweitzer III, SEL President, is recognized as a pioneer in digital protection and holds the grade of Fellow of the IEEE, a title bestowed on less than one percent of IEEE members. In 2002, he was elected a member of the National Academy of Engineering. He is the recipient of the Graduate Alumni Achievement Award from Washington State University and the Purdue University Outstanding Electrical and Computer Engineer Award.

In September 2005, he was awarded an honorary doctorate from Universidad Autónoma de Nuevo León in Monterrey, Mexico, for his contribution to the development of electric power systems worldwide. He has written dozens of technical papers in the areas of digital relay design and reliability and holds more than 30 patents pertaining to electric power system protection, metering, monitoring, and control.

Dr. Schweitzer received his Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in electrical engineering from Purdue University, and his PhD from Washington State University. He served on the electrical engineering faculties of Ohio University and Washington State University, and in 1982, he founded Schweitzer Engineering Laboratories, Inc. to develop and manufacture digital protective relays and related products and services. Today, SEL is an employee-owned company, which serves the electric power industry worldwide, and is certified to the international quality standard ISO-9001. SEL equipment is in service at voltages from 5 kV through 500 kV, to protect feeders, motors, transformers, capacitor banks, transmission lines, and other power apparatus.