Stacking the deck isn't always cheating. With the help of our friend Paul Ehrlich, P.E., of the Building Intelligence Group, our first-ever Building Automation Conference offered a slew of industry "face cards" to provide some presentation firepower. Beforehand, and in Baltimore, Jessica Yamin and the rest of our conference staff promoted and organized what really did amount to a good deal for attendees. And ultimately - to borrow from the ever-popular poker terminology - we drew an ace "on the river" when about 150 of you shuffled in to energize the conference.
The wireless storm that blew out of the windy city at this year's AHR Expo is forming connectivity clouds on our horizons. Is this a change in the weather? I am not sure. A change in our industry? Absolutely. The excitement that was in Chicago is spreading across the country, following the crowd to BuilConn in Palm Springs.
The commissioning lexicon currently includes terms such as recommissioning, retro-commissioning, and continuous commissioning. This month, I'd like to explore a concept that may not be new, but which I believe is an integral part of commissioning a building renovation project. By giving it a name, I'm hoping it may be more likely to become common practice. I'd like to dub it pre-commissioning.
I thought Howard McKew's "Tomorrow's Engineer" column on commissioning services ("How Do You Sell Commissioning Services?" July 2005, page 70) was informative, but I feel it failed to mention a problematic area that has been occurring on larger projects with increasing regularity: The lack of overall system integration.
In my experience, one of the trouble spots in project specifications is coordinating the control panels furnished with mechanical equipment with the standards that apply to the balance of electrical equipment on the project. Regardless of what you may include about NEMA enclosure types, short-circuit ratings, and other features, manufacturers tend to supply their standard control panel. The result is often an installation that cannot be verified to meet code or project requirements.
The largest ever AHR Expo 2006 in Chicago was a kaleidoscope of change, powered by the windy city itself. The energy and feeling of the transition into a new era was everywhere. Industry synergy abounded and the feeling of all the pieces fitting together was never greater. When I returned from this event, I wrote down 10 observations that I formulated at the show, which I call "My 10 Takeaways from AHR Expo, Chicago," and which appear on the AutomatedBuildings.com website
For years, consulting engineers would blame the ATC contractor when systems did not operate as designed or as hoped. Blaming the ATC contractor seemed like an easy target, since the design engineer probably used the ATC firm's standard sequence of operation within their contract specification and abdicated the responsibility for the system to work to the ATC contractor in the construction phase.
In the life of a building design and construction process, various formal and informal forms of communication are used - written or verbal communication and body language are a few. Communication influences decision, and these decisions ultimately need to be documented in formal written formats such as meeting minutes, memos, phone logs, and contract documents (specifications and drawings).
In response to Howard McKew's "Tomorrow's Engineer" column about construction CAD layering standards (April 2005, page 78), it seems to me that the AEC industry as a whole would benefit from having such standards, although this would likely be difficult to achieve. With each company having their own standards, the transfer of information becomes infinitely more difficult, and it would be interesting to watch how the use of building information models might force such a change.
As far as song titles go, you can't get much more generic than "We Belong Together." In fact, a quick search of www.allmusic.com reveals at least 50 recording artists who have released a song with that title, and I'd bet almost all of those are separate compositions. Personally, I prefer Rickie Lee Jones' version, but if you take the title and apply a typical late-winter head cold, then you get where we're headed this month: the new ES Blog at http://blog.esmagazine.com.