Scott Siddens, Senior Editor

Emergency power for financial data centers

For any facility that handles key financial data, 100% up time is a must. When there is a power event, this kind of reliability depends on a seamless system of transferring power from primary to backup systems.

Rethinking high-rise egress, top to bottom

Good egress design was fairly simple when high-rises first became popular: Provide enough stairways and doors for people to get out, and designers were set. Not true anymore—Sept. 11 changed all that. Now engineers must think about reinforced stairways, evacuation by elevator, and mass notification systems.

Greening the Caribbean

Standard Refrigeration Co. Inc.'s Guaynabo, Puerto Rico, facility was getting old. Real estate costs were skyrocketing. The shared office and manufacturing space just wasn't cutting it any more. The mechanical/electrical contracting firm, founded 60 years ago, had to move. But firm officials didn't want just to build a new facility—they wanted a unique, sustainable building.

2007 Product of the Year

2007 MVP — Received most reader votes online: Dual flush toilet Ultra Flush technology uses the standard water supply to pressurize air inside a toilet tank and drive water into the bowl with accelerated force, thereby conserving the amount of water required. The dual-flush model incorporates two flush buttons: the long flush uses 1.

Cabling Innovations

A few years back, it seemed that whenever engineering professionals talked about innovations in cabling, the topic was focused on new offerings in fire-rated cable, and on the newest UL-certified cable product for fire and life-safety systems: ceramified circuit integrity (CI) cable. Certainly, there continues to be advances in this area.

Industrial Energy Stars

Owners and managers of manufacturing facilities used to be heavily focused on managing the costs of process and production. They always were thinking about lean manufacturing and 'six sigma.' And while energy efficiency—and cost—is a concern, they tended to defer to others on the issue. But with programs like the EPA's ENERGY STAR geared toward the plant, the best and the brightest ...

Academic Reliability

In order to handle future electrical demand, a major scientific university (name withheld by request) in the Boston metropolitan area undertook an ambitious program in the last few years to upgrade every facet of its power distribution system. As one of the premier technical engineering research and educational institutions in the nation, the school is well aware of its critical need for ensuri...

Variable Refrigerant Systems Make for Zoned HVAC Control

Several manufacturers offer variable refrigerant volume or variable refrigerant flow (VRF) HVAC systems. And while there are differences among the various systems, all of them react to changes in heating and cooling requirements by varying the flow of refrigerant. This is accomplished by using inverter technology to vary the speed of a compressor, or by making use of multiple compressors of var...

Health Code

The whole is the sum of its parts. And nothing demonstrates this old maxim better than the seamless integration of engineered building systems at the recently completed Center for Health & Healing at Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU) in Portland. “The building has so many different kinds of systems.

A Show of Power

With enactment of the Energy Policy Act of 2005 last year, the power industry was dealt a new hand in the power generation game in coming years. This year's PowerGen International, which convenes Nov. 28 through 30 at Orlando's Orange County Convention Center, will provide some answers to attendees' questions about the new power picture.