CEAC-2023-3-March

DON’T LET YOUR BUSINESS GO UP IN FLAMES!
100% TAX DEDUCTIBLE
INSTALL OR RETROFIT FIRE
SPRINKLERS TODAY!
DEDUCT THE FULL COST OF QUALIFIED PROPERTY IMPROVEMENT!
CARES ACT
The Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES)
Act closed a loophole that was included in the TCJA by
making QIP 15-year property. This change made businesses
of all sizes, regardless of the amounts spent on equipment,
eligible to deduct the full cost of commercial fire sprinkler
systems using bonus depreciation.
The time is now to upgrade your building's fire safety with a
fire sprinkler system or a sprinkler retrofit. Under the new
Section 179 guidelines, the one year deduction period
phases out after 2022. Any new sprinkler system or retrofit
completed between September 27, 2017 and December 31,
2022 will be able to be fully expensed in one year. After
2022, the allowed deduction percentage is as follows:
2021: 100%
2022: 100%
2023: 80%
2024: 60%
2025: 40%
2026: 20%
2027 and after: The depreciation schedule becomes
permanently set at 15 years.
WHAT IS QIP?
The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA), passed in December,
2017, gave small businesses the ability to deduct the full
cost of Qualified Improvement Property (QIP) up to $1.04
million in the year of installation using Section 179.
QIP is defined as improvements to the interior of an existing
building that is not residential property. Commercial fire
sprinkler systems, including upgrades of existing systems or
retrofitting in existing structures, are considered QIP.
The Section 179 deduction is not phased out over time.
However, there is a phase out of the amount allowed as a
deduction based on a maximum spending amount of $2.59
million on equipment in a year. Businesses that spend over
that amount will see a dollar for dollar reduction of their
eligible deduction. So a business that spends $3.63 million
or more on equipment in a given year would not be allowed
any Section 179 Deduction.
WHAT HAS CHANGED?
Prior to the TCJA allowing Section 179 on qualified
improvement property, including sprinkler systems,
property of this type was only allowed a deduction on a
straight line basis over a period of 39 years. In other words,
a company spending $390,000 on a commercial sprinkler
system prior to the TCJA would only deduct $10,000 per
year for 39 years.
While many believe that the intention of Congress was to
make Qualified Improvement Property 15-year property,
which would have made this property eligible for bonus
depreciation, the TCJA left the life of this property at 39
years. So, a taxpayer who did not elect to use the Section
179 Deduction or who has that deduction phased out would
have been left to depreciate the remaining balance of the
assets over a 39-year period.
Neither of these deductions is currently available for fire
sprinkler systems installed in residential high rises. The
National Fire Sprinkler Association (NFSA) continues to fight
to obtain incentives for residential structures.
For more information on how these tax incentives might impact the business of your
contractors, we would recommend that they contact their tax professionals, as
situations differ based on the facts and circumstances for each business. As a general
rule, we would not recommend that the Local provide tax advice to the contractors.
CALL OR CLICK 708­710­1448 • FireProtectionContractors.com

March 2023
VOLUME 88 • Number 3
Official Magazine of
Founded 1934
Dedicated to the Precept “That Anything Being
Done - Can Be Done Better”
Business and Editorial Office:
4701 Midlothian Turnpike, Ste. 4
Crestwood, IL 60418
Phone: 708-293-1720 | Fax: 708-293-1432
E-mail: info@chiefengineer.org
www.chiefengineer.org
Chief Engineer magazine
(ISSN 1553-5797) is published 12 times per year for
Chief Engineers Association of Chicagoland by:
Fanning Communications
4701 Midlothian Turnpike, Ste 4
Crestwood, IL 60418
www.fanningcommunications.com
38
8
35
cover story:
Disaster Remediation in a Secure
Environment
When ACR Restoration & Construction Services got a call to
remediate a data storage room full of highly confidential
materials damaged by fire, smoke and water, and that could
not be brought outside the building, they had a new sort of
challenge before them.
Troubleshooting Commercial
Pumps
Taco Comfort Solutions offers direction on dealing with
“pump issues” in the field.
Clean Technology Lasers: New Tool
in Surface Pretreatment for Superior
Coating Adhesion
New precision laser technology offers a clean alternative
for surface pre-treatment to remove rust, paint and
contaminants, allowing for an optimal substrate primed for
coating adhesion.
Publisher
John J. Fanning
john@chiefengineer.org
Editor In Chief
Karl J. Paloucek
karlp@chiefengineer.org
Editor/Graphic Designer
Rob Durkee
robertd@chiefengineer.org
Accounting/Billing
Leslie Johnson
lesliej@chiefengineer.org
Social Media Specialist
Jamal Mizyed
jamalm@chiefengineer.org
IT Developer
Mike Zeballos
mikez@chiefengineer.org
Subscription rate is $36.00 per year in the United States and Canada; $110.00
per year in all other foreign countries. POSTMASTER: Send address changes
to 4701 Midlothian Tpk, Ste. 4, Crestwood, IL 60418.
All statements, including product claims, are those of the person or
organization making the statement or claim. The publisher does not adopt
any such statements as its own, and any such statement or claim does not necessarily
reflect the opinion of the publisher © 2023 Fanning Communications.
5 president’s message
6 in brief
8 news
48 member news
50 techline
56 new products
62 events
64 ashrae update
66 american street guide
68 boiler room annex
70 advertisers list
Volume 88 · Number 3 | 3

DON’T LET YOUR
BUSINESS GO UP
IN FLAMES!
The Fire Protection Contractors work on all aspects of fire protection
systems. Starting with the initial design of your system to the installation we
are with you every step of the way. Almost as important as installing a fire
sprinkler system is the routine maintenance. This includes inspection and
testing to ensure the system is working and, in most areas, required by law.
24 Hour Emergency Service
Inspection, Testing and
Maintenance
Fire Pump Testing
Design and Installation –
Residential, Commercial,
Industrial
Retrofit and Remodel
Fire Suppression Systems
CALL OR CLICK ANYTIME FOR
EMERGENCY OR ROUTINE SERVICE
708­710­1448 • FireProtectionContractors.com

PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE
Dear Members,
BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Dan Carey
Trustee
312-446-1967
Bryan McLaughlin
Doorkeeper
708-687-6254
Robert Jones
Warden
773-407-5111
OFFICERS
Ken Botta
President
708-952-1879
Douglas Kruczek
Vice President
312-287-4915
Laurence McMahon
Vice President
708-535-7003
Ralph White
Recording Secretary
708-579-0259
Brian Staunton
Treasurer
312-533-1575
Brendan Winters
Financial Secretary
773-457-6403
Barbara Hickey
Sergeant-At-Arms
773-350-9673
Kevin Kenzinger
Corresponding Secretary
312-296-5603
DIRECTORS
John McDonagh
Curator
312-296-7887
Brock Sharapata
Warden
312-617-7115
Michael Collins
Warden
708-712-0126
A big thanks to everyone who
came out to enjoy our Skatefest
event last month. If you weren’t
there, you missed a great afternoon
of family fun!
Next up, of course, is our annual
St. Patrick’s Day event at the
Irish American Heritage Center
(4626 N. Knox Ave., Chicago)
on Wednesday, March 15, 2023.
This is one of the most popular
events the Chiefs hosts every
year, and certainly the most
popular dinner. We expect a big
turnout as usual for this night, so
we encourage you to register as
soon as possible. Look forward to
an evening of great food, great
brews and great music from The Boils, as well as plenty of lively conversation.
To register, visit the Upcoming Events page at www.chiefengineer.
org. We look forward to seeing you there!
Also coming up fast is the return of our usually biennial Vendor Fair. We
were sorry to have had to cancel them during the roughest part of the
pandemic, but we’re especially glad to be bringing this tradition back
to Chicago Gaelic Park on Wednesday, April 19, 2023, from 4:00-8:00pm.
This event is open to all vendors, not just CEAC Associate Member organizations,
so spread the word. If you’re interested in showcasing your
products or services at this year’s Vendor Fair, please free to contact me
(kbotta@sbcglobal.net) or any of the other members of the Vendor Fair
Committee: Ralph White (rwhite@chiefengineer.org), Michael Collins
(mcollins@chiefengineer.org), Larry McMahon (lmcmahon@chiefengineer.
org), Brian Staunton (bstaunton@chiefengineer.org), Patrick Wawrzyniak
(pwawrzyniak@chiefengineer.org) or Sean Casey (scasey@chiefengineer.
org).
The Vendor Fair provides us a chance to interact with our vendors and to
see what’s current in our industry that we should know about. We hope
that all of the Chief Engineers will be in attendance to take advantage
of the available technology and expertise. It’s a great opportunity to advance
your knowledge about the solutions that can keep your buildings
running as well and as efficiently as possible, and in line with ever-evolving
regulations and codes imposed on our industry.
Finally, thanks to all of our Active and Associate Members for your ongoing
support of the CEAC. Let’s continue to keep our men and women of
the military and our first responders in our thoughts, and we’ll see you at
the St. Patrick’s Day meeting on March 15!
Sincerely,
Patrick Wawrzyniak
Warden
773-410-2326
Pat Biesty
Warden
312-618-6864
Sean Casey
Warden
312-890-9282
Thomas Phillips
Past President
773-445-7423
Ken Botta
Volume 88 · Number 3 | 5

In Brief
Power Outage Cancels, Diverts Flights at
Kennedy Airport
NEW YORK (AP) — A power outage in a terminal of New
York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport Feb. 16
stretched into a second day after forcing some flights to be
canceled or diverted, including one that was turned around
and sent back to New Zealand after nearly making it to the
U.S.
The airport operators said in a tweet late Thursday, Feb.
16 that Terminal 1, which handles some of the airport’s
international flights, would remain closed the following day
“due to electrical issues.”
The outage was caused by an electrical panel failure that led
to a small fire, which was quickly extinguished, authorities
said.
The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which
runs New York’s major airports, said it was working to
accommodate affected flights at JFK’s four other active
terminals.
No Hazardous Materials Spill in Michigan
Train Derailment
officials were monitoring reports Friday, Feb. 17, of sooty
matter being found on parked cars throughout the state.
The state Department of Energy and Environmental
Protection said it was unclear what exactly was falling from
the sky or why, but it had not led to unhealthy air quality.
In a statement, the department said monitors “have not
been able to determine any singular source, such as a forest
fire, power plant, or transportation-related emissions, that
would cause this.”
Officials said there had been reports of moderate amounts
of fine particles in the air from air-quality monitors in the
Northeast from Washington, D.C., through New Jersey,
western New York, Connecticut and Massachusetts.
In neighboring New York, state environmental officials are
investigating reports of an unusual odor in the Hudson
Valley. The source of the odor was unclear.
Connecticut’s environmental agency said a cold front and
rain the afternoon of Friday, Feb. 17, were expected to
reduce those levels back into the “good” range.
The department said that air flow at 1,500 feet was
following the Interstate 95 corridor northeast into New
England.
VAN BUREN TOWNSHIP, Mich. (AP) — A train hauling
hazardous materials derailed Thursday, Feb. 16, near Detroit,
but none spilled, officials said.
The Norfolk Southern train derailed nearly two weeks after
a Norfolk Southern derailment in Ohio left a mangled and
charred mass of boxcars that had been carrying various
hazardous chemicals.
Video recorded of the derailment in Van Buren Township,
Mich., showed that more than a half-dozen cars derailed,
some of them left sideways across the tracks.
The derailment just before 9:00am west of Detroit
Metropolitan Wayne County Airport left the tracks damaged
and wheels disconnected from some rail cars.
Police said there were no reported injuries and no evidence
that hazardous materials were exposed in the derailment.
Authorities urged drivers and residents to avoid the area
while they investigated. Several roads were temporarily
closed by the derailment.
Environmental Officials Monitoring Reports
of Falling Soot
HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) — Connecticut environmental
Governor Signs Bill for Bowling Green
Veterans Center
FRANKFORT, Ky. (AP) — Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear signed
legislation Wednesday, Feb. 15, that allocates more than
$16 million in a final round of funding to build a veterans
nursing home in Bowling Green.
The bill signing at the statehouse culminated efforts
spanning more than a decade to put a state veterans home
in the fast-growing city in south-central Kentucky.
The measure, which sailed through the legislature, will
allocate $16.6 million from the state’s Budget Reserve Trust
Fund to complete construction of the $53 million veterans
center. The 60-bed skilled nursing facility is expected to be
completed in 2024, the governor’s office said. Construction
workers broke ground on the project late last year,
anticipating the state’s funding approval.
“Today is another example of how, when we work together,
we can do what’s right for our people — especially our
heroic veterans,” the Democratic governor said.
The bill’s completion means full funding is in place for the
facility, said state Sen. Mike Wilson.
“More than a decade in the making, we have broken
6
| Chief Engineer

ground and can now look forward to the completion of
this wonderful, much-needed new facility to support our
veterans and their families,” said Wilson, a Bowling Green
Republican.
The bill was one of the first to become law during the 2023
legislative session, reflecting the state’s commitment to its
veterans, said Republican state Rep. Michael Meredith. It
means local veterans will receive quality care close to home,
he said.
West Virginia Senate OKs $105M for Iron-Air
Battery Plant
CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — West Virginia’s Senate gave final
approval Wednesday, Feb. 15, to a $105 million investment
for a renewable energy plant in the state’s Northern
Panhandle.
Senators approved the appropriations bill on a 21-13 vote
after lengthy debate. The House of Delegates approved the
funding for the project in early February.
Massachusetts-based Form Energy will build the plant on a
55-acre site once occupied by Weirton Steel in the Northern
Panhandle. Construction is expected to begin this year with
manufacturing of battery systems set to start in 2024, the
company said.
Form Energy — which will produce iron-air batteries and has
several prominent investors, including Microsoft founder
Bill Gates and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos — has stated
opposition to fossil fuels.
It was another representation of the ongoing shift in
coal-rich West Virginia as state leaders seek cleaner forms
of energy while preserving the state’s roots. In the past
year, the state has seen several major announcements for
alternative energy projects, including green battery plants
and a Warren Buffett-backed industrial park powered by
renewable energy.
UN Chief: Rising Seas Risk ‘Death Sentence’
for Some Nations
UNITED NATIONS (AP) — U.N. Secretary-General Antonio
Guterres warned Tuesday that sea levels will rise significantly
even if global warming is “miraculously” limited to 1.5
degrees Celsius — and said Earth is more likely on a path to
warming that amounts to “a death sentence” for countries
vulnerable to that rise.
Every fraction of a degree counts, since sea level rise could
double if temperatures rise by 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees
Fahrenheit), and increase exponentially with further
temperature increases, the U.N. chief said. He spoke at the
opening of a U.N. Security Council meeting on sea level rise,
which was hearing from 75 countries, and said the council
has a critical role in building support for actions to fight
climate change.
Under any scenario, countries like Bangladesh, China, India
and the Netherlands are all at risk, and large cities on every
continent will face serious impacts, including Cairo, Lagos,
Maputo, Bangkok, Dhaka, Jakarta, Mumbai, Shanghai,
Copenhagen, London, Los Angeles, New York, Buenos Aires
and Santiago, he added.
The World Meteorological Organization released figures
Tuesday, Feb. 14, cited by Guterres, that say global mean sea
level will rise by about 2 meters to 3 meters (about 6.5 to 9.8
feet) over the next 2,000 years if warming is limited to 1.5
degrees Celsius. With a 2-degree Celsius increase, seas could
rise up to 6 meters (19.7 feet), and with a 5-degree Celsius
increase, seas could rise up to 22 meters (72 feet), according
to the WMO.
EPA Outlines $27B ‘Green Bank’ for Clean
Energy Projects
WASHINGTON (AP) — On Tuesday, Feb. 14, the Biden
administration outlined how states and nonprofit groups can
apply for $27 billion in funding from a “green bank” that
will provide low-cost financing for projects intended to cut
planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions.
The so-called Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund, created by
Congress in the landmark climate law approved last year, will
invest in clean energy projects nationwide, with a focus on
low-income and disadvantaged communities.
The Environmental Protection Agency expects to award
$20 billion in competitive grants to as many 15 nonprofit
groups that will work with local banks and other financial
institutions to invest in projects that reduce pollution and
lower energy costs for families.
Another $7 billion will be awarded to states, tribes and
municipalities to deploy a range of solar energy projects,
including residential rooftop solar, community solar and solar
storage.
EPA Administrator Michael Regan said the green bank —
modeled after similar banks established in states such as
Connecticut, New York and California — will unlock billions
of dollars in private investment to enable neighborhoods
and communities “that have never participated in the cleanenergy
economy to participate in full force” in creating
green jobs.
Volume 88 · Number 3 | 7

