Translating the U.S. Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Silver certification into a standard for all international construction—which the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has pledged to do—may be impossible. Photo: Tom Sawyer Corps holds workshop for staffers to acquaint them with LEED, which the Corps has committed to adopting as a worldwide standard. Related Links: Building Abroad Has Corps of Engineers Working Hard To Adapt Creating high-performance facilities is not the issue, but holding to a LEED rating is problematic. “LEED is a very U.S.-based standard, and trying to take that and apply it overseas
Environmentalists were disappointed by the two-week United Nations-sponsored Copenhagen climate- change summit, which failed to set binding emissions targets. But the Danish conference, attended by 119 government heads, has helped stimulate engineers to promote themselves as low-carbon champions. Indonesian floods are thought to be tied to climate change. Global summit in Copenhagen produced only an outline of how countries may address the issue, but engineering firms see clients who believe “decarbonizing” is going to happen. Related Links: Head Sees Climate Change Chances: Arup Group Gears up to Low Carbon 'Suffering and Economic Collapse' Atkin's Keith Clarke on Global Warming Regardless
Three of four contractor teams prequalified to bid the second major leg of an $8.7-billion transit tunnel under the Hudson River between New Jersey and Manhattan submitted bids that were opened by the owner, New Jersey Transit, on Dec. 15. The project, to dig 5,200-ft-long twin bored tunnels through New Jersey's Palisades rock formation to a river access point in Hoboken, N.J., had been estimated to cost $250 million. A Secaucus, N.J., joint venture of Schiavone Construction Co., Skanska Civil and J.F. Shea was the low bidder at $258.8 million; a joint venture of OHL USA Inc., Davie, Fla., and
Thanks in part to design-build and a lane rental arrangement, a bridge over Interstate 75 near Detroit reopened to traffic on Dec. 11, less than five months after collapsing in flames. Photo: Bergmann Associates Michigan transportation officials and their contractor team credit a lane rental agreement process and design-build for speeding the rebuilding of an Interstate overpass, competed in under five months. The steel beams of the two-span Nine Mile Bridge in Hazel Park, Mich., melted on July 15 after a car hit a tanker truck on six-lane I-75, causing 14,000 gallons of fuel to erupt in flames. “The northbound
The Missouri Dept. of Transportation is building its second “diverging diamond” interchange design that requires motorists at an interchange to temporarily drive on the left side of the road. It was devised by an engineer in graduate school who wasn’t aware the concept already existed in Europe. The Federal Highway Administration has tested and presented the design, and a dozen states are considering using it Photo: MODOT Springfield, Mo., diverging diamond design moves left-turning traffic more easily. The design calls for the approach road on either side of the interchange to curve to the left, so the driver can easily
Geothermal energy “appeared to be on a launch trajectory” in 2009, says the Geothermal Energy Association in its year-end report. With more than 3,150 MW of geothermal capacity on line in the U.S. in August and 144 new geothermal plants under development, the Washington, D.C.-based industry association says the accelerating growth could add 7,000 MW of new plants. The U.S. already leads the world in geothermal installed capacity and could have 10,000 MW in a few years, officials say. GEA credits state and federal policies—including state renewables portfolio standards, the Dept. of Energy’s extension of a loan program for innovative
Wind energy from north-central Oregon will power homes in Southern California when an 845-MW wind farm is completed in 2012. Turbine supplier GE and developer Caithness Energy LLC say the $2-billion project, with 338 wind turbines sprawling across 30 sq miles near the town of Arlington, Ore., will be the world’s largest operating wind farm. Photo: GE Wind turbines to be installed in Oregon will be GE’s largest in the U.S, but similar machines have been successfully operating for several years in Europe and Asia. Under a $1.4-billion contract, Fairfield, Conn.-based GE will furnish and deliver its newest 2.5-MW wind
Two weeks after an 18-in. three-phase common pipeline ruptured on Alaska’s North Slope, spewing more than 1,000 barrels of crude oil, produced water and natural gas from a 24-in. gash, cleanup workers are “trimming” the tundra by hand and with machinery in subzero temperatures to remove oil and produced water. At ENR press time, they had removed the bulk of the spilled material from the surface of the 8,400-sq-ft affected area, says Steve Rinehart, spokesman for producer BP Exploration Alaska Inc. Photo: B. Fultz, Alaska Dept. of Environmental Conservation Spilled material melts for collection with a vacuum rig. Small Bobcat-type
The National Science Foundation confirmed on Dec. 15 that it will delay until next summer award of a long-term contract, worth at least $2 billion, to manage support logistics for the federal governments’s huge polar research program in Antarctica. Raytheon Co., site contractor since 1999, will continue under its existing contract but is not proposing this round. The new contract, originally set for award this fall and about 12.5 years in duration, has generated proposals from seven teams, including those led by AECOM Technology Corp., CH2M Hill Cos., KBR Inc. and Fluor Corp. Parsons Corp. and EG&G Inc., a unit
One year after dikes failed at the Tennessee Valley Authority’s Kingston coal-fired powerplant near Knoxville, Tenn., and sent coal ash spilling over 300 nearby acres and into the Emory River, contractors have removed two-thirds of the river waste and are halfway through the $1-billion cleanup. But the agency and regulatory officials are struggling with how to prevent a repeat of the Dec. 22, 2008, catastrophe. Photo: Sevenson Environmental Services Ash waste that spilled into the Emory River is most critical portion of TVA remediation project. Tom Kilgore, TVA’s CEO, told a congressional subcommittee this month that he expects cleanup and
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