Since the founding of Stanford Research Park in Menlo Park, Calif., in the 1950s, research parks have seen an explosion of growth. Now, their development is tied to life sciences, a field seen by its practitioners as being on the verge of an historic breakthrough. It is fed by investment from sources as disparate as venture capitalists, academia, corporations, philanthropists and government that see the investment as an economic engine, attracting high-paying jobs and further development. "The cluster of industries feed off each other," acting as a magnet for more investment, says Bill Drohan, executive director of the Association of
FINDING NANO Cranes dominate site of $175-million NIST nanoscale lab (above), while $300-million complex will give Human Genome Sciences manufacturing capacity. (Photo top courtesy of HDR Inc.; bottom courtesy of Gilbane Building Co.) Fixing what ails society is generating multibillion-dollar investments in far-reaching arenas of research by the federal government and private sector. The goals are not totally altruistic, however, as agencies vie for new missions that will bolster budgets and prestige, and biotech companies push to turn expensive research into bottom-line profit. One key area of federal R&D investment now is in nanotechnology–the emerging field of molecular and atomic
All LNG import operations require berthing or docking facilities, offloading capability, storage tanks, regasification equipment and sendout lines. Four different offshore concepts mix and match these facilities in novel and creative ways. RELATED LINKS Stymied by Local Resistance, Terminals Take to the Sea Offshore LNG Terminals (Data) A gravity-based structure (GBS) is a massive rectangular, prismatic caisson that rests on the ocean floor. LNG tankers would dock alongside or in tandem and offload into a tank in the caisson’s interior. Regas equipment on the structure would feed the product to a submarine pipeline tied into the onshore gas network. "The
NEW VIEW Fabrication is moving full-speed ahead on patented system for docking LNG ships. (Photo left courtesy of Excelerate Energy LLC) History may be made in January when the world’s first offshore liquefied natural gas receiving terminal and the first new deepwater terminal in the U.S. in nearly 30 years is scheduled to receive its first delivery. Construction of the would-be history-maker will put to rest fierce opposition to basing such facilities on land because of safety and security issues and help the U.S. fill a natural gas shortage by supplementing domestic supplies with imports. Norway-based engineering-procurement-construction contractor Advanced Production
I-Room. Construction information workspace links programs in synchronized display. (Photo by Tom Sawyer for ENR) Making fast decisions is easy. Any fool can do that. Making good decisions fast is what’s hard. Now, more and more firms are turning to visualization tools to help make that possible. A look at how some are doing it suggests that a revolution in construction communications is under way. People up and down the chain of construction are churning out graphics created with blends of digital photographs and three-dimensional design data. They are manipulating images as models or animated construction sequences, or snapping off
ASIA'S PROMISE Singapore sewer job is lucrative, but follow-up is tough. (Photo courtesy of CH2M Hill) The war in Iraq failed to provide much help for a flat non-U.S. environmental remediation market in 2003. Since weapons of mass destruction production were never found, there were no cleanup contracts let for WMD production site remediation. As one observer points out, that may be bad for the White House and a handful of big-Energy Dept. contractors, but it’s good news for the rest of us. After President Bush declared the end of hostilities in May 2003, many hoped to see an aggressive
By recalling Ambassador L. Paul (Jerry) Bremer from Baghdad two days early on June 28, the Bush administration could claim it had met at least one element of its ambitious Iraqi reconstruction schedule. The coalition was wrong on so many other counts–the number of Iraqis it would employ, the amount of power it could produce, the volume of oil it could export, how many troops it would need. Defeating Saddam Hussein’s demoralized army, already thoroughly trounced in the Gulf War and prevented from reloading by economic sanctions, proved relatively easy for the strongest military force in history. RELATED LINKS Caught
By its 788-MW nameplate rating, al Daura is the biggest electricity producer in Baghdad. But in output it’s a basket case, limping along at 80 or 90 MW on a good day. That doesn’t mean it’s a failed project, according to Francis Canavan, Bechtel’s spokesman in Baghdad. It’s just a tough one. In e-mailed replies to inquiries he explains why. When U.S. Army engineers entered the plant on April 14, 2003, damage from fighting was minor, but dilapidation was extreme (ENR 4/21/03 p. 12). Daura has four 160-MW thermal units. Two are Italian and two are German. It also has
Let’s get the bad news out of the way first: revenue for ENR’s Top 200 environmental firms dropped 4% in 2003 to $31.4 billion. Among the market sectors, water work numbers shrank the most—a $725-million contraction representing an 11% drop. Other sector declines include air (-11%), nuclear (-10%), wastewater treatment (-8%) and hazardous waste (3%). The two sectors that recorded positive revenue movement during 2003 were environmental management, up 17% to just over $2 billion, and environmental science, up 6% to slightly under $2 billion. But those increases may be misleading since $1.1 billion has flowed out of the undesignated
(Photo by Tudor Hampton for ENR) The war in Iraq, combined with tight U.S. inventories in a rebounding economy, have pushed crude oil prices to levels that have not been seen in decades. While prices have eased somewhat recently, continuing jitters in global oil markets appear poised to have a dramatic impact on the derivative liquid asphalt market. "Asphalt prices are moving up higher and faster than ever before," says Scott Rowe, vice president of Tulsa-based CITGO, one of the nation’s largest refiners of liquid asphalt. Prices also surged last year in the first quarter, but it was due to
RSS