News
Troubleshooting Commercial Pumps
By Richard Medairos, P.E.
There’s a wide variety of possible scenarios that may require
a service technician, facility manager or manufacturer’s rep
to troubleshoot a pump. Regardless of the circumstances,
using a methodical approach is best when diagnosing a
pumping problem.
At Taco Comfort Solutions, we’ve found that 80-90 percent
of the calls we receive about commercial “pump issues” are
in fact system issues. That’s not so say that the pump is never
the cause of the problem; it’s just easy to point to the pump
before verifying that the system meets the design for which
the pump was selected.
Distinguishing between a pump problem and a system problem
often requires a good bit of information gathering.
Methodical Approach
We use a multistep process when identifying issues involving
commercial pumps. This process is broken down and
explained in detail in one of our Taco Tuesday Webinars,
hosted by me and moderated by Brett Zerba, application
engineer, at youtu.be/KpFoH_8FjXs
The webinar explains each step and provides examples from
typical troubleshooting calls, but we’ll cover the process here
so that you’re prepared to determine what’s causing an issue
you may face in the future, whether you handle it on your
own or consult the pump manufacturer’s support team.
Usually, troubleshooting support calls come from the rep or
customer. When it’s the customer that calls, I bring the rep
into the conversation before proceeding through the following
steps.
1. Stay calm
The person looking for help may be the engineer or the
installer. Regardless, the caller is sometimes panicked. We
explain that we need to be methodical and collect as much
information as possible.
Panicking or jumping to conclusions is not helpful. In fact,
jumping to a conclusion is counter-productive because it may
cause us to overlook the real issue.
2. Identify the problem
Here, I ask the caller to briefly explain what’s going on. For
example, they have a chilled water system and the water
flow is low. They may tell me that they’re sure it’s the pump,
but we don’t know that yet. We can be fairly certain that
there’s a flow problem, but we’re unsure of its cause.
3. Interview process
At this point we need more information. I ask specific questions.
For example:
• Is this a water-cooled system?
• If so, is the issue on the chilled water or condenser water
side?
• How many pumps are in the system?
• Which model Taco pump?
If it’s not a Taco pump, we’ll still help resolve the issue for
the customer, but they need to understand that I won’t
have the pump data on hand. There’s a chance that we can
still identify if there’s something wrong within the system,
but without the pump data, we may not be able to reach a
conclusion.
Once we have the pump model, we need to know the design
operating conditions. These are the conditions for which the
pump was specified. We also need to know the actual, real-time
pump performance. We’ll compare design conditions
and actual performance information later.
This means that someone onsite will be required to measure
the flow and pressure drop across the pump. If there are
pumps in parallel, it’s best to measure flow across one pump
at a time. This establishes the performance of the pumps
individually.
If the people onsite are reading less flow than design, we
need to know what they’re using to measure flow. The
preferred method is a calibrated flow meter — either a
permanently installed unit or a strap-on, ultrasonic meter.
Measuring the Delta-P across the pump is an indicator, but
it’s not conclusive.
4. Data collection
The importance of photographs can’t be overstated. There’s
no such thing as too many images. Photos can help determine
if the system was piped according to the original
design and identify easily overlooked issues like placement
of meters. Collect as many images as possible and develop a
file. The earlier you have these images in the troubleshooting
process, the better.
I like to review these images while I’m on the phone with
the person who took them. This allows me to navigate the
images and ask further questions that may arise.
We also need access to the piping diagrams. If diagrams
aren’t available, I ask for a hand sketch.
8
| Chief Engineer

Once we have images and a diagram or sketch, we need to
collect electrical data. Volt and amp readings should be taken
at the motor input by a licensed electrician. If the pump
is equipped with a VFD, the readings should be taken at the
input of the drive, not the motor. This is because the VFD
modifies the voltage going to the motor.
There are other considerations when a VFD is present on the
pump. Ideally, the electrical data at the drive should be taken
at full speed. This means that the flow and pressure differential
must also be measured at full speed.
Make note of the pump RPM. This allows us to verify that
the pump is in fact operating at the correct speed and in the
correct direction.
The next thing we need is manufacturer data. It’s quite
common for people to think they have pump model X, only
to realize it’s a different pump when they send a picture of
the pump tag. This is another reason for photos. We need to
confirm the pump model.
After the pump model is known, the single most important
piece of manufacturer data is the pump curve. The installation
and operation manual is also critical. The next thing we
need is the field data. Taco calls this the commercial pump
troubleshooting report. This sheet is available as a download
from the Taco website.
This is the minimum amount of data we like to collect.
5. Analyze the data
Keep in mind that there’s a correction needed here. The
5011D is an end-suction pump, which typically have a larger
inlet than outlet. So we need to correct for velocity.
They did this and 92 feet was correct, meaning that they
intersected the pump curve line at 750 GPM.
We would prefer to have the flow measured independently
so that we could check it, either through a permanently installed
flow meter or a non-invasive, strap-on ultrasonic flow
meter that’s been recently calibrated.
In this scenario, we find that the pump is operating on the
pump curve but at a different pressure drop, which hints at
a system issue instead of a pump issue. Looking at the pump
curve, we know that this unit should be operating at 25
horsepower while providing 1,000 GPM at 80 feet of head.
Given the field-collected flow and pressure, the pump curve
shows that the pump should be operating at roughly 21
horsepower.
Determining the actual horsepower of the pump in the field
requires a number of electrical calculations.
We use the field data recorded by our electrician (at 1,760
RPM) to calculate the actual pump horsepower. The efficiency
and power factor of the pump is listed on the pump’s
nameplate. These numbers are a critical component in the
calculation. For detailed information on this calculation,
refer to the webinar.
When we calculated the horsepower in this example, we
found that the pump was operating at 21 horsepower, as
expected. This confirmed that the reason we’re not getting
the proper flow is that there’s more system resistance than
was originally anticipated.
We can also ask the people in the mechanical room for the
shut-off head. Keep in mind that this number can be greater
or less than the published value by as much as 8 feet. To determine
the shut-off head, throttle back the discharge valve
and isolate it for a few seconds. The operator should be able
to measure the pressure differential across the pump. In this
case, the shut-off pressure should be around 97 feet, which
will confirm that the impellor diameter is as specified (10.15
Inches) and indicated on the pump curve.
6. Recommend a solution
Let’s assume this is a Taco FI Series 5011D. Referencing the
pump curve, we find that in a single-pump configuration,
this unit provides 1,000 GPM at 80 feet of head. The red line
represents the pump curve, and the blue line represents the
system curve. In this example, the customer didn’t actually
measure the flow. Instead, they measured the pressure
differential across the pump and reported that it was 92 feet
of head.
Everything we’ve done so far leads us to believe that there’s
a pressure drop in the system beyond what was anticipated.
So I took another look at the piping diagram and photos.
In this scenario, there was only one difference between the
piping diagram and what existed in the mechanical room.
The photos revealed a basket strainer installed between the
cooling tower and the suction side of the pump. This, we
came to learn, was added after the initial installation, and
was not part of the design. Despite the fact that the
(Continued on pg. 11)
Volume 88 · Number 3 | 9

News
Three types of pressure gauges are readily available: conventional, compound and digital. If you’re using a conventional gauge, remember that the unit will
read “zero” when the pressure is at or below zero — an unlikely event, in any case.
(Continued from pg. 9)
published pressure data for the strainer was 2 feet, it was
causing a 12-foot pressure drop.
At this point, it was up to the customer to determine what
to do about the strainer. Maybe it can be removed, maybe it
can be oversized, but suffice to say that this was not a pump
issue.
7. Additional considerations
There are a few key elements to troubleshooting a pump
issue that weren’t discussed in the above example.
The use of a glycol mixture instead of pure water will significantly
raise pumping resistance within a hydronic system.
The dilution of the glycol, along with the temperature of the
system fluid, will have an impact. The more glycol used, and
the lower the fluid’s temperature, the greater the resistance.
When measuring the pressure differential across the pump,
the difference in elevation between the inlet gauge and the
outlet gauge can have an impact on collected data. If the
gauges are at different elevations, a correction needs to be
made before the readings can be used in any calculations.
conventional, compound and digital. If conventional gauges
are used, keep in mind that the unit will read zero any time
the pressure is at or below zero. It’s very unlikely that pressure
will ever be zero.
In one instance, I asked the contractor to exchange the existing
conventional gauge with a compound gage. After doing
this, it became evident that there was negative pressure at
the gauge and the negative pressure was causing the pump
to cavitate. As a result, it’s better to install compound or digital
gauges than conventional gauges in most cases.
As you troubleshoot a pump, keep in mind that, more often
than not, the pump isn’t the issue. While the pump can be
the problem, it’s far more likely that there’s an issue with
another component in the system: perhaps a deviation from
the engineer’s piping diagram, a faulty component, or an
installation mistake.
The best approach to quickly resolve the issue is to eliminate
variables by collecting and reviewing information. The more
information and photos that can be referenced, the faster
you are likely to come to a conclusion.
Richard Medairos, P.E., is Senior Systems Engineer for Commercial
Training at Taco Comfort Solutions
Having calibrated gauges and meters is the only way to ensure
that the readings taken are accurate. Most suppliers of
gauges and meters will check the calibration of the instruments
before shipping them.
There are three types of pressure gauges readily available —
Volume 88 · Number 3 | 11

News
AAADM, Automatic Door Industry’s
Trade Association, Marks 30th
Anniversary
In 1993, Jurassic Park made us believe dinosaurs lived again,
“I Will Always Love You” dominated the pop charts, and the
Buffalo Bills made their third of a historic four consecutive
trips to the Super Bowl. That same year, another milestone
was reached with the forming of the American Association
of Automatic Door Manufacturers (AAADM). Here in 2023,
AAADM celebrates its 30th anniversary.
AAADM is the trade association of manufacturers of automatic
pedestrian door systems, with a mission to increase
education, training and professionalism, promote safe usage,
and champion accessible building design.
For two decades prior to AAADM’s founding, the automatic
door industry’s association presence was via Section P, a
committee within the Builders Hardware Manufacturers Association
(BHMA). By 1993, the industry had grown to a point
where it needed its own, dedicated association.
AAADM celebrates three decades of working together to enhance the
safety and practices of those in the automatic door industry.
The first order of business was designing a training program
for the men and women in the field who install and maintain
automatic doors — getting industry buy-in and participation,
creating a curriculum, training the trainers, and deploying
the uniform methodology nationwide.
In the ensuing decades, AAADM has continued to be the
industry’s crucible for innovation, safety, and sustainable
practices. Perhaps most importantly, it has become a trailblazer
for accessible building design.
A significant achievement came just last year, when nearly
a decade of work resulted in an update to the International
Building Code, mandating the inclusion of automatic doors
for entrances to public buildings that meet occupant load
thresholds. Throughout, AAADM members have become
sought-after experts to advocate for building accessibility to
assist those with mobility issues and other physical challenges
live more independent lives.
The automatic door industry has seen many changes in the
past three decades. It will continue to evolve. Through it all,
AAADM will be there.
For more information, visit www.aaadm.com.
Volume 88 · Number 3 | 13

News
Wildfire Damage Prompts Calls for
Funding Water System
By Susan Montoya Bryan | Associated Press
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — Dozens of traditional irrigation
systems that supply community farms, gardens and orchards
in northern New Mexico won’t flow with water this spring,
forcing many families to decide whether to risk planting
crops this year with no guarantee of water.
Rural officials testified Tuesday, Feb. 14, before a state Senate
committee, saying the damage done to the acequia system
is a devastating consequence of a historic wildfire that
the U.S. Forest Service sparked last year during a prescribed
burn operation that went awry.
Portions of the earthen canals have been wrecked by postfire
flooding and are choked with debris.
Paula Garcia, who heads the New Mexico Acequia Association,
told lawmakers that the systems are managed by
volunteers and that without resources, it will be impossible
to clean and clear them before the irrigation season begins.
“They are full of silt, sediment, ash, debris and they will not
flow this spring — and that’s endangering a whole way of
life that’s been in our valley for hundreds of years,” said
Garcia, who lives in the shadow of a burn scar that stretches
across more than 530 square miles of the Rocky Mountain
foothills.
Garcia and others testified in support of legislation that
would double the amount of money earmarked annually
to fund community ditch infrastructure and construction
projects. The bill also includes language that would allow
the money to be used for disaster response, recovery, hazard
mitigation, and for meeting matching requirements under
other state and federal programs.
It’s one of a series of bills aimed at addressing what
many lawmakers have described as a water crisis in the
drought-stricken state — which has been complicated by
fallout from the Hermits Peak-Calf Canyon Fire in northern
New Mexico and another blaze that charred more than 508
square miles of the Gila National Forest.
Congress has approved billions of dollars in federal funding
for wildfire recovery in northern New Mexico, but supporters
of the state legislation noted that having a sustainable pot
of money for farmers elsewhere would help fill the gap left
when federal assistance has not been granted.
The New Mexico Legislature also is considering a measure
14
| Chief Engineer
The Hermits Peak-Calf Canyon Fire burns in the mountains near Pecos,
N.M., on Thursday May 25, 2022.
that would clear the way for the state to provide zero-interest
loans to local governments in order to repair or replace
public infrastructure that has been damaged by wildfires.
Even when the Federal Emergency Management Agency is
involved in surveying the damage and decides to dole out
recovery funds, Sen. Pete Campos said New Mexico needs to
have a way to brace for the next flood or the next wildfire.
“We’re trying to make all the resource available for the long
term,” said Campos, whose district includes communities
affected by wildfire.
Another measure that recently unanimously cleared the
Senate Conservation Committee included a $150 million
proposal to create a permanent trust fund that would be
managed by state investment officers. The goal is to establish
a consistent source of revenue for the design, construction,
and restoration of reservoirs and dams statewide.
Supporters estimate that there’s at least an $8 billion need
for water infrastructure improvements statewide.
State Engineer Mike Hamman, New Mexico’s top water official,
told lawmakers that minimal zoning considerations have
allowed for more housing developments to be constructed in
areas where dams were originally designed only to protect
agricultural lands, not homes and lives.
“When we talk about dams, irrigation, infrastructure, what
we have done is neglected our water system overall in the
state and that’s a very hard statement to make,” Campos
said.

Smart Energy Decisions Announces 2023
WISE Award Winners
PORTLAND, Me. (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Smart Energy Decisions
(SED), the first Web-based information resource dedicated
to addressing the information needs of large power
customers, recently announced the winners of its second-annual
WISE (Women in Smart Energy) Awards.
“We’re thrilled by the impressive accomplishments of this
year’s WISE Award nominees and winners,” said Debra
Chanil, Editorial and Research Director. “They truly validate
our mission in creating and presenting these awards, which
is to bring attention and acclaim to women who are making
great — and sometimes underrecognized — strides in pushing
forward the energy transition.”
Open to women in commercial, industrial, institutional (higher-ed
and healthcare), and government organizations, the
2023 WISE Awards sought leaders across seven categories:
Project, Industry Veteran, Rising Star, Innovation, Leadership,
Mentorship and Advocacy.
1. Project, which recognizes women who led or significantly
contributed to a project for her organization or the wider
smart energy industry:
• Project - Commercial/Buildings: Karen Cusmano, Senior
Vice President, Head of Sustainability and ESG (Veris Residential)
• Project - Manufacturing: Kimm Jarden, Global Energy Manager
(The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company)
• Project - Institutions: Jennifer Malaniuk, Director of Energy
& Sustainability (Richardson Independent School District)
• Project – Government: Annie Secrest, Energy & Water Coordinator
(County of San Luis Obispo)
• Project – Commercial/Retail: Rachel Swanson, Lead Program
Manager – Solar (Target Corporation)
2. Industry Veteran, which recognizes women with more
than 10 years of experience who continue to make a positive
impact on the smart energy industry:
• Tria Case, University Executive Director, Office of Sustainability
and Energy Conservation (City University of New
York)
• Jennifer Daloisio, CEO (Massachusetts Clean Energy Center)
• Abigail Johnson, Executive Director (Virginia PACE Authority)
• Sophia Gluck, ESG & Sustainability Program Manager
(Okta, Inc.)
• Elizabeth King, Performance and Operations Engineer
(Georgetown University)
• Katie Peterson, V2X Programs Manager (General Motors)
4. Innovation, which recognizes a woman who has developed
a new or substantially improved a product, service,
or strategy for her organization or the wider smart energy
industry:
• Alise Porto, VP of Sustainability (Switch)
5. Leadership, which recognizes women with demonstrated
leadership excellence (either within her own organization
or the wider smart energy industry):
• Leadership – Commercial: Kim Strickland, Global Head of
Execution, Energy & Sustainability (Prologis)
• Leadership – Manufacturing: Rebecca Tody, Manager - Energy
Procurement and Reliability (General Motors)
• Leadership – Institution: Ibi Yolas, Vice President, Campus
Planning and Facilities (Pace University)
6. Mentorship, which recognizes a woman with a demonstrated
commitment to mentoring rising women or men in
the smart energy industry:
• Kulsoom Khan, Energy Efficiency Manager (Congebec, Inc.)
7. Advocacy, which recognizes a man for helping to empower
women in their organization and/or in the wider smart
energy industry:
• Doug Yunaska, Director Global Energy & Sustainability
Center of Excellence (Merck & Co., Inc.)
Award winners will be celebrated during a gala dinner at
Net Zero Forum Spring on March 16, 2023 at the La Cantera
Resort & Spa in San Antonio, Texas. Winners are also invited
to participate at the event to make new connections, gain
critical industry insights, and spark further accomplishments.
3. Rising Star, which recognizes a woman with less than
10 years of experience in the smart energy industry who is
already making a positive impact:
Volume 88 · Number 3 | 15

