Wallace S. Read was born in Newfoundland, Canada and received his Bachelor of Engineering from Nova Scotia Technical College in 1951 before entering the pulp and paper and hydro-electric power industries in his native province. Between 1964 and 1984, he held senior positions with Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro including President of Churchill Falls (Labrador) Corporation, and President and Chief Executive Officer of the Lower Churchill Development Corporation.

In 1985 he joined the Canadian Electricity Association (CEA) serving as its first full time President. In that position, Read worked to promote the interests of electric utilities and the customers they serve and acted as spokesperson on issues of national concern to the electric utility industry. Upon retirement from CEA in 1995, Read accepted a three year appointment as Commissioner on the Public Utilities Board of Newfoundland and Labrador. Currently he is President of REMAS Inc., which provides consulting services to electric power utilities and governments.

Read has also served as Chairman of the Board of the Canadian Center for Marine Communications and as a Director on the Board of SaskPower, the Crown Corporation responsible for the generation, transmission and distribution of electricity in the Province of Saskatchewan.

He was elected 1996 President of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), the world's largest engineering professional society with 370,000 members in 150 countries.

His professional affiliations include being a Life Member of the Association of Professional Engineers and Geoscientists of Newfoundland, a Fellow of the Engineering Institute of Canada and a Life Fellow of the IEEE.

Over the years, he has received numerous awards including IEEE's General A.G.L. McNaughton Gold Medal, the Engineering Institute of Canada's Julian C. Smith Medal, the CEA's Distinguished Service Award, the Canadian Standards Association's John Jenkins Award and the IEEE Power Engineering Society's Power Life Award. In 2001 Dr. Read was inducted in the Canadian Academy of Engineering, in 2003 he was elected a Member of the Order of Canada, and in 2006 he received the EIC's highest honour - the Sir John Kennedy Medal.

In addition to these honours, Doctor of Engineering Degrees (Honoris Causa) were conferred upon him by the Technical University of Nova Scotia in 1992 and by Memorial University of Newfoundland in 1996.