William A. Thue graduated with a BS in electrical engineering in 1946 while in the US Navy. He was employed by Florida Power & Light Co. (FP&L) for 38 years, where he specialized in engineering and operations of underground cable systems for their generation, distribution, and transmission systems. He was active in the development of industry standards for cables and accessories. Thue has authored and coauthored many AIEE and IEEE papers on cable shielding, fireproofing, performance, and life estimation. He also authored a chapter in the 1957 Underground Systems Reference Book on duct construction.
He is a life fellow in the IEEE, past chair of the Insulated Conductors Committee of IEEE (where he has been a member for over 55 years and received their Outstanding Service Award in 1985), past chair of the Cable Engineering Section of the AEIC, and past chair of two subcommittees of the National Electrical Safety Code (ANSI C-2), and a member of EPRI’s Distribution Task Force. He is a member of the Institution of Engineering and Technology (previously, the IEE in the UK) and the Royal Institution. After taking early retirement from FP&L, he began a consulting engineer career in 1984, where he has been involved in research projects for EPRI, taught short courses at the University of California at Los Angles and the University of Wisconsin–Madison during the past 30 years, was editor of Electrical Power Cable Engineering, and involved in over 150 legal cases as an expert witness.