News
The Moon Now Could Be Just Right
for Humans, Thanks to Newly Available
Science
WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. — With temperatures on the moon
ranging from minus 410 to a scorching 250 degrees Fahrenheit,
it’s an understatement to say that humans will need
habitats with heat and air conditioning to survive there long
term.
But heating and cooling systems won’t be effective enough
to support habitats for lunar exploration or even longer trips
to Mars without an understanding of what reduced gravity
does to boiling and condensation. Engineers haven’t been
able to crack this science — until now.
“Every refrigerator, every air conditioning system we have on
Earth involves boiling and condensation. Those same mechanisms
are also prevalent in numerous other applications,
including steam power plants, nuclear reactors and both
chemical and pharmaceutical industries,” said Issam Mudawar,
Purdue University’s Betty Ruth and Milton B. Hollander
Family Professor of Mechanical Engineering. “We have
developed over a hundred years’ worth of understanding of
how these systems work in Earth’s gravity, but we haven’t
known how they work in weightlessness.”
A team of engineers at Purdue led by Mudawar, who is collaborating
with NASA’s Glenn Research Center in Cleveland,
has spent 11 years developing a facility to investigate these
phenomena.
The facility is called the Flow Boiling and Condensation Experiment
(FBCE). Initial designs were tested on Zero Gravity
Corporation’s (Zero-G) weightless research lab, a specially
modified Boeing 727 that flies parabolic maneuvers to create
the reduced gravities on the moon and Mars as well as the
weightless conditions in space.
Following in-flight testing, NASA Glenn and the agency’s
Biological and Physical Sciences Division assisted Mudawar’s
team in creating a smaller version of the experiment to fit
into the Fluids Integrated Rack on the International Space
Station. After passing NASA safety and readiness reviews,
FBCE launched to the space station in August 2021 and has
since helped researchers to begin to unlock the mystery of
how boiling and condensation work in the extreme environments
of space.
These answers are in data the team is collecting from two
sets of FBCE experiments taking place on the station. Last
July, the facility’s first experiment finished gathering all the
data that Mudawar says scientists need to understand how
Issam Mudawar’s research on heat transfer could enable space habitats to
be built in extreme environments like the moon. (Purdue University photo/
John Underwood)
reduced gravity affects boiling. In the coming months, the
equipment for the second experiment will launch to the orbiting
laboratory as part of a Northrop Grumman commercial
resupply services mission for NASA (NG-19) to gather data
on how condensation happens in a reduced gravity environment.
Both experiments making up the facility will remain in orbit
through 2025, allowing the fluid physics community at large
to take advantage of this data.
“We are ready to literally close the book on the whole science
of flow and boiling in reduced gravity,” Mudawar said.
“Astronauts on the moon will need air conditioning systems,
refrigeration systems and many other systems that all require
boiling and condensation. Because of the new understanding
we’ve received from data showing how these phenomena
are influenced by reduced gravity, we are able to provide
guidance into how to size the equipment, how to design it
effectively and how to predict its performance.”
The researchers are preparing a series of research papers
unpacking data the FBCE has collected on the International
Space Station, adding to more than 60 papers they have
published on weightlessness and fluid flow since testing their
facility on Zero-G flights at the beginning of the project.
16
| Chief Engineer

Answering Decades-Old Questions
“The papers we have published over the duration of this
project are really almost like a textbook for how to use boiling
and condensation in space,” Mudawar said. “For more
than 60 years, since the beginning of spaceflight, the field
has known that boiling and condensation would be ideal
for space, but previous attempts to study these concepts in
microgravity hadn’t been successful.”
Each decade the National Academies publishes a report that
guides NASA, the White House and Congress on areas of research
to prioritize for funding over the next 10 years. In the
2011 report, numerous scientists recommended that the role
of gravity in controlling vapor-fluid behavior be considered
as one of those priorities for space exploration. The FBCE
project was created in response to the decadal report.
The farther missions are from Earth, the more likely that the
spacecraft for those missions will need nuclear power. Compared
to other types of processes that enable heating and
cooling in space, boiling and condensation are much more
effective at transferring heat for these nuclear-powered
vehicles and habitats. Boiling and condensation would also
allow heat, ventilation and air conditioning systems to be
more compact and lightweight.
Since the 1970s, Mudawar has been working to make it possible
to use boiling and condensation to tackle energy transfer
and temperature control challenges for a wide range of
systems. Examples include high-temperature turbine systems,
supercomputers, data centers, avionics, hybrid vehicle power
electronics, hydrogen fuel cells, metal alloy heat treating,
particle accelerators and fusion reactors.
The Largest Experiments of Their Kind
According to Mudawar, FBCE is the first set of experiments
to provide data that is extensive and systematic enough for
developing the models engineers need to design all sorts
of space systems using boiling and condensation in reduced
gravity.
“We now have a basis for comparing and contrasting data
for both Earth gravity and reduced gravity in pursuit of
modeling tools that can be applicable to a broad range of
gravities,” Mudawar said.
Mudawar and his students have been developing three sets
of predictive tools over the past 11 years based on FBCE data.
One set of tools puts the data into the form of equations
that engineers can use to design space systems. Another set
identifies fundamental information about fluid physics from
the data, and the third set is computational models of the
fluid dynamics.
All together, these models would make it possible to predict
which equipment designs could operate in lunar and Martian
gravity.
Astronaut Mark Vande Hei assembles components of the Flow Boiling
and Condensation Experiment on the International Space Station. (Photo
courtesy of NASA)
fluid physics research. Between February and July last year,
the facility successfully conducted 234 tests, yielding nearly
3,800 data points and an equal number of high-speed video
records.
More than 35 engineers and technicians from different
teams across NASA Glenn have worked on this project, helping
turn design concepts from Mudawar and his students
into a facility that could be installed into the space station.
These teams included Glenn’s FBCE Engineering, Safety and
Mission Assurance, Science, Software, and Technician teams,
and Fluids and Combustion Facility Operations teams.
Fifteen past and current Purdue PhD students have assisted
Mudawar on all aspects of collaborative work with NASA.
Two Purdue doctoral candidates, V.S. Devahdhanush and
Steven Darges, assisted in monitoring the experiments on
the space station via a dedicated workstation set up at Purdue.
The Purdue team also provided recommendations for
refinement of operating conditions for subsequent tests to
continuously improve science yield per test.
Data from the FBCE would benefit not only space systems,
but also technology on Earth. Using lessons they learned
about boiling from this data, Mudawar and his team invented
a new charging cable design for electric vehicles that
would allow them to charge in less than five minutes. Today’s
most advanced charging cables take more than 20 minutes
to charge an electric vehicle. A patent application for this
fast-charging cable invention has been filed through the
Purdue Research Foundation Office of Technology Commercialization.
“The amount of data coming out of the FBCE is just absolutely
enormous, and that’s exactly what we want,” Mudawar
said.
FBCE is NASA’s largest and most complex experiment for
Volume 88 · Number 3 | 17

News
New AD30 Goes to Work After
Complicated Mine Transfer Process
A lot goes into putting a large piece of equipment to work
in a mine site — from selecting the ideal machine for the job
and shipping it via land or sea, to assembling it and commissioning
it on site.
When the mine is underground, the process can get even
more complicated — especially when it’s located 630 feet below
the surface and accessible only by a shaft measuring 60
by 70 inches. The only way to get equipment into the mine is
to disassemble, lower and reassemble it underground.
But after the successful commissioning of three Cat® R1600
underground loaders over the last decade, U.S. Gypsum’s
(USG) Sperry mine in Iowa, USA, didn’t hesitate to add
another large piece of Cat equipment to its underground
loading and hauling fleet — this time a Cat AD30 underground
truck.
Just as it did five years prior, U.S. Gypsum relied on Altorfer
Cat, the Cat dealer serving a three-state region that includes
the Sperry location near Mediapolis, Iowa. In fact, several
of the Altorfer team members responsible for the first mine
transfer were also on hand for this one, including sales representative
Jeff Krug and field technician Chris Wolf.
“Altorfer and United States Gypsum have had a relationship
for many years, starting with surface equipment,” recalls
Krug. “When the opportunity to offer Cat mining solutions
for their underground equipment materialized, the mine
quickly realized there were many of the same components in
the underground machines as on the surface. Parts availability
and a strong service partnership made it much easier for
them to switch to Cat machines.”
Providing an Important Mineral
Since 1959, the underground Sperry operation has produced
gypsum, an important mineral for a variety of products. The
mine produces over 650,000 tons of raw gypsum annually.
Most of the mine’s gypsum is used in the on-site manufacturing
plant, where USG makes Sheetrock® brand wallboard.
Gypsum also has medicinal and agricultural uses.
The room and pillar mine has an average ceiling height of
about 10 feet. Gypsum is mined using the drill and blast
method, then the rock is hauled to the mine’s crusher.
“The physical size of the mine has always been a limiting factor
for selection of mobile equipment,” says Dennis Hollingsworth,
former Mine General Foreman. “When Cat started
producing more underground equipment, it created a new
choice for us — first with the R1600s, and now the AD30.”
18
| Chief Engineer
Following a Well-Thought-Out Process
After the successful implementation of Sperry’s R1600 fleet,
Altorfer developed best practices for the mine transfer process
that were shared with other dealers around the world.
Taking advantage of those lessons learned, the Altorfer team
spent several weeks planning and collaborating with the
Sperry team before beginning the AD30 transfer.
First, the AD30 arrived at Altorfer’s Cedar Rapids, Iowa, facility,
where it was adapted to the specific requirements of the
mine. The bed was removed and modified so it could meet
the 6-foot height requirement for loading. In addition, tires
were replaced with a lower profile tire to meet the maximum
height requirement of the mine.
Finally, the machine arrived on the surface of the Sperry
mine. On a cold November day, with the temperature dipping
below -2 degrees F, the technician team got to work.
Joining Wolf were two Sperry employees who also worked
on the R1600 mine transfers: mine maintenance supervisor
Doug Edle and technician A.J. Kuisle.
“Taking the machine apart is the most important part of the
process,” says Wolf. “You need to remove things in a precise
order, be two to three steps ahead and have a plan for keeping
track of everything.”
The team removed the rear axle and all the cooling lines and
wiring harnesses from the rear frame, then separated the
rear frame from the front frame. Then they tackled the front
frame, removing the cab, engine transmission and front axle
and lowering them into the mine. Next was the removal of
the fire suppression system and wiring harnesses, as well as
hoses and valves.
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When Cat began producing the AD30, it was an ideal choice for underground work at the Sperry mine.
Once everything was removed from the front frame, the
team welded on fixtures they would use to line up the frame
pieces for reassembly. Then the cutting began, with oxyacetylene
torches and an air arc being used to cut the frame into
smaller pieces that would fit down the shaft.
Once all the pieces and parts were down the shaft, the AD30
was cleaned, and the welding team put the frame back together.
Then Wolf and Kuisle got busy reassembling the rest
of the machine.
“It took about 3 weeks to get it back together and running,”
said Wolf. “We were very particular to make sure that everything
was assembled correctly, that there were no hoses or
wires rubbing. Then we started it up and installed the bed
and made sure everything was working correctly.”
Hollingsworth is proud of the teamwork involved in the
machine transfer. “Getting new equipment underground
has always been a challenge,” he says “Bringing a new piece
of equipment underground and re-assembling it has always
been a process that our mechanics take pride in being able
to accomplish. Chris Wolf has a been a part of that process
four times now, and I think, feels the same way. He has done
a great job helping with the teardown and reassembly of all
4 Cat machines.”
Putting a New Machine to Work
Altorfer’s role in the life of the new AD30 didn’t stop once
the machine was assembled underground. In fact, it was
just beginning. Before handing off the keys, the team took
it for a test drive. “We drove it through the mine to make
sure it would fit everywhere it needed to go. We went to the
north and south crushers and made sure it could successfully
dump at either place.” When the testing was complete, Wolf
provided training to the employees who would be operating
the new truck.
“The training process went well,” says Hollingsworth. “Chris
came in on both shifts and trained all of the operators. It’s
something we’ve come to expect from Altorfer that we don’t
typically get from other manufacturers.”
And finally, about 4 ½ weeks after the mine transfer process
began, the AD30 went to work.
Hollingsworth said the mine’s satisfaction with its Cat R1600s,
the long life and rebuildability of Cat machines, and the
quality of Altorfer’s service all contributed to the decision
to purchase the AD30. And they haven’t been disappointed.
“The AD30 has been a great addition to the mine fleet,” he
says. “The truck is running great. The operators took to it
quickly. They like the way it drives and performs.”
Just like Sperry mine’s other Cat equipment, the new machine
will be supported throughout its life by Altorfer, with
more new Cat machines continuing to join the mine’s fleet in
the years to come.
This article was originally published on The Cat Blog at
altorfer.com.
Volume 88 · Number 3 | 19

News
Weil-McLain® Upgrades ECO® Tec Series
2 with Multi-Boiler Functionality
BURR RIDGE, Ill. — WM Technologies, LLC, North America’s
leading boiler manufacturer, makes multi-boiler functionality
control easier with the introduction of the Weil-McLain
ECO Tec Series 2 high-efficiency residential boiler. Featuring
the same components, design advantages, features and
accessories as the original ECO Tec unit, the Series 2 features
integrated control software that allows for multiple boiler
configurations without the need for a third-party control
component.
“With an optional multi-boiler wiring kit, users can connect
and operate up to eight high-efficiency ECO Tec boilers
simultaneously to satisfy the needs of larger structures like
homes or apartment buildings,” said Mike Boyd, product
manager with Weil-McLain. “Having complete control over
the system also means there is no need to add expensive
external sequencing control software to initiate, interrupt or
terminate boiler commands.”
Another defining feature of the Series 2 is its compatibility
with the Weil-McLain ProTools App via Bluetooth®,
which allows contractors and technicians to view operational
logs that provide trending data for monitoring system
performance and detailed information for potential fault
conditions. The connected “at boiler” features include a
user-friendly dashboard, fault and warning lookup, software
update options and a “clone to phone” setting that can copy
settings from one boiler to another to make installation
easier.
“Following in the footsteps of the original ECO Tec, the
Series 2 offers superior performance and energy-efficient
comfort home heating,” Boyd said. “Featuring touchscreen
control for multizone and other advanced capabilities, contractors
will appreciate the ease of installation, use and service
while homeowners enjoy targeted warmth and comfort
when and where they need it.
“As the busy heating season continues, contractors will
appreciate ECO Tec’s multi-boiler functionality and connectivity
to the ProTools App — both designed to make their jobs
easier,” Boyd added.
Designed to meet the demanding needs of residential
replacement applications, the ECO Tec Series 2 features
a 95-percent AFUE rating and is among the most energy
efficient residential boilers on the market today. It features a
long-lasting stainless steel fire tube heat exchanger, built-in
zone control and heating system presets, and is available
in four heat-only sizes ranging from 80-199 MBH and three
combi-version sizes of 110, 150 and 199 MBH. Additionally, it
is versatile in its placement options as the wall-mount design
Weil-McLain’s ECO-Tec Series 2 boilers feature integrated control software,
allowing for multiple boiler configurations without a third-party control.
frees up valuable floor space while an optional pedestal can
be used for floor-standing installations.
Other key features of the ECO Tec Series 2 include:
• Unity 2.0 control equipped with 10 preloaded system-type
options and a guided setup wizard
• Up to 10:1 turndown ratio that self-adjusts to minimize
fuel usage
• Low NOx emission certified
• NSF/ANSI 372 certified domestic hot water components
• Built-in energy-saving ECM circulator to conserve energy
• Built-in zone control that can operate up to 4 circulators
(plus internal)
• Natural- or propane-gas capable
• Multiple venting options for different home styles and
buildings
To learn more about the new ECO Tec Series 2 high-efficiency
residential boiler, visit
https://www.weil-mclain.com/full-line or locate a Weil-McLain
regional sales office at
www.weil-mclain.com/en/weil-mclain/about-us/locations/. For
more information about the Weil-McLain ProTools App, visit
www.weil-mclain.com/protools or download the app via the
App Store.
20
| Chief Engineer

Danfoss to Build New Compressor and
Sensor Factory to Match Growing North
American Demand
Danfoss is witnessing tremendous growth in demand for
cooling technology from the United States market, and is
announcing the construction of a new compressor and sensor
manufacturing facility in Apodaca, Mexico. The new expansion
will produce medium- and large-scroll compressors,
pressure sensors for HVAC/R, and A2L leak detection sensors
for residential and commercial air conditioning and refrigeration.
The facility is expected to be ready by the end of
2024, starting with a capacity for 100,000 compressor units,
1.6 million pressure sensors, and 1 million A2L leak detection
sensors.
This move is a part of the Danfoss ESG (Environmental, Social,
Governance) strategy to offer localized production for
customers. By expanding the global footprint of production,
Danfoss is also securing supply chain flexibility and security
for the future.
Danfoss is ramping up production to match the needs of the market for
energy-efficient cooling technology, building a new manufacturing facility
in Apodaca, Mexico.
“We are really proud to launch production in Mexico to
increase our support to the market,” says Fabio Klein, Senior
VP Scrolls and Reciprocating Compressors, “Our Commercial
Compressors unit is a significant growth journey, and this
move will take us one step closer.”
“It is exciting to get even closer to our American customers
and support them helping improve efficiency and safety of
their cooling systems with a regionalized supply chain,” says
Bert Labots, Vice President Sensing Solutions.
Danfoss Commercial Compressors is a leading compressor
manufacturer of fixed-speed scrolls, inverter scroll solutions
with prequalified drives, reciprocating compressors, condensing
units, and centrifugal oil-free Turbocor compressors.
These technologies are used in a variety of applications in
the air conditioning, refrigeration, and heat pump markets
globally.
Danfoss Sensing Solutions offers an extensive portfolio of advanced
sensor technologies and application expertise, to help
the industries and people we serve to embrace a digital-focused
future with industry-leading know-how, world-class
support, and sensors that enable a connected and sustainable
future.
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Volume 88 · Number 3 | 21

News
PolyMet Mine in Minnesota Becomes
NewRange Copper Nickel
By Steve Karnowski | Associated Press
ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) — PolyMet Mining and Teck Resources
finalized a joint venture Wednesday to complete the copper-nickel
mine that PolyMet has been developing in northeastern
Minnesota, and the partnership hopes to eventually
build a separate mine next door in an even larger ore body
that Teck controls.
The long-planned PolyMet mine near Babbitt will now be
known as NewRange Copper Nickel, the name of the 50-50
joint venture. Combined, the joint venture’s mineral resources
are more than quadruple the size of what PolyMet had on
its own.
Under the newly closed deal, NewRange now controls about
half of the known copper, nickel, cobalt and platinum-group
metal reserves in the geological formation known as the Duluth
Complex, one of the world’s largest untapped resources
of the critical minerals.
“Successful closing of the joint venture moves NewRange
Copper Nickel to the forefront of responsible development
of American-sourced critical minerals for the manufacture
of clean energy and clean transportation technologies such
as battery storage, wind and solar generation and electric
vehicles,” Jon Cherry, PolyMet chairman, president and CEO,
said in a statement.
Environmental groups that have long fought PolyMet raised
concerns when initial plans for the joint venture were announced
last summer, saying it potentially could lead to even
bigger threats to the water-rich region. But NewRange says
it will be a conscientious steward of the area’s water, air and
natural resources.
The name NewRange pays homage to the mining heritage of
northeastern Minnesota’s Iron Range. The joint venture’s first
task is to bring the open pit mine that PolyMet had been developing
in its NorthMet ore body over the finish line. That
project remains on hold because three key permits, which
were issued over four years ago, are still tied up in challenges
in courts and regulatory agencies. Because of those,
NewRange still isn’t projecting a date for major construction
to begin.
Environmentalists have opposed the mine because the copper
and nickel in the Duluth Complex are bound up in sulfide
minerals that can leach sulfuric acid when exposed to water
and air. For that reason, President Joe Biden’s administration
is trying to kill another proposed mine nearby, Twin Metals
near Ely, which sits in a watershed that flows into the pristine
22 | Chief Engineer
Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness. While the administration
last year committed itself to expanding domestic
sources of critical minerals for electric vehicles and renewable
energy, it says the Boundary Waters merit special protections.
The joint venture controls both the NorthMet deposit and
Teck’s Mesaba deposit a few miles to the east. The lower-profile
Mesaba project hasn’t progressed past the exploratory
stages. NewRange plans further studies. A formal proposal
for the envisioned open pit mine would have to go through
a full environmental review and permitting process. That
process would take at least several years. It hasn’t been
decided whether a mine at the Mesaba site would use the
former LTV Steel processing plant near Hoyt Lakes that will
handle NorthMet’s ore.
The combined indicated and inferred resources of the two
deposits adds up to nearly 4.8 billion tons — over 1.1 billion
tons from NorthMet and over 3.6 billion tons from Mesaba,
the companies said.
While the NorthMet deposit is in a watershed that eventually
flows into Lake Superior, the Minnesota Center for Environmental
Advocacy has pointed out that the Mesaba ore body
sits mostly in the Boundary Waters watershed, like Twin Metals.
But unlike Twin Metals, the Mesaba mineral rights leases
are from the state, not the federal government.
Also in the early stages is the proposed Talon Metals mine
near Tamarack, which has a deal to supply nickel to electric-carmaker
Tesla Inc. It’s about 90 miles to the southwest,
in the Mississippi River watershed. Talon plans to submit its
application to kick off the review process in the next few
weeks.
Both St. Paul-based PolyMet Mining Corp. and Vancouver,
British Columbia-based Teck Resources Ltd. will remain
publicly traded companies listed on both the New York and
Toronto Stock Exchanges. PolyMet’s majority shareholder is
Swiss commodities giant Glencore, which owns 71 percent
of its common stock plus rights to acquire 78 percent. Teck’s
largest shareholder is the China Investment Corp., the sovereign
wealth fund of the Beijing government, with a 10-percent
stake.
Tannice McCoy, who had been Teck’s Mesaba project manager
since 2018, will be general manager of NewRange,
responsible for day-to-day operations. Cherry will remain
chairman, president and CEO of PolyMet and will chair the
management committee of the joint venture.

MissionGO and Valmont® Team Up for
Infrastructure Inspections
BALTIMORE (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — MissionGO, Inc. and
Valmont® recently announced their service partnership and
mutual efforts toward a stronger infrastructure system utilizing
aerial solutions including uncrewed aircraft for inspections.
With identical values and goals of improving utility —
from bridges to power lines — MissionGO and Valmont look
forward to using UAS infrastructure inspections to improve
peoples’ lives.
Valmont currently serves customers across six continents and
in more than 100 different countries in creating vital infrastructure
that helps keep roadways safer, connects communities,
and enables a more resilient and reliable power grid.
Their work in renewable energy helps generate cleaner, more
sustainable power. Their focus is not just on maintaining current
infrastructure, but also innovating and actively pursuing
a future in which infrastructure not only supports communities
but empowers them. Valmont product lines include
Utility, Lighting and Transportation, Telecom, Solar, Coatings,
Irrigation and Ag Tech.
MissionGO is currently servicing one of the largest UAS inspection
contracts in the world and has a proven track record
for the highest standards of inspection work and results.
The team focuses on delivering high-quality and data-rich
information at a fraction of the cost and time of traditional
manual inspection services. At MissionGO, the number-one
priority is always safety. Doing the job is not just enough —
MissionGO delivers on the guarantee of a job done right,
well and safely.
The team will work together on infrastructure inspections
across the United States. From visual inspections to LiDAR
work, MissionGO and Valmont are bringing together the best
in efficiency and safety.
MissionGO and Valmont recently announced a service partnership agreement
to work together toward a stronger infrastructure through the use of
aerial inspections.
Volume 88 · Number 3 | 23

News
EPA Moves to Restore Rule on Mercury
From Power Plants By Drew Costley | AP Science Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Environmental Protection Agency
on Friday, Feb. 17, reaffirmed the basis for a rule that requires
“significant reductions” in mercury and other harmful
pollutants from power plants, reversing a move late in
former President Donald Trump’s administration to roll back
emissions standards.
The EPA said it found it “appropriate and necessary” to
regulate emissions of toxic air pollution under the Clean Air
Act, setting the stage to restore protections enacted when
President Barack Obama’s EPA issued the Mercury and Air
Toxics Standards.
“For years, Mercury and Air Toxics Standards have protected
the health of American communities nationwide, especially
children, low-income communities, and communities of
color who often and unjustly live near power plants,” EPA
Administrator Michael Regan said in a statement. “This
finding ensures the continuation of these critical, life-saving
protections while advancing President Biden’s commitment
to making science-based decisions and protecting the health
and wellbeing of all people and all communities.”
The move is in line with a larger push by the EPA under
President Joe Biden to restore the numerous federal environmental
protections that were rolled back by Trump’s administration,
like reinstating rigorous environmental reviews
for large infrastructure projects, protecting thousands of
waterways and preserving endangered species.
Coal-fired power plants are the largest single manmade
source of mercury pollutants, which enter the food chain
through fish and other items that people consume. Mercury
can affect the nervous system and kidneys; the World Health
Organization says fetuses are especially vulnerable to birth
defects via exposure in a mother’s womb.
“The concern largely is the brain development of young
children ... and also [it] has effects on adults that contributes
to heart attacks. It’s a highly toxic substance,” Charles
T. Driscoll, an environmental scientist at Syracuse University
who studies mercury pollution, said.
Public health professionals and environmentalists praised the
restoration of the Obama-era rule, saying it protects Americans,
especially children, from some of the most dangerous
forms of air pollution. But many also said the administration
could go further by requiring even greater reductions in
toxic air pollution from power plants.
those living near power plants,” said Georges C. Benjamin,
executive director of the American Public Health Association.
Michael Panfil, an attorney for the Environmental Defense
Fund, also urged the Biden administration to strengthen the
protections, but said the restoration of the rule “should be a
relief to all Americans.”
Most coal-fired power plants have already made upgrades to
their facilities required when the regulation first went into
effect in 2012. The Edison Electric Institute, a lobbying group
that represents investor-owned electric companies, thanked
the EPA for restoring the rule.
“EEI’s member companies, and the electric power industry
collectively, have invested more than $18 billion to install
pollution control technologies to meet these standards,”
Tom Kuhn, president of the lobbying firm, said in a statement.
“Since 2010, our industry has reduced its mercury
emissions by more than 91 percent, and we have seen a significant
change in our nation’s energy mix, which is getting
cleaner and cleaner every day.”
Democratic Sen. Tom Carper of Delaware, the chairman of
the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, said
the announcement resolves whether the EPA should regulate
mercury and other toxic air pollution.
“When the previous administration chose to remove the
legal underpinnings of the MATS rule, they ignored the irrefutable
science on the devastating impacts that mercury has
on children’s health,” Carper said.
But Sen. Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia, the committee’s
ranking Republican, warned the rule is part of Biden’s
goal “to shut down American coal plants.”
“We’ve experienced the damage these regulations have
done across our country, including in West Virginia,” Capito
said.
The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives
support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science
and Educational Media Group. The AP is solely responsible
for all content.
“Retaining these protections is a critical first step; we now
urge EPA to strengthen them. We need stronger standards
to protect all communities from these pollutants, especially
24
| Chief Engineer

Georgia Nuclear Plant Again Delayed at
Cost of $200M More By Jeff Amy | Associated Press
ATLANTA (AP) — Georgia Power Co. has again delayed the
projected startup for two new units at its Vogtle nuclear
power plant near Augusta, saying its share of the costs will
rise by an additional $200 million.
Southern Co., the utility’s Atlanta-based parent, announced
the delays and higher costs on Thursday, Feb. 16, as it announced
its yearly corporate earnings for 2022.
Georgia Power says Unit 3 could now begin commercial operation
in May or June, pushing back from the most recent
deadline of the end of April. The company also now says
Unit 4 will begin commercial operation sometime between
this November and March 2024. The company previously has
promised commercial operation of Unit 4 by the end of 2023
at the latest. When complete, the two units will be the first
entirely new U.S. reactors in decades.
Georgia Power wrote off $201 million in additional costs on
its earning statement, reflecting increased costs.
Despite the Vogtle delays, Southern Co. still announced
strong revenue and profits. The company reported profits of
$3.5 billion for the year, or $3.28 per share.
The total cost of the project to build a third and fourth
reactor at Vogtle will cost all its owners more than $30 billion.
Georgia Power owns 45.7 percent of the project, while
Oglethorpe Power Corp. owns 30 percent, the Municipal
Electric Authority of Georgia owns 22.7 percent and the city
of Dalton owns 1.6 percent.
Georgia Power had already pushed back the startup of Unit
3 by a month after it discovered that a pipe that is part of a
critical backup cooling system was vibrating during startup
testing. Construction workers had failed to install supports
called for on blueprints. Those supports have now been
installed, the company said, but Southern Co. Chairman and
CEO Tom Fanning told investors that “we found a few additional
issues to address.”
The utility said the Unit 3 reactor is now likely to reach a
self-sustaining nuclear reaction, a stage called criticality, in
March or April. That’s the last major waypoint before commercial
operation.
The company said it was also pushing back its completion
dates for Unit 4, citing slower-than-planned testing.
Georgia Power says it will now spend a projected $10.6 billion
on construction costs, not counting some financing costs.
That’s projected to include $407 million in costs that Georgia
Power has assumed from the other owners, after all three
A nuclear reactor and two cooling towers are shown at Georgia Power’s
Plant Vogtle nuclear power plant Friday, Jan. 20, 2023, in Waynesboro, Ga.
sued to force the company to honor a cost-sharing agreement.
Georgia Power has settled its lawsuit with MEAG, but
the suits with Oglethorpe and Dalton are still ongoing. The
company warned it could have to pay those two co-owners
another $345 million in the dispute.
Ratepayers at Georgia Power and some cooperatives served
by Oglethorpe are already paying for Vogtle, and most electric
customers in Georgia, as well as in parts of Alabama and
Florida, eventually will be charged.
The effects of the further delay on ratepayers are unclear.
Georgia Power has signaled it may not request to be repaid
for more than $7.3 billion in capital costs and about $400
million in financing, but could ask for more. The Georgia
Public Service Commission, a five-member elected body that
sets rates for Georgia Power’s 2.7 million customers, could
approve even less spending. Georgia Power must prove any
capital costs above $5.68 billion were prudently spent.
Some increased costs will be passed through to municipal
utilities served by MEAG. Because they dispute that they owe
any more costs for Vogtle, Oglethorpe and Dalton customers
might not see further increases because of the delay.
A third and a fourth reactor were approved for construction
at Vogtle by the Georgia Public Service Commission in
2009, and the third reactor was supposed to start generating
power in 2016. The cost of the third and fourth reactors was
originally supposed to be $14 billion.
Volume 88 · Number 3 | 25

News
5 Tips to Solve Industrial Facility
Workstation Space Constraints
Many industrial manufacturing facilities expand their capacity
by retrofitting existing spaces. However, expansion can
crowd existing facilities, leaving less room for critical computing
platforms and key performance indicator (KPI) visualization
displays. Without sufficient control equipment, current
processes can be challenged to meet critical quality standards
and productivity can lag.
Fortunately, a variety of innovative space-saving options are
now available that can help industrial facilities make the
most effective use of virtually every square inch of usable
space for computing and data analytics platforms, including
hallways, production areas, and cleanrooms.
Paul Shu of ARISTA Corporation, a leading provider of computing
platforms and visualization display products for harsh
industrial environments, offers five tips to manufacturers
who need to maximize their use of space within constrained
facilities.
The company’s broad array of ruggedized products includes
standard and custom solutions like thin clients, panel PCs,
ruggedized touch displays, keyboard, video monitor and
mouse (KVM) solutions, as well as mobile and operator workstations.
Tip 1 – Increase Flexibility With a Pendant Arm Mount
When industrial operator workstations are required within
tight confines, highly flexible stainless steel pendant arm
designs can save a significant amount of space, according to
Shu. With this option, the screen and connected keyboard
are suspended by a pendant arm that is mounted to the
wall. When needed, the user can extend, rotate, and swivel
the workstation into the ideal position. When data entry is
completed, the workstation can be pushed back against the
wall, out of the way.
“Today, space-efficient, pendant arm, 360° double-joint
[single-screen] and triple-joint [dual-screen] designs make
wall-flush installation, folding, and workstation retraction
easy tasks,” says Shu. “The angle of the screen or keyboard
in some models can be adjusted to accommodate operators’
various heights and specific requirements. This enables comfortable
workstation operation over an extended period.”
Tip 2 – Take Advantage of Wall-Recessed Workstations in
Hallways
Mobile workstations are increasingly popular in industrial manufacturing
environments since the units can be used where needed and then moved
out of the way.
When installing workstations in hallways or other space-constrained
areas, wall-recessed units are the perfect solution.
According to Shu, 15-, 17-, 19- and 21.5-inch touchscreen displays
can be fully recessed into a wall to allow greater clear-
26 | Chief Engineer
ance. There is even an option for a 55-inch large-format 4K
display workstation with Quad View display so operators can
visualize KPIs and take full control of the production data.

“Recessed workstation mounts should be utilized when hallways
are employed for operational control while allowing
maximum walking space,” says Shu.
The pendant arm can be utilized for a keyboard in hallways.
For use in tighter spaces, the company offers a wall-mount
option, in which a hinged keyboard support stand with a
sliding brace releases from the wall. It folds back virtually
level with the wall when not in use. A lockable utility tray
that extends from the keyboard stand also enables the use
of a full-size computer mouse and pad (viewable at www.
youtube.com/watch?v=ZPBaC7AcUjw&t=16s).
Shu advises that a fanless cooling design should be implemented
in wall-recessed models to ensure that the workstations
operate stably and reliably. The compact design
does not utilize bulky fans yet lowers the system’s operating
temperature.
Tip 3 – Install Wall, Pedestal or Ceiling Mounts to Suit Specific
Space Requirements
Depending on the available space, wall, pedestal, and ceiling
mounts can all play a role in better utilizing certain manufacturing
facility configurations. Shu notes that wall mounts
come in several types and configurations, including fixed and
adjustable height.
Computing systems can be mounted to walls using a VESA
Mounting Interface. With a floor-mounted pedestal mount,
the workstation is situated on a compact platform supported
by a stainless-steel column that occupies very little space.
Ceiling mounts, as the name suggests, support the workstation
and monitor from above, leaving the floor fully open for
storage, production, or other uses.
Tip 4 – Take Advantage of Mobile Workstations in Any Available
Space
Mobile workstations are increasingly popular in industrial
manufacturing environments since the units can be used
where needed and then moved out of the way. In addition,
mobile workstations enable rapid and easy reorganization
of the work environment and process flow for more flexible
management.
“One mobile workstation can replace multiple fixed workstations,
and there are no installation costs,” Shu suggests.
“Wireless connections allow for direct communication with
manufacturing execution systems, electronic batch records
(EBR), SOP, ERP and other back-end systems.”
To be truly mobile, ARISTA designed a wireless, portable
system that operates on a heavy-duty lithium battery that allows
the workstation to function seamlessly and uninterruptedly
while in motion. The battery can last for several shifts
before requiring a recharge, enabling full non-stop mobile
operation over a 24-hour period.
uninterrupted wireless communication in all corners of the
factory or laboratory. In addition, most advanced industrial
manufacturing facilities today have Wi-Fi-based system backbones
connected to legacy subsystems, meaning the workstation
can communicate directly with the facility’s server.
“With no cables to be disconnected, managed, and reconnected,
and with no break in any live or critical connections
to re-establish, manufacturers can save time and significantly
increase productivity,” says Shu.
The portable systems are completely enclosed and therefore
fully compliant from a regulatory standpoint, which is essential
for sensitive production environments. Eliminating the
wires means removing integrity compromises and contamination
caused by connecting and reconnecting systems to move
the workstation. Each unit can do everything a stationary
system can do while remaining mobile, which reduces both
infrastructure cost and deployment complexity over a deskbased
system.
Tip 5 – Custom Solutions When All Else Fails
When standard catalogue options are insufficient, custom
solutions can be required to fit into tight spaces or hallways.
To do this, the equipment must often be customized as to
the size, inputs, communication connections, mounting, battery
types, and other factors.
Although the leading process automation equipment providers
offer computing solutions, the options are limited. In
addition, they are not typically flexible enough to provide
custom computing system component solutions since this is
not their core competency.
“Most providers offer basic monitors and workstations, but
if there are specific space constraints or other design changes,
they are not able to create new solutions or make minor
changes to existing products,” says Shu.
In contrast, ARISTA has serviced industrial manufacturers for
more than 10 years and developed a broad range of products
during this time. The company has a strong track record and
capability to customize products to meet necessary process
specifications.
“If there are unique requirements due to space constraints,
we meet with the manufacturer to fully understand the
situation and design a solution,” says Shu. “In six to eight
months, we can deliver the first articles for approval, and
begin production of the equipment.”
For more information, contact ARISTA Corporation at
(510) 226-1800, e-mail sales@goarista.com, or write to
48460 Lakeview Blvd., Fremont, CA 94538.
Wi-Fi capability is built into the workstations to allow for
Volume 88 · Number 3 | 27

News
NADCA Publishes White Paper on
Inspection and Cleaning of Open-Air
Plenums
MT. LAUREL, N.J. — The National Air Duct Cleaners Association
(NADCA), also known as the HVAC Inspection, Cleaning,
and Restoration Association, recently announced the publication
of a white paper on methods of inspecting and cleaning
open-air plenums.
The paper addresses common contaminants found in openair
plenums that can adversely impact the conditioned space,
and provides guidance for the inspection and cleaning of
those areas.
Open-air plenums are found in both commercial and residential
settings, and consist of intended non-ducted air pathways
formed in building cavities, voids and spaces outside of the
occupied zone of buildings. By design, they facilitate airflow
between HVAC equipment and the occupied space of a building,
and often contain building elements such as mechanical
(HVAC), electrical, plumbing, gas piping, fire protection,
sewer and telecommunications systems that are essential to
the operation of the building or residence.
Open-air plenums are typically unfiltered spaces, and can
contain dust, dirt, debris, asbestos, lead, animal and insect
by-products, microbial contamination, and a broad range
of hazardous chemicals and materials. The accumulation of
contaminants in an air plenum can cause indoor air quality
issues that potentially pose health risks to the occupants of
the building.
“As the authority in the industry, NADCA has developed this
white paper to provide recommended approaches to inspecting
and cleaning open-air plenums,” Paul Keller, Jr., ASCS,
NADCA Board member, said. “These spaces are often overlooked
when cleaning HVAC systems, because typical duct
materials like ductboard and flex duct may not be present.
Unlike sealed ductwork, open-air plenums can be used for
purposes other than to facilitate a pathway for air circulation,
and often contain items unrelated to the HVAC system.”
Open-air plenums should be inspected and cleaned periodically
since airflow throughout these spaces can create an increased
risk of contamination, odors, condensation, microbial
growth and other conditions that may require attention and
cleaning.
NADCA’s Open-Air Plenums white paper is available for
download at www.nadca.com/resources/nadca-white-papers.
NADCA has issued a white paper on methods of inspecting and cleaning
open-air plenums.
MAKE THE CONNECTION.
Connect your brand’s message with the Chief
Engineers through a live presentation or onsite
learning opportunity.
Contact Alex Boerner at
aboerner@chiefengineer.org for details.
www.chiefengineer.org
28
| Chief Engineer

We Inspect Acquires Certified Mold
Inspections and The Mold Guy:
Customers Benefit
SAN DIEGO, Calif. (SEND2PRESS NEWSWIRE) — We Inspect,
LLC, a global mold inspection, consulting and health technology
company, recently acquired Certified Mold Inspections
and The Mold Guy. Its acquisitional goal is to unify these
individually owned family businesses under one name and to
better serve the community as a whole.
We Inspect was founded in 2018 by Corey Levy and Brian
Karr; Certified Mold Inspections was founded by Steve Levy
in 2004; and The Mold Guy was established by Mark Levy in
2005. As individual companies, the Levy family serviced different
territories and were collectively known as the number
one mold and biotoxin resource for medical practitioners
across the country.
“These acquisitions have provided the company with the expertise
and human capital needed to expand its educational
and consulting capabilities, allowing it to fulfill its mission of
empowering people everywhere with the tools and services
they need to create healthy homes,” Karr says.
Streamlining the family business under the one We Inspect
name will now allow it to serve significantly more mold-sensitive
individuals by deploying its 42 years of experience
across in-person home inspections, remote consulting and
educational offerings.
Unlike other mold inspection companies that rely on antiquated
inspection and testing practices that oftentimes
dismiss the presence of mold contamination in homes, We
Inspects’ #FindProveRemove framework has been shaped by
the most current scientific findings and proven by more than
$20 million dollars of successful mold remediations.
“The majority of mold contamination in homes is hidden,
but most mold inspection companies don’t understand how
to find it,” Karr says. “They often rely on outdated testing
methods that provide false negatives 70 percent of the time,
which is dangerous and gives occupants a false sense of security,
and perpetuates chronic illness.”
Karr says that what sets them apart from other mold inspection
companies is their ability to find the hidden sources of
mold contamination in a home.
“Once we know where it’s coming from, it can be remediated
and the occupant can begin to heal in their home,” he
says.
Additional advantages of streamlining these businesses
include free training and actionable resources for medical
practitioners and their patients (bridging communication
gaps), #moldfinders: RADIO podcast, scholarships, discounts
for mold-affected people worldwide, DIY home screens and
consulting services for anyone regardless of where they live
or their financial situation.
Volume 88 · Number 3 | 29

NIFSAB_NEW_
News
WoodWorks Releases Open-Source Mass
Timber Installer Training Curriculum
WASHINGTON (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — With the release
of 10 mass timber installer training modules in adaptable
PowerPoint format, WoodWorks - Wood Products Council
has further expanded the ability of design and construction
teams to pursue mass timber projects, and of U.S. workers to
develop the skills they need to construct these buildings.
Intended for use by contractors, subcontractor erectors,
training centers, community colleges and workforce development
programs, the modules complement other Wood-
Works’ efforts to ensure that qualified workers are available
to install mass timber projects across the country.
“The release of installer training curriculum for anyone who
wants to use it is a significant milestone,” said Jennifer Cover,
WoodWorks President and CEO. “When we created our Mass
Timber Construction Management Program in 2019, there
was a critical gap in knowledge and skills among contractors
and installers. Developers and building designers were eager
to use mass timber for its carbon, biophilia and other benefits,
but most contractors were unfamiliar with the materials.
As a result, budgets and estimates were skewed high to
cover the unknowns, and many projects didn’t go forward.
Since then, WoodWorks has developed education and technical
content tailored to the needs of project managers and
estimators as well as field team leaders and installers, both to
help ensure competitive pricing and contribute to a growing
pool of trained workers.”
Available free on the WoodWorks website, the modules
may be delivered under the WoodWorks brand as is or
with non-substantive changes, or drawn from to create
non-branded presentations with credit to WoodWorks for
utilized content. The curriculum will be updated as needed
to reflect ongoing innovation in the industry, and users are
invited to send their suggestions to info@woodworks.org.
Modules include:
1. Introduction to Mass Timber
2. Connection Considerations
3. Beam and Column Connections
4. Panel Connections
5. Fasteners, Hardware and Equipment
6. Safety Considerations
7. Planning and Coordination
8. Material Protection
9. Installation
10. Repairs, Finishes and As-Builts
Training in the proper and safe construction of mass timber buildings is now
accessible to contractors, educators, and workers across the U.S.
In addition to this curriculum, WoodWorks has partnered
with more than a dozen training centers to develop mass
timber installation training programs, and three universities,
which provide a hands-on mass timber experience and
education to the next generation of construction project
managers. Learn more about the Mass Timber Construction
Management Program at www.woodworks.org/learn/masstimber-clt/mass-timber-construction-management-program
As part of its own education, WoodWorks also offers a project-management
curriculum for individuals who estimate,
procure and manage new commercial and multifamily construction
projects in the U.S. Upcoming construction management
education can be found on the organization’s website.
WoodWorks continues to seek other entities interested in
developing installer training programs, including training
centers, technical community colleges, workforce development
programs, and general contractors. For more information,
contact Brandon Brooks, Construction Management
Program Manager.
30
| Chief Engineer

NIFSAB_NEW_Inspect-to-Protect-Ad_BO-BM-v9_8-5x11_wbleed_OL.indd 1
12/19/22 8:45 AM

News
Bid to Keep California Reactors Running
Faces Time Squeeze By Michael R. Blood | Associated Press
LOS ANGELES (AP) — A late-hour attempt to extend the life
of California’s last nuclear power plant has run into a predicament
that will be difficult to resolve: a shortage of time.
A state analysis Monday, Feb. 13, predicted it will take
federal regulators until late 2026 to act on an application to
extend the operating run of the Diablo Canyon nuclear power
plant. The problem is that the plant is scheduled to shut
down permanently by mid-2025.
The future of the state’s remaining reactors could hinge on
operator Pacific Gas & Electric’s request to the Nuclear Regulatory
Commission for an unusual exemption that would
allow the decades-old reactors to continue making electricity
while the NRC reviews the application — not yet filed — to
extend its licenses for as much as two decades.
One reactor is scheduled to close in November 2024, and its
twin in August 2025. The plant is located on a seaside bluff,
midway between Los Angeles and San Francisco.
On Monday, anti-nuclear activists and national environmental
groups urged the federal agency to reject the request,
saying in a petition that the exemption would amount to a
dangerous, unprecedented shortcut that would expose the
public to safety risks from reactors that began operating in
the mid-1980s.
“There is absolutely no precedent for the exemption requested
by PG&E. The NRC has never allowed a reactor to operate
past its license expiration dates without thoroughly assessing
the safety and environmental risks,” Diane Curran, an attorney
for the anti-nuclear advocacy group Mothers for Peace,
said in a statement.
The dispute over the potential exemption is the latest battlefront
in a long-running fight over the safety of the reactors.
Construction of the Diablo Canyon plant began in the 1960s
and critics say potential shaking from nearby earthquake
faults, not recognized when the design was first approved,
could damage equipment and release radiation. One nearby
fault was not discovered until 2008. PG&E has long said the
plant is seismically safe; federal regulators have agreed.
Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom — who once supported
closing the plant — did a turnaround last year and argued
it needed to keep running beyond the scheduled closure to
ward off possible blackouts as the state transitions to solar
and other renewable sources. At his urging, the Legislature
dissolved a complex 2016 agreement among environmentalists,
plant worker unions and the utility to close the plant
by 2025, opening a pathway to keep it running longer. The
utility said it changed direction given the energy policies
adopted by the state.
PG&E officials have said they are eager for certainty about
the plant’s future because of the difficulty of reversing
course on a plant that was headed for permanent retirement,
but now needs to prepare for a potentially longer
lifespan.
In October, the utility asked the NRC to resume consideration
of an application initially submitted in 2009 to extend the
plant’s life, which later was withdrawn after PG&E in 2016
announced plans to shutter the reactors when the licenses
expired.
But the idea of going back in time to resume consideration
of the previous filing was rejected by the agency, leaving
PG&E with the time-consuming task of submitting a new
application that it expects to file by the end of the year.
Reviewing a request for an extended license typically takes
two years or more. Without extended licenses, that means
one reactor, or both, might have to close while the NRC
reviews the applications.
That led to a separate request: PG&E wants the NRC to allow
the plant to continue running beyond its current, authorized
term while the federal agency considers the license extensions.
That ruling is not expected until next month.
Typically, if a nuclear plant files for a license extension at
least five years before the expiration of the existing license,
the existing license remains in effect until the NRC’s application
review is complete, even if it technically passes the
expiration date. But PG&E would not meet the usual fiveyear
benchmark.
325 EISENHOWER LANE NORTH LOMBARD, IL 60148
TELEPHONE (630) 261-1166 FAX (630) 261-1818
info@htareps.com www.htareps.com
Representing
Zoeller Pump Company
Mansfield Plumbing Products
Sioux Chief
Lenox Tools
Irwin Tools
Prier Products
Blanco
AK Industries
Magic Plastics
IPEX/Canplas
32
| Chief Engineer

An aerial photo of the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant, south of Los Osos, in Avila Beach, Calif., is seen on June 20, 2010. California’s last operating
nuclear power plant could get a second lease on life. At the urging of Gov. Gavin Newsom, owner Pacific Gas & Electric is taking steps it hopes will extend
the operating licenses for the twin reactors, which now expire in 2024 and 2025. (Joe Johnston/The Tribune via AP, File)
In documents submitted to the NRC, the company said the
change it’s seeking “will not present an undue risk to the
public health and safety.”
Without the exemption, the NRC would have less than a year
to conduct the license-extension review — far less time than
is typical — before the current license expires and the plant
would be required to close.
The environmental groups said conducting a truncated
review in just months “would be difficult if not impossible”
and raise safety risks for a plant that until recently was headed
for closure.
Completion of the NRC review, before a longer run is permitted,
is needed “to assure that continued operation of the
reactors will be safe,” they wrote.
Volume 88 · Number 3 | 33

News
LSU Petroleum Engineering Professor
Proposes Plan for Orphan Oil Wells
BATON ROUGE, La. (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Oil drilling has
had its fair share of controversy as of late, leaving engineers
trying to determine how to keep fossil fuels in play while
considering environmentally friendly solutions. LSU Craft &
Hawkins Department of Petroleum Engineering Professor
Dandina Rao has a plan that will not only create less carbon
dioxide during oil production but will also make use of the
millions of orphan wells that are scattered throughout the
United States.
“With the oil industry possibly venturing toward renewable
energy, the question is can we continue to use fossil fuels but
in an environmentally sustainable manner, and that’s exactly
what our invention does,” said Rao, the Emmett C. Wells Jr.
Distinguished Professor.
Rao’s proposed pilot project recently received a grant from
LSU’s LIFT2 (Leveraging Innovation for Technology Transfer)
program, which moves innovative concepts closer to
commercialization. His LIFT2 project would initially convert
orphan wells to carbon-neutral production wells through
GAGD-process adaptation. GAGD stands for Gas-Assisted
Gravity Drainage, an oil recovery process that has environmental
benefits since it sequesters the CO2, or the flue gas.
The GAGD process yields 65-95 percent of the original oil in
place compared to other oil recovery methods, such as Conventional
Gas Injection, which yield just 5-15 percent and use
large volumes of CO2.
This LIFT2 project proposes to test the GAGD process in the
field using orphan wells, which are oil wells that have been
abandoned by companies for one reason or another. Currently,
there are 131,277 documented orphan wells in the
United States. However, the U.S. Department of the Interior
estimates there are 3.5 million nationwide that are undocumented.
Louisiana has 4,601 of those, most of which are
in the northwest corner of the state in Caddo and Union
Parishes.
“Louisiana only caps 40-50 orphan wells each year because
it’s costly, and there’s no budget for it,” Rao said. “Companies
who were responsible walked away leaving it to the
state. This has been a problem. There is no monetary incentive
for companies to cap these wells, so you must create an
incentive for industry to take positive action. Our proposal
was to create that incentive.”
Another added benefit of this project, according to Rao, is
getting Louisiana’s oil production trending upward again.
From 1980 to 2020, oil production in the state has gone
down from 200 million barrels/year to 40 million barrels/year.
“We want to help the state spur oil production in an environmentally-sensitive
manner so we will have a booming energy
and petrochemical industry for several decades into the
future, [creating] jobs and prosperity,” he said. “There is a
need for oil, not only as a source of energy, but also as a raw
material for the enormous petrochemicals industry around
the world, which neither solar nor wind energy can fulfill.”
Thanks to Rao and LSU Petroleum Engineering Postdoctoral
Researcher Bikash Saikia, the university holds two patents on
the GAGD and Single-Well-GAGD processes, with hopes to
license the technology.
“The success of this project would have far-reaching consequences
to Louisiana’s oil industry and economy,” Rao said.
LSU Craft & Hawkins Department of Petroleum Engineering Professor Dandina Rao has formulated a plan to convert orphan oil wells to carbon-neutral
production wells using a process called Gas-Assisted Gravity Drainage (GAGD).
34 | Chief Engineer

Clean Technology Lasers: New Tool
in Surface Pretreatment for Superior
Coating Adhesion
Most manufacturers understand the value of pretreating
metal surfaces of parts to remove corrosion, grease, residue,
old coatings, or to roughen the surface of metals prior to
coating. By ensuring the items are cleaned down to bare
metal, manufacturers can avoid costly warranty issues that
result when coatings peel, flake, bubble, or otherwise fail
prematurely.
Unfortunately, the traditional techniques used for this purpose
— such as sandblasting, dry ice blasting and chemical
stripping — are messy and require expensive consumables, as
well as substantial time for preparation and cleanup. These
methods are also drawing scrutiny from regulators like the
EPA and OSHA, since they can pose risks to the environment
and applicators.
I use the laser to treat a small area, everyone starts talking
and getting excited. By the end, when I let them try the
equipment, everyone is having a good time and saying how
great the laser works.”
Given its effectiveness pretreating metal surfaces, industrial
laser systems are increasingly being used in manufacturing
facilities. The systems can be integrated into automated inline
processing lines, or technicians can use mobile handheld
units. With significant advantages in safety and efficiency,
laser cleaning is poised to disrupt the surface pretreatment
market across more sectors.
(Continued on pg. 36)
Today, a more effective alternative is utilizing industrial-grade,
precision laser-based systems that can remove
paint, contaminants, rust and residues with a high-energy
laser beam that leaves the substrate unaffected. Preparation
and cleanup time are minimal, and the low-maintenance
equipment can last decades.
According to Vincent Galiardi, owner of Galiardi Laser Clean,
a surface cleaning operator based in St. Charles County, Mo.,
many people are surprised to learn that clean technology
lasers are the most cost-effective, efficient and safest method
of industrial surface preparation.
“Many people are unfamiliar with the use of lasers to pretreat
metal surfaces,” says Galiardi. “When I do a demonstration,
at first the people in attendance are skeptical. But after
Volume 88 · Number 3 | 35

(Continued from pg. 35)
News
Resolving Conventional Cleaning Limitations
There are many applications in manufacturing that require
pretreatment of metal surfaces prior to coating. To improve
coating adhesion, residue, oil or grease must be removed before
coating application. In some cases, a manufacturer may
seek to further enhance coating adhesion by roughening the
surface.
When defective metal parts are produced, instead of discarding
the product, manufacturers can strip the paint and recoat
the component.
To refurbish existing metal parts or recoat industrial infrastructure,
removing the previous coating along with any
corrosion is usually required to facilitate the new coating’s
adhesion to the surface.
To pretreat metal surfaces, sandblasting, dry ice blasting or
chemical stripping are traditionally used as industrial cleaning
processes.
Sand Blasting
Abrasive sandblasting involves forcefully projecting a stream
of abrasive particles onto a surface, usually with compressed
air or steam. The silica sand used in abrasive blasting typically
fractures into fine particles and becomes airborne, which can
cause serious or fatal respiratory disease.
When workers inhale crystalline silica, the lung tissue reacts
by developing fibrotic nodules and scarring around the
trapped silica particles, causing a fibrotic lung condition
called silicosis. Estimates indicate that more than 1 million
U.S. workers are at risk of developing silicosis and that more
than 100,000 of these workers are employed as sandblasters.
In addition, particles are generated during abrasive blasting
that further contribute to respiratory problems and other
harmful health effects.
“When sand or any other media is used to knock off particles
from a substrate, there is always a byproduct that has the
potential to become airborne and inhaled,” says Galiardi.
“Besides the sand, this could be the particles you’re removing
— the coatings, plating, anodizing, corrosion, and even
lead paint.”
“Industry has needed a cleaner, safer surface pretreatment
solution for a very long time,” adds Galiardi. “Sandblasting
is inherently unsafe for operators. The silica glass used in
sandblasting is toxic. An operator must wear a full HEPA suit
when sandblasting to avoid breathing in particulates.”
Sandblasting also is time-consuming to clean up, since the
sand essentially scatters everywhere, even though it is usually
considered a “fast” cleaning method.
Laser systems remove corrosion, grease, residue and existing coatings from
metal surfaces quickly.
Dry Ice Blasting
With dry ice blasting, dry ice pellets are used as the abrasive.
The challenge is that dry ice blasting is often not abrasive
enough to sufficiently remove paint or corrosion from the
surface of metals. Since dry ice is an expensive consumable,
the costs can escalate when cleaning metal surfaces in higher
volumes.
Chemical Stripping
With chemical stripping, harsh, even toxic chemicals are used
to strip metal-based objects of paint, rust, and other contaminants
to bare metal. However, for operators, exposure
to corrosive acids and noxious chemical fumes is inherently
dangerous. The process can also be time-consuming to prepare
the proper chemical bath, achieve the required level of
cleaning, and dispose of the waste. In addition, disposing of
toxic chemicals is costly and closely regulated by agencies like
OSHA and the EPA.
Safe, Effective Laser Cleaning
Laser-based systems have significant advantages over these
traditional methods, including ease of use in which an operator
simply points and clicks a high-energy laser beam at the
surface. The substrate is not affected by the laser, and the
systems do not create any mess or byproducts. The approach
is eco-friendly, energy-efficient, and completes the job in
half the time of traditional methods when preparation and
cleanup are considered.
“In our experience, laser cleaning is as fast at removing rust
or old coatings as other methods, but without the same
amount of cleanup,” said Galiardi. “When we treat a surface
with lasers, any fumes or dislodged particulate are extracted
into a HEPA filter, and the job is done. There is no media
[sand, dry ice, chemicals] to replenish or clean up.”
36
| Chief Engineer

Galiardi Laser Clean uses laser systems made by Orlando,
Fla.-based Laser Photonics, a leading provider of patented
industrial grade CleanTech® laser systems for cleaning and
surface conditioning. The American-made systems function
either as mobile standalone units or can be integrated into
production lines.
The laser systems are available in portable and stationary
models ranging from 50 to 3,000-watts — a 4,000-watt version
is in development — with chamber sizes from 3' x 3' in
size to 6' x 12'. The systems can also be installed in manufacturing
lines in cabinets or operated by a robotic arm.
Galiardi says that laser pretreatment of metal surfaces can
be used to streamline various manufacturing processes.
Corrosion, for example, can begin to accumulate within a
very short time on new parts, depending on the material and
environmental conditions, and should be removed prior to
coating.
For one major auto manufacturer, Galiardi Laser Clean was
asked to remove rust from conveying system components
used to transport cars through the manufacturing process.
The components were corroded due to being left outside
during a 6-month delay in the project. When it was time
to install the items, the provider wanted to first treat the
surfaces and return the components to a “like new” appearance.
In another example, Galiardi was asked to remove rust from
over 400 transmissions in a couple of days. The laser systems
are particularly effective when reaching into tight spaces
that are hard to reach by hand. By masking the area to
protect vulnerable parts, the laser can be applied without
affecting the rest of the assembled product.
“No other parts [of the transmission] had to be removed and
nothing had to be cleaned afterwards,” he says.
Galiardi’s company also utilized the laser system to remove
cleaning oils from truck chassis. “We used the laser to
remove the oil right before painting so it was a bare metal
object going with nothing on it that would affect the coating,”
he says.
Industrial plants that need to recoat existing metal structures
also need to remove rust before painting. According to Galiardi,
he removed corrosion from a very large storage tank
using the CleanTech laser system in about half the time of
the alternative being considered, an abrasive disc grinder.
“Disc grinders basically just chip off [the rust] and it becomes
airborne and makes a mess,” he says. “Grinders can also be
dangerous because sparks or debris can shoot off the wheel
or catch an article of clothing.”
With clean laser technology, there is now an environmentally
friendly alternative to abrasive blasting and chemical
stripping for surface pretreatment. The approach is safer for
operators and highly adaptable to a wide range of manufacturing
and industrial applications.
Laser systems remove corrosion with less preparation and mess than traditional
techniques.
“As people become more aware of laser-based systems and
compare them to traditional methods, they need to factor
in prep and cleanup time, which can significantly impact
project cost,” says Galiardi. “When the improved operator
safety, equipment longevity, and lower maintenance of laser
systems are also considered, the clean laser technology has a
much higher ROI.”
The longevity of low-maintenance laser systems further adds
to their value, increasing ROI, and making replacement unnecessary
for decades.
“CleanTech laser systems can last for 50,000 to 100,000 hours.
That’s many decades working eight-hour days. After purchase,
there’s virtually no maintenance necessary,”
concludes Galiardi.
For more information on laser cleaning solutions for surface
preparation, contact Laser Photonics at (407) 804-1000 or
visit www.laserphotonics.com.
Volume 87 · Number 12 | 37

DISASTER
RESTORATION
IN A
SECURE
ENVIRONMENT
by KARL J. PALOUCEK
Sprinkler systems are vital to the safety and security of
any building and its occupants. The importance of their
ability to extinguish a blaze before firefighters can respond
can’t be overstated. But once they’ve done their job to
mitigate a potential inferno, things in the affected space are
anything but normal, with water and soot splashed out all
over the floor and everything on it. This is what restoration
services like ACR are for — to ensure that the continuity of
whatever your business in that space is can continue as close
to uninterrupted as possible.
Sometimes restorers face a straightforward cleanup, with
personnel cleaning out the affected spaces, cleaning and
drying the room and its contents, and putting things back in
their right order. But what do you do when the space you’re
working is loaded with highly secure files and databases
that need to be available round the clock, and that can’t be
removed from the facility for cleaning? This is what ACR
faced during a particular job at a major government agency
in Cook County.
“They reported a fire, which was caused by a power outlet
that was connected to a workstation that had the computers
and [other devices],” Eric Brophy, Project Manager at ACR,
says. “It caught fire, plastic melted, and that set off the sprinkler
head right above it, affecting that whole office space/
division.”
The fire source in a cubicle with resulting water/soot mixture on the floor.
What confronted them when they arrived was a daunting
task for a number of reasons. “There was a lot going on,”
Brophy recalls. “They had brought to my attention the files,
38 | Chief Engineer

so that was a major key in looking at it. There were odor issues
because of the fire. There was soot damage from the fire, and
then the sprinklers went off, so we had water. And then we had
water mixed in with the soot. There were a lot of variables going
on within one room. So what we had to do is, figure out what
we do first in a timeline of what was considered the emergency,
what we had to get done right away, which is to get the water
extracted off the floors so we’re not cross-contaminating into
other parts of the [facility].”
First Things First: Restoring Data Access
Also of paramount importance to the client were about 15-20
computers that were essential to the functioning of the facility.
These had to be cleaned and returned to service as soon as possible
— but there was a problem: Because of the sensitive nature
of the data contained on them, they absolutely had to remain on
the premises. “Normally, those types of things would be cleaned
offsite, using other, more aggressive methods,” Brophy explains.
“Obviously we couldn’t do that, so we had to set up a system
to do that onsite. What we ended up doing is taking one of the
areas that was affected, and essentially turning it into what we
would call a ‘clean room’ to where we could take those computers
that had the information on it, and the hard-copy files, and
put them in a room, clean them outside of the affected room —
right outside the affected room — and then once we were done
cleaning that room and everything was dry, putting them back
in.
All ceiling tiles exposed in preparation for cleaning by hand.
So they were opened up, cleaned, deodorized, put back together,”
Brophy continues. “All of those things were inventoried — what
workstation all the different parts and pieces went to — and
reassembled at the desks that they were removed from. We set
them up, re-energized them, and made sure that the items were
in the safe working order as they were before we started.”
ACR had the computers back in service in two days’ time.
The rest of the job would take a good deal longer, entailing a
laundry list of concerns that needed addressing. “Emergency
extraction within the source unit,” Brophy begins to list, “getting
the water extracted, getting the room detail-cleaned, removing
ceiling tiles, detail-cleaning the metal ceiling grid, all the
mechanicals above the ceiling, all your HVAC — we had to wipe
all that down. All your light fixtures. We started from the top
and worked our way down, essentially. Basically, everything in
that room is touched. It’s a fine detail-clean to remove the soot,
the smoke, odor, and any other contaminants that might be in
there.”
The entire job would take 14 days.
(Continued on pg. 40)
Hand-cleaning the exposed ceilings.
Volume 88 · Number 3 | 39

Water in the Walls
Once the computer and data situation was in hand after
those first two days, more attention could be turned to fixture
and structural concerns. Ceiling tiles had to be removed
and scaffolding put in place to address issues high up. Soot
from the fire had to be cleaned up. And then there were the
walls. John Schaefer, ACR’s Director of Operations, detailed
the situation and ACR’s solution. “The walls in this particular
area were double-layer 5/8" drywall,” he says. “That’s for
fire codes. And they were insulated as well, for soundproofing
in an office environment, so one side of the wall was two
layers of drywall. The other side of the wall was two layers of
drywall. That’s a very difficult sandwich to try and dry. We’ve
come up with an innovative system for that, so we keep the
costs down not only for the extended drying for that type of
stuff. What we do is, we cut the first outside layer of drywall
up to 2 feet, and then we leave the other drywall.
The exact source of the fire immediately after sprinklers were deactivated.
“We’ve talked to drywall contractors over the years,” Schaefer
says. “They’ve said, ‘Hey, if you could just cut the outside
one up to 2 feet, and leave the other one, that way we can access
to dry that wall cavity insulation.’ And then when they
go back, all they have to do is put a 2-foot piece of drywall in
on that length of wall — mud tape it, sand it, and it’s a much
quicker, cost-effective way of doing it.”
Chasing Water
One of the downsides of water issuing from sprinkler systems
is that it will always seek its own level — meaning it
won’t stay put in the room where it’s needed just because you
want it to. If it can find a way down, it will. And so where
the water goes, ACR has to follow. “We had to go to adjacent
rooms and chase the water,” Brophy says. “[It] went into the
basement, went into adjacent offices and apartments, and
through that wing of the building. So, outside of the source
unit, it was mainly dealing with water — setting up drying
equipment, getting the structure dried out.”
All the same, the challenges posed by water in this case were
fairly average compared to other jobs ACR has dealt with in
the past. “We’ve had water losses in high-rise units downtown,”
Schaefer says. “A riser might let go, or a pipe freezes
and breaks, and it literally leaks 50 floors down — multiple
units per floor. So it’s not just one unit, or one wall of all 50
floors — it’s multiple walls, floors and ceilings. There’s a lot
of planning and strategy, investigation and thought that go
into losses like that. Those are large, extensive losses that
take a lot of resources, and a lot of planning and a lot of
knowledge to be able to execute.”
More of the source of the fire immediately after sprinklers were deactivated.
ACR’s Director of Marketing and Business Development
Jeneane Ally jumps in momentarily to point out one of the
most labyrinthine difficulties they face on jobs like this:
40 | Chief Engineer

insurance companies. “A job like John just mentioned, where
there might be 50 floors affected? While you’re dealing with the
homeowners association, you’re also dealing with, primarily, 50
different individual insurance carriers. So the crew in their work
not only has to mitigate these jobs, but they need the acumen,
the finesse and the knowledge to be able to facilitate conversations
with multiple carriers.”
And this is where differentiation comes in where ACR is concerned.
Lots of other restoration service companies may have the
same equipment to do the work. But this is a job that requires
more than just the right tools. It takes tact, it takes insight, and
it takes properly trained and qualified personnel. “There’s two
main governing bodies in the restoration industry,” Schaefer
explains. “The first one is the RIA — the Restoration Industry
Association. There’s also the IICRC, the Institute of Inspection,
Cleaning and Restoration Certification. The IICRC is the main
training body that offers all of the training and certifications.
Our technicians go through that, whether they’re training for
water damage, mold remediation, fire damage, smoke removal
— those types of things. … There’s the EPA Lab [Certification],
there’s the OSHA training that we go through, asbestos awareness
training — there’s all kinds of different ones that we put our
technicians through.
Files and their cabinets had to be cleaned by hand using a multi-step process and
consistent HEPA filtration.
“Fortunately, for our clients,” he continues, “ACR has two of the
highest-certified employees in, really, the world. There’s two certifications
that I hold myself, and we have one other gentleman
that has those, the Certified Restorer, and Water-Loss Specialist
certifications. There are probably 300 people in the world that
hold both of those designations. They’re essentially the master’s
degree of the restoration industry.”
Schaefer agrees with Brophy that it’s their highly trained staff
that makes the difference, which he sees in action every day.
“The people that we have here at ACR — their training, their
experience, the procedures that we have in place, and the management
of those people. That’s really what comes into play with
being able to successfully execute a loss like this.”
Fine particles of soot and debris found their way into thousands of files.
The Project Manager must test all walls for moisture in order to create a plan of attack. The moisture reading of the drywall in the room where the fire started was off the charts.
Volume 88 · Number 3 |
41

42 | Chief Engineer

Volume 88 · Number 3 | 43

News
Alternatives to the Ever-Increasing Cost
of Copper-Wire Phone Service By Chris Burgy
“The PSTN is headed toward an inevitable sunset.”
Back in August 2019, the Federal Communications
Commission (FCC) said this in describing the original Public
Switched Telephone Network (PSTN), also known as analog
copper-wire phone lines or “plain-old telephone service”
(POTS).
It’s no secret that POTS is reaching retirement age after
a very long run that started on March 10, 1876, when
Alexander Graham Bell famously barked to his assistant, "Mr.
Watson — come here — I want to see you." to his assistant.
What’s less well known is how incumbent
telecommunications carriers are getting their customers —
including building owners and managers — to move away
from POTS. The carriers’ strategy, in three words: jack up
prices.
Ooma is hearing from customers that business POTS lines
priced at less than $100 a month only a year or two ago now
cost several hundred dollars per month.
See Fig. 1, heavily redacted to protect the consumer’s
identity. It illustrates a monthly bill for a single POTS line for
the period ending May 9, 2021. The total cost is $105.55 after
totaling up all the taxes and fees.
In Fig. 2, we see the monthly bill for the same POTS line for
the period ending May 9, 2022 — just one year later. The
total cost now is $508.93, which is a 382-percent increase.
Another customer had a staggering bill of $2,478.56 from
January 2022 for just four POTS lines. That’s $619.64 per line!
Numerous customers are now paying $200 a month or
more for POTS lines. We’re also hearing that reliability is
decreasing, with customers sometimes waiting days or even
weeks for service to be restored when POTS lines go down.
Most may not always be aware of these staggering price
hikes if POTS charges are buried in much bigger line items
for overall telecommunications services. They may also be
reluctant to pull the plug on POTS because of concerns that
mission-critical devices, such as fire alarms, elevator phones,
building entry systems and more, will be knocked offline.
Not to worry. There are now POTS replacements solutions
on the market — such as Ooma AirDial (www.ooma.com/
airdial) — that can be “drop-in” substitutes for copper-wire
phone lines.
The right POTS replacement choice can significantly reduce
ongoing costs while meeting regulatory requirements and
eliminating the need to rip and replace legacy devices.
We see POTS replacement as a three-step process: audit,
select and install. Let’s walk through the process:
1. AUDIT
POTS replacement should begin with an audit to determine
how many POTS lines an organization is paying for, where
each line is located, and which devices are supported. This is
often easier said than done.
The organization’s accounting or finance team should be
able to provide records that list how many POTS lines are
billed to the organization and the facilities where the lines
are located. An IT or telecom specialist should then visit each
facility to identify the actual wiring.
This can be an eye-opener, especially for larger businesses.
We’ve seen facilities where live POTS lines aren’t connected
to any devices and, on the flip side, devices that were
believed to be active that aren’t connected to live POTS lines.
The final task in the audit process is making a list of the lines
that will be replaced, noting the phone number and device
associated with each line.
For those who want help with auditing, Ooma provides
a free on-site assessment and cost evaluation for POTS
replacement. Go to www.ooma.com/airdial to request an
assessment or call (866) 839-5810.
2. SELECT
Once you’ve identified the POTS lines that need replacement,
the next step is selecting a specific solution. Among the
criteria to consider:
Regulatory Compliance.
Life-safety systems are covered by regulations — such as
NFPA 72 for fire alarms and ASME A17.1 for elevator phones
— that have specific requirements for POTS replacement,
such as making sure the device uses a private network rather
than sending data over the public Internet. Don’t get stuck
with POTS replacement devices that aren’t designed to
achieve regulatory compliance.
One Vendor Bill.
POTS replacement solutions typically involve multiple services
— including wireless data and phone service — in one box.
Some solutions are incomplete, leaving it to the customer to
provision the hardware with services. Others require tracking
44
| Chief Engineer

and paying monthly bills from more than one provider. The
best POTS replacement solutions deliver one comprehensive
bill from one vendor.
Flexibility.
POTS replacement devices often need to be installed in
cramped spaces, such as basements or crowded equipment
closets. Choose devices that can be wall-mounted or shelfmounted
and have an option for the antennas to be
physically separated from the base station.
Remote Management.
Managing POTS replacement in multiple locations can
become unwieldy if building management or IT staff must
physically check on each device to confirm that it’s working.
Look for a solution that offers remote management through
a Web portal to instantly check status of all devices, along
with automatic notification for key personnel when a device
goes offline or has a low back-up battery.
Reputation.
Many small and minimally funded vendors are crowding
into POTS replacement. Look for a vendor with a solid track
record of delivering telecommunications services over a span
of years. Also, with the recent pandemic-driven supply chain
disruptions, make sure the vendor has an adequate inventory
to promptly fill orders.
Fig. 1: This monthly bill is for a single POTS line for the period ending May
9, 2021. After adding up all taxes and fees, the total cost is $105.55.
Customer Support.
The gold standard for tech support is 24/7/365, with a clear
escalation path when issues can’t be fixed on the first call.
The best vendors are committed to this goal.
3. INSTALL
Installation of POTS replacement devices need to be carefully
coordinated, especially the moment when numbers are
ported from the old POTS line to the POTS replacement, to
avoid downtime.
The installation work should be assigned either to
telecom support staff, an outside telecom partner or the
vendor’s field service team. Immediately on completion, all
downstream systems should be tested to confirm the new
virtual POTS lines are active.
When all the work is done, building owners and managers
will get two immediate benefits: They will have peace of
mind knowing their facilities are no longer at risk from the
end of POTS, and their monthly expenses will significantly
drop.
Ooma AirDial
Ooma AirDial is an all-in-one POTS replacement solution that
runs on a secure and reliable network that is trusted by more
than two million users — businesses can save money, remain
compliant and keep using critical life-safety voice and alarm
systems.
Installation is easy. Manage life-safety systems in a whole
Fig 2: This is the monthly bill for the same POTS line for the same period
illustrated in Fig. 1, just one year later. The total cost now is $508.93 — a
382-percent increase.
new way using the Remote Device Management Web portal.
Get automated email and text alerts should any AirDial
device go offline.
Ooma, the POTS replacement expert, makes it easy for
any organization to eliminate POTS line dependency by
providing the hardware, software and phone service in one
simple monthly service package with one monthly bill and
zero rate surprises.
Chris Burgy is the Vice President of Development at Ooma,
and is responsible for mergers and acquisitions, strategic
partnerships and driving Ooma’s strategy for enterprise
unified communications as a service (UCaaS). Chris brings
diverse experience ranging from information technology,
sales, channel business models, corporate development and
strategy. For more information, visit: www.ooma.com. For
questions or comments, please email: press@ooma.com.
Volume 88 · Number 3 | 45

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METROPOLITANIND.COM

News
Vape Detector Detects Vape Smoke at
Schools and Businesses
LOS ANGELES, Calif. (SEND2PRESS NEWSWIRE) — Vape
Detector, a Californian brand, has announced the launch of
its line of Vape Detectors for schools, hotels, businesses and
parents. The growing popularity of vaping among young
people has made it increasingly difficult for schools and
workplaces to enforce policies against it. Vape Detector is a
trademarked brand of Forensics Detectors, which is a leading
gas detection company located in Los Angeles, Calif.
Dr. Koz, the president of Forensics Detectors says, “The
new line of vape detector products will offer schools,
hotels, casinos and business with choices that will assist in
controlling the vaping epidemic.”
Vaping has become a growing concern for school
administrators and business managers, leading to the
implementation of policies aimed to curb vape use.
However, enforcing these policies can be difficult. With the
introduction of affordable vape detectors, enforcement
becomes much more manageable, especially with
continuous, real-time vape detection and cellphone alarm
features.
A vape detector is an electronic device that detects vape
smoke using laser scattering sensor technology. They are
more than 100 times more sensitive than a typical home
smoke alarm. Vape Detector has launched three unique
affordable vape detector products to address the vape
challenge.
The first is a handheld unit, priced at $195, that can be used
for point-and-sample measurements to confirm if vaping
has occurred in an indoor space. The second is a modern
and slim wall-mount unit, priced at $495, that can provide
Vape Detector introduces a line of sensitive and affordable Vape Detectors
that detect vape smoke from glycerin, propylene glycol, and other vape
juice components.
discreet and real-time monitoring and smartphone alarming,
popular among schools and hotels. The third is an industrial
wall-mount vape detector, priced at $895, that has cosmetic
deterrent features and a super-sensitive laser sensor for
industrial workplaces.
The detectors are sensitive to a variety of toxins emitted by
vaping, including vape juice smoke, THC vapor, CBD vapor,
weed smoke, nicotine smoke, propylene glycol vapor and
glycerin vapor.
Volume 88 · Number 3 | 47

Member News
Western Specialty Contractors Installs
Concrete Pad Printing Machine at
Cleveland’s Tap Packaging + Design
ST. LOUIS, Mo. — Western Specialty Contractors – Cleveland
Branch recently installed a concrete equipment pad to
support Tap Packaging + Design’s newest printing machine.
The industrial printing facility has been based in the
Cleveland area for nearly 120 years. Located in a
208,000-square-foot modern production facility, Tap offers a
variety of equipment and services from graphic and structural
design to printing, converting, inventory management and
fulfillment.
Western contracted with Tap in August 2022 to install
the 13-ft.-wide x 33-ft.-long, two-foot-thick concrete pad,
according to engineering specifications, for a large printing
machine that prints beer cases and packaging for other
consumer products.
Because the plant operates 24 hours a day, Western’s
craftsmen utilized an electric mini excavator and other
electrical equipment to minimize fumes and noise while
digging a trench in the plant’s 5-inch-thick concrete floor for
the new pad.
Western’s craftsmen then created a foundation to pour the
5000-psi concrete mix using #6 rebar running both directions
every 12 inches, with hook bars at the end of each run to
create a pair of rebar mats.
Western completed the project in October 2022, on time and
within budget and has plans to install concrete pads at the
plant later this year for three additional pieces of machinery.
Western’s craftsmen setting #6 rebar in both directions every 12 inches,
with hook bars at the end of each run, before pouring the 5000-psi
concrete to create the pad that will support a large printing machine.
48
| Chief Engineer

Register Now for
the 2023 Vendor
Fair
It’s been quite a while since we’ve been able to hold our
usually biennial Vendor Fair, but it’s back on!
Make sure you’re registered for the big event being held at
Chicago Gaelic Park (6119 147th St., Oak Forest). This is a big
event for our Associate Members, as well as for our other
participating vendors.
We hope to see as many of you there as possible to take in
what’s new in our industry!
Volume 88 · Number 3 | 49

Techline
Eplan Offers Maximum Customer
Benefits for the Digital Transformation
MONHEIM, Germany — Companies rely on a variety of
software applications from different manufacturers. The
Eplan Partner Network was founded to exploit the full
potential of productive interactions between the various
solutions in the environment of product configurators, CPQ,
PLC and PLM/ERP. The network has set binding targets for
further developing their integrations, creating a solid basis
for the manufacturers. Customers benefit from the tested
quality of the software, ongoing developments of such, and
a systematic increase in benefits to their own workflows.
Open interfaces and deep integration offer a wide range of
opportunities for implementing the digital transformation in
the real world.
The Watchword is Integration
The Eplan Partner Network is a global framework
organization with companies divided into four types of
partners: strategic partners, technology partners, solutions
partners and research partners. By way of joint development
of integrations, not to mention quality assurance and
support based on open interfaces, users derive the greatest
possible benefits from the applications.
International Partner Expansion
Key players in automation were already participating in the
network in early 2021, including the strategic partners Rittal,
Phoenix Contact and Rockwell Automation, and which was
expanded in 2022 to include Siemens and the company’s
Smart Infrastructure division. Technology partners make up
the most comprehensive area in the Eplan Partner Network,
with 38 companies from this sector. Digital Ecosystem
Manager Luca Cavalli at ABB, a leading technology company,
says, “Eplan plays an important role in the growing network
of electrical systems designers. A clear example is the
seamless integration between ABB’s digital e-Configure
platform and the Eplan Data Portal, which streamlines
the design process for users. With the introduction of
sustainable energy systems and smart industry upgrades,
ABB is committed to supporting professionals managing
these changes. The integration of engineering tools and
configuration tools ensures both time savings and highquality
data.”
Other technology partners include Auvesy-MDT, Ehrt,
Gossen Metrawatt, Jetter and Sigmatek. Internationally,
Digiwin (China) and Trace Software (France) have also been
integrated into the network, as have Omron, Wago and
Weidmüller, which are all global players. Sandra Huang
of Digiwin says, “The interface between Digiwin PLM
and Eplan helps engineers to fully focus on their actual
project planning. All relevant information including bills
of materials, parts data and project data are automatically
50 | Chief Engineer
Working closely with its partners, solutions provider Eplan is paving the way
for companies to implement the digital transformation.
synchronised between the Eplan Platform and Digiwin
PLM. Users benefit from consistent and up-to-date data
throughout the entire project life cycle.”
On the solutions partners side of thing, there are a slew of
well-known automation companies, including Alexander
Bürkle (electronics wholesaler/technology services provider),
CADTalk (CAD/PDM-ERP integrations), Cideon (systems
integrator), D&TS GMBH (master data management), Elmo
Solutions (CAD/PDM/PLM-ERP integrations), Grollmus (PLC
programming), PLM CAD Utilities (CAD/PDM/PLM-ERP
integrations), Secude International (Microsoft and SAP
Partners), Semodia (MTP export), Solidline (PLM systems
vendor), Wus-Tec (wire fabrication), and Zahnen Technik
(water/wastewater technology). This demonstrates the wide
range of solutions that are utilised and integrated into the
Eplan environment. CTO Benedikt Ney at Zahnen Technik
says, “We want to provide everyone access to clean water.
Thanks to our amazing partnership with Eplan, we’re getting
closer to this vision every day.”
In the field of research partnerships, a cooperation with
TH Lübeck University was recently signed, expanding
the circle of existing research partners, the European 4.0
Transformation Center (E4TC) and the Institute for Control
Engineering of Machine Tools and Manufacturing Units (ISW)
of the University of Stuttgart.
Find out more at www.eplan-software.com/partner/

Watts Introduces New Smart &
Connected W561 Thermostat
Watts has launched the Watts W561, a smart and connected
WiFi thermostat that provides precise temperature control of
a single-stage heating system.
When connected to the Internet, the W561 thermostat can
be controlled remotely using the Watts® Home mobile app.
It offers a 7-day, four-event programmable schedule and an
early start feature that automatically heats up a room by the
scheduled time.
An “away” mode can be quickly and easily accessed to
provide energy savings when the space is unoccupied. In
addition, the thermostat supports radiant floor heating with
a floor sensor that can be installed to enhance comfort and
protect floor coverings.
For more information, go to https://www.watts.com/w561.
Watts’ WiFi-connected W561 Thermostat offers broadly flexible,
programmable control via the Watts Home mobile app.
Volume 88 · Number 3 | 51

Techline
Electric Vehicles Loom Large in US
Power Grid Modernization
DENVER (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Since its inception, the
U.S. electric grid has mostly operated smoothly as one
synchronous machine with a one-directional flow of
electricity to meet the nation’s predictable power needs.
However, as older centralized thermal resources are being
replaced with more variable renewables and long-distance
delivery systems are showing their age, that synchronicity
appears to be declining. U.S. power outages are up 64
percent this decade compared to the previous decade.
According to a new report from CoBank’s Knowledge
Exchange, age, weather and the generating resource
mix is undermining U.S. power systems faster than the
infrastructure can be replaced, reinforced and possibly reenvisioned.
Customer engagement and time-of-use charging rate incentives could help
electric distributors manage demand, and even store excess renewable
energy in idle vehicles’ batteries to meet system peaks.
“The U.S. electric grid is experiencing something of a
midlife crisis”, said Teri Viswanath, lead power, energy
and water economist for CoBank. “It’s not just that the
nation’s power system is aging; it was designed and built
with the presumption of a stable climate and a centralized,
unidirectional flow of electricity. But that premise is quickly
changing.”
During periods of system stress, upstream grid operators
are increasingly turning to large customers to voluntarily
curb their power use. But as grid management technologies
evolve, this manual upstream coordination might give way to
an increase in downstream controls, with a greater amount
of electricity “traffic flow” coordinated at the distribution
level.
EVs and Chargers: Grid Disruptors or Grid-Balancing Tools?
Electric vehicles are poised to have a monumental impact on
the power grid. And they could prove to be the greatest grid
disruptor, or possibly the most effective grid-balancing tool.
EV adoption in the U.S. is happening faster than originally
anticipated and rampant, uncontrolled charging could pose
a major threat to local distribution networks. However, if
the integration challenges are effectively addressed, the
associated grid benefits could be enormous.
Because the average car spends about 95 percent of its
life parked, EV owners have few timing constraints for
charging, giving electric distribution cooperatives ample
opportunity to match charging load with optimal resource
availability. Electric co-ops that effectively coordinate with
their membership could conceivably level out daily electricity
demand on the network. Additionally, they could potentially
even store excess renewable energy in these mobile batteries
during extended vehicle idle periods to meet system peaks.
Roughly 27 quadrillion BTUs of energy — mostly from petroleum resources
— are consumed by the transportation sector annually. As more of those
BTUs shift from petroleum to the electricity sector, concern about the
impact on the grid must be addressed.
According to Viswanath, the key for electric co-ops is to
develop and promote the right set of market signals to
bring about the desired behavioral shift from its membercustomers.
“The widely prevalent flat-rate pricing structure that doesn’t
account for time or location incorrectly assumes that each
kilowatt hour consumed imposes the same cost on a utility,”
she said. “Time-of-use and other time varying rate structures
will not only prove to be more equitable but might actually
shift some of the load to a lower cost time of day.”
Electric co-ops have the power to influence EV drivers and
fleet operators to charge at optimal times that will save
customers money and benefit the grid by more efficiently
utilizing assets, added Viswanath.
Read the report, The Fix for the Electric Grid's Mid-life Crisis
Might be in the Garage, at bit.ly/3llrBPA
52
| Chief Engineer

Download the Cat Inspect App for
Organized Inspections
Cat® power doesn’t just lie under the hood of your MTS
tractor. Digital services, like Cat Inspect, give you the power
to get back to doing what you do best. Take your daily
inspection forms to an organized, easy-to-access digital
platform. Cat Inspect integrates with other digital Cat
services, like the Cat App, My.Cat.Com and VisionLink®,
and is simple to set up — just log in with your standard
credentials and start capturing your daily key inspection
data.
What can Cat Inspect do for You?
• Share assets, photos, and videos
• Capture on-the-go notes
• Assign inspections
• Rate needed repairs
• Integrate with My.Cat.Com and The Cat App
• Create Custom Inspection Forms
Download an Easier Way to Inspect
Simply visit wherever you download your smart device apps
and search for “Cat Inspect.” Log in with your standard
credentials to start viewing, completing, and assigning
inspections with ease.
Take Back Uptime
You put in your best daily — and so does Cat Inspect. Get
back to your real work more quickly when you streamline
your daily inspections from your smart device with Cat
Inspect.
To learn more about Cat Inspect and what it can do, visit
www.altorfer.com/cat-inspect-mts
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Altorfer Cat’s Cat Inspect app simplifies the details of inspection, leaving
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Volume 88 · Number 3 | 53

Techline
Alta eMobility Announces Agreement
With BorgWarner to Service and
Distribute Direct Current Fast Chargers
LIVONIA, Mich. — Alta eMobility, a leader in turnkey fleet
electrification solutions, has announced an agreement with
BorgWarner to service and distribute direct current fast
chargers (DCFCs) as part of its long-term goal to provide
fleet, workplace charging, and retail customers with a onestop
shop for electric charging solutions.
Manufactured in the U.S., BorgWarner offers DCFCs that can
handle a wide range of vehicles. The DCFCs are in production
with industry-best lead times; Alta eMobility is expected to
secure over 350 chargers over a two-year period.
The agreement solidifies and enhances Alta eMobility’s
seamless integration for new and existing customers
wanting to electrify and charge their electric vehicles with a
guaranteed inventory of DCFCs.
Per its agreement with BorgWarner, Alta eMobility will service and distribute
DCFCs as a step toward its goal of providing a one-stop point of sale for
electric charging solutions.
“We are thrilled to partner with an industry leader in
vehicle-to-grid (V2G) technology with manufacturing based
in the U.S.,” said Mike Bucci, vice president, Alta eMobility.
“BorgWarner is a proven automotive leader known for
building a reliable product. With our international footprint
and 1,500 highly skilled technicians, we know this partnership
will suit our customers perfectly.”
“Alta eMobility delivers an elevated level of customer
satisfaction and expertise in construction, material handling
and electric vehicles. We value the alliance with Alta
eMobility to grow the high-power charging market,” said
Davide Girelli, president and general manager, BorgWarner
Morse Systems.
Alta eMobility customers interested in DCFCs can contact
Alta eMobility directly for charger installation. Alta eMobility
is currently located in 15 states and Ontario and Quebec in
Canada. The Alta eMobility team and technicians can install
DCFCs in any state in North America or province in Canada,
using its strategic partners and BorgWarner’s telemetry
platform. Alta eMobility can monitor their chargers remotely
and provide data to better understand status, usage and
optimized charging time, as well as educate users on the
importance of keeping their EVs charged.
For more information about Alta eMobility or DCFCs,
contact David Breault, business development manager, Alta
eMobility, at david.breault@altg.com or visit
https://emobility.altg.com
54
| Chief Engineer

Danfoss Partners With Wireless AI
Company Lizard Monitoring to Achieve
Zero Food Waste Goals
Danfoss is partnering with retail technology company Lizard
Monitoring to aid North American retailers with their Zero
Food Waste (ZFW) goals. Lizard complements Danfoss’
Alsense monitoring suite to ensure continuous temperature
monitoring, providing store managers and food safety
executives with detailed data on refrigeration performance
and environmental compliance.
Globally, if food waste could be represented as its own
country, it would be the third largest greenhouse gas
emitter, behind China and the United States. The resources
needed to produce the food that becomes lost or wasted has
a carbon footprint of about 3.3 billion tons of CO2.
To minimize food waste, it is essential to monitor
refrigeration systems and individual products to detect
and address potential problems before they occur. "Lizard
supplies robust wireless sensor networks to collect data
from retail environments and send it to the cloud where
it is mined for trends that lead to food waste before they
happen," explained Terry Cates, co-founder of Lizard
Monitoring. To accomplish this, Lizard goes beyond
traditional control system data collection and is focused
on monitoring the product, not just the refrigeration
equipment. This data is sent real-time to the cloud and
an array of neural networks analyze the data to detect
emerging problems as well as long-term trends. “We are
able to run AI algorithms on every data point,” explained
Cates.
As a result, customers receive early warnings and fewer
alarms combined with a detailed record of each event and
what was done by in store teams in response.
Danfoss has partnered with Lizard Monitoring through its Danfoss Alsense
monitoring suite to provide store managers and food safety executives with
cold chain data in an effort to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from food
waste.
Rupert Prince, co-founder and CEO of Lizard Monitoring,
emphasized that “the best solution leverages a marriage of
data from sensors to tell you what is happening and control
system data to tell you why. Our partnership with Danfoss
allows an integrated solution that can escalate problems in
real-time. This is critical for Zero Food Waste initiatives at
scale.”
Volume 88 · Number 3 | 55

New Products
Three Gloves, One Mission: Comfortable
Compliance
CLEVELAND — With long-lasting comfort comes increased
compliance. That’s the thought behind the SmartFlex 400
Series hand protection from Brass Knuckle®. Three gloves,
each designed with a 13-gauge nylon shell offering abrasion
resistance, uncoated back and wrist to encourage all-day
wear, and ultra-thin polyurethane coating on the palm and
finger area for an amazingly sensitive gripping surface. Every
glove in the 400 Series enables accurate handling of even the
smallest of parts, whether in dry or light oil applications.
These thin-gauge general purpose gloves are ideal for
everything from electronics repair to small parts assembly.
The SmartFlex 400 Series combines outstanding dexterity,
lightweight comfort, and protection from injury. BK401 is
black nylon with gray coating to conceal dirt and grime.
BK402 is white-on-white, making it easy to identify foreign
particles on the glove, ideal for inspectors and quality
control. BK403 is black nylon with a black coating, a toughlooking
concealer for grimy projects. Each model is available
in seven different sizes with color-coded cuffs to simplify
re-issuance.
Each glove in the series is carefully constructed, designed
for fit, but also cost-competitive. The lightweight, 13-gauge
nylon shell provides dexterity and grip and is more lint-free
than polyester. A grippy but not sticky polyurethane coating
on the palm and fingers makes the 400 Series excellent for
dry-grip applications.
Brass Knuckle’s 400 Series gloves are ideal for many
applications not requiring cut-level protection, from
automotive to warehouse to light construction and assembly.
Designed for maximum comfort and ease of use for all-day
wear, the 400 Series offers protection and helps increase
wearer compliance.
You’ll never feel like you have to take them off: Brass Knuckle’s SmartFlex
400 Series.
For more information, visit
https://www.brassknuckleprotection.com/.
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(312)666-4780 -- FAX (312)666-5145 -- Website: www.hudsonboiler.com
Info@Hudsonboiler.com
56
| Chief Engineer

EVAPCO eco-Air Series, Ideal for
Water Conservation
EVAPCO’s eco-Air Series of dry and adiabatic coolers include
flat, V-style and double stack dry coolers available with
optional spray or adiabatic pad pre-cooling systems.
With coil sections stacked vertically, eco-Air double stack
coolers are designed for applications with very large cooling
requirements and reduced footprint.
Recently, EVAPCO was recognized as the only manufacturer
with a Cooling Technology Institute (CTI)-certified line of dry
coolers. Dry coolers are a recent addition to CTI’s standard
201, which previously included only cooling towers and
evaporative fluid coolers.
eco-Air also offers a newly updated control package
with larger touchscreen and proprietary EVAPCO control
sequence, and further reduction in water usage for their
adiabatic systems.
EVAPCO provides a full spectrum of global product solutions
for the commercial HVAC, industrial refrigeration, power
generation and industrial process markets.
The product line now offers custom ECM fan assemblies on
double-stack units through a collaboration with Multi-Wing.
The equipment offers high electrical efficiency, high airflow,
integrated control package for fan speed control, and BAS
communications.
EVAPCO’s eco-Air double-stack dry cooler is designed to fulfill large cooling
demands with a reduced footprint.
Volume 88 · Number 3 | 57

New Products
RadioWaves Releases New Antenna
Retrofit Kits
IRVINE, Calif. — RadioWaves, an Infinite Electronics brand
and a manufacturer of high-quality microwave antennas
and accessories, has just released a new series of retrofit kits
designed to save users time and money by allowing them
to continue using their previously deployed antennas while
upgrading to the latest radios on the market.
RadioWaves’ new line of antenna retrofit kits (RFKs) ship
with new feed horns, interface and mounting hardware
needed for rapid and easy installation. These RFKs allow
continued used of high-quality antennas with a different
radio/frequency, with frequency range options from 5.725
GHz to 23.6 GHz.
These retrofit kits provide the ability to make the change
from the back of a preexisting antenna without taking it
down, saving time and money.
These RFKs are engineered from rugged aluminum and
Rexolite for long-lasting, reliable installations. They have
mount and connectivity options for multiple radios, including
Remec, Aviat Networks, Ubiquiti, Mimosa, Cambium, Ceragon
and more. Both general waveguide and Type N connector
options are also available.
RadioWaves’ new line of antenna retrofit kits are designed to save time,
money and resources by utilizing existing antennas.
“Our newly expanded antenna retrofit kits are saving our
customers thousands of dollars and helping them achieve
rapid installations, thanks to no longer needing to spend
hours aligning new antennas. These new kits can be used
with a wide range of popular radios,” said Kevin Hietpas,
Antenna Product Line Manager.
The antenna retrofit kits are in stock and available for sameday
shipping. For inquiries, call (978) 459-8800.
58
| Chief Engineer

New Thomson Compact Linear Motion
System Brings Modularity to Small-Space
Application Development
WOOD DALE, Ill. — Thomson Industries, Inc., a leading
manufacturer of linear motion control solutions, has
introduced a family of compact linear systems that makes
it easier for motion designers to implement complex
applications in small spaces. Designers needing thrust and
bearing support in a single, compact unit now have the
flexibility to build such applications with versatile, timetested
components from Thomson.
"As demand for smaller-scale applications grows, so does
the challenge of packing high functionality into a smaller
footprint,” Thomson Product Line Specialist – Linear Motion
Systems Matt Palmer said. “Our new family of compact
linear motion systems equips designers to meet those
challenges by assembling world-renowned Thomson linear
motion components, with the added option of real-time
collaboration with one of our engineers.”
In building a Thomson compact linear system, a designer can
configure a unit or combination of units from a wide variety
of components based on their specific application details.
Components include, but are not limited to:
• Integrated stepper motors
• Lead screws
• Profile rail linear guides
• 60 Case® LinearRace® shafting
• Linear Ball Bushing® bearings
• End blocks
Many features can be customized, including screw diameters
and leads, mounting holes and mounting configurations.
Machine designers who need thrust and bearing support in a single,
compact unit can now build a personalized Thomson linear system in real
time under the guidance of an expert engineer running 3D modeling tools.
(Photo: Thomson Industries, Inc.)
To enable engineers to take maximum advantage of such
flexibility, Thomson offers an innovative new 3D modeling
tool that optimizes their solution by revealing design
tradeoffs in real time. The tool, in collaboration with a
Thomson engineer, guides the designer in tailoring motor
size, stroke length, and other variables to function most
effectively within given load and space parameters.
The resulting designs go directly to the Thomson product
CAD system, where the information is used to produce
the prototype sent for testing. Because of such close user
involvement during the design process, the number of design
iterations is reduced, which, in turn, decreases the likelihood
of mistakes being made.
Applications
Thomson compact linear systems are appropriate for
applications requiring high-accuracy linear axes in confined
spaces, such as 3D printers, microscope stage managers,
medical pipetting systems and semiconductor manufacturing.
They are available with NEMA motor sizes between 14 and
23; stroke lengths of up to 40 in; and load capacities up to
2,091 lbs.
For more information on Thomson compact linear systems,
please visit https://www.thomsonlinear.com/en/products/
compact-linear-systems
Volume 88 · Number 3 | 59

New Products
Pipe Saw & Wraparound Track Cuts
Concrete-Lined Ductile Iron Pipe
A pneumatic saw combined with a pipe trolley and
wraparound track system for cold cutting pipe from 6" to 60"
dia., including concrete lined pipe, has been introduced by
Esco Tool of Holliston, Mass.
The MILLHOG® APS-438 Air Powered Saw and WrapTrack®
system also features an articulating arm that keeps the saw
blade on its leading edge to produce square cuts accurate to
±1/16". Available with track sections for cutting pipe from 6"
to 60" dia., this combination saw-and-track system employs a
proprietary 12" abrasive cut-off blade.
Ideally suited for cutting underground steam lines, the
MILLHOG APS-438 Air Powered Saw and WrapTrack system
eliminates torch cutting and grinding which can chip and
crack the concrete internally because of stress and bending.
The MILLHOG APS-438 Air Powered Saw sells for $6,350.00
and the WrapTrack from $450.00 up.
MILLHOG’s APS-438 Air Powered Saw and WrapTrack system is effective
and accurate, cold cutting even concrete-lined pipe up to 60" dia.
60
| Chief Engineer

TaskBrand® Prep-Paint-Finish Wiping
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CLEVELAND — Painting and refinishing is a painstaking,
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all the wiping products needed for each stage of the paint or
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TaskBrand Essential Tack Cloths effectively remove dirt and
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This option will be more forgiving for new painters when
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TaskBrand Wash & Dry Prep Cloths are large and superabsorbent
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TaskBrand Final Tack Cloths remove dust and overspray
between coats with virtually no fraying or linting while
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Volume 88 · Number 3 | 61

Events
Process Heating & Cooling Show
to Partner With Industry Trade
Organizations to Offer Education
Opportunities
ROSEMONT, Ill. — The 2023 Process Heating & Cooling
Show, which will be held May 24-25, 2023, at the Donald E.
Stephens Convention Center in Rosemont, IL has announced
the partnership with three organizations to offer educational
opportunities for professionals involved with the industrial
heating and cooling processes. The new partnerships are
with the Ammonia Safety & Training Institute (ASTI), the
Industrial Heating Equipment Association (IHEA), and the Air
Movement and Control Association International (AMCA).
“We are thrilled to be partnering with these important
industry organizations to provide our attendees with timely
and informative education on important topics,” said Erik
Klingerman, Senior Group Publisher, BNP Media. “The
benefit to attendees of these education offerings is that they
will also have access to the education and vendors at the
Process Heating & Cooling Show. With these new offerings
we expect attendance to increase significantly.”
On Tuesday, May 23 the Industrial Heating Equipment
Association (IHEA) will be offering the IHEA Combustion
Safety Training as a pre-conference workshop. Registration
also includes full conference registration for the Process
Heating & Cooling Show. Topics to be covered during
the Combustion Safety Training include Fundamentals of
Combustion, Burners and Nozzles, Practical Fluid Flow and
Piping Practices, Combustion Safety Systems, Flame Safety
and Sequence Control, and so much more.
IHEA meets the need for effective group action in promoting
the interests of industrial furnace manufacturers, the
organization has expanded and currently includes designers
and manufacturers of all types of industrial heat processing
equipment used for the melting, refining and heat
processing of ferrous and nonferrous metals and certain
nonmetallic materials and heat-treatment of products made
from them.
On Wednesday, May 24, the Ammonia Safety & Training
Institute (ASTI) will host an 8-hour Ammonia Safety Day
Course in partnership with Global Cold Chain Alliance
(GCCA); IIAR, the world’s leading advocate for the safe,
reliable and efficient use of ammonia and other natural
refrigerants; and Refrigerating Engineers & Technicians
Association (RETA). This conference-style presentation is
a free safety conference designed with the end-user, the
firefighter, and the regulator in mind. For more than two
62 | Chief Engineer
decades, the Ammonia Safety & Training Institute has
been an internationally recognized leader in developing
emergency response protocols and training for the safe
response to ammonia emergencies. This will be the
first Ammonia Safety Day Course in Chicago since 2019,
so register now to secure a spot. ASTI provides safety
management support through effective use of Prevention,
Mitigation, Preparedness, Response and Recovery (PMPRR)
training. All courses meet OSHA standards.
The Air Movement and Control Association International
(AMCA) will offer three courses during the Process Heating
& Cooling Show, and on Thursday, May 25th their course will
include a demonstration of a replica industrial environment
on the show floor which will be open to everyone. AMCA is
one of the most highly regarded international, not-for-profit
organizations in the air movement and control industry.
Through education and active advocacy, they provide a
forward-moving environment for each of their members.
They strive to advance the industry and improve the
community that it encompasses.
In addition to these courses, The Process Heating & Cooling
Show will offer several continuing education sessions
where attendees can get continuing education credits,
from PDH, RETA PDH, AIA and IACET, and gain insights into
groundbreaking information related to new technologies,
materials, products, trends or applications for process
heating or process cooling systems. The sessions offering
credits include:
• 5 Best Practices for Energy Baselining presented by Charles
Tuck, Ndustrial
• Decarbonization Process – Heat Pumps Utilizing
Hydrocarbons and CO2 presented by Matteo Iobbi,
Frascold USA
• CO2 Chillers for Process Cooling Applications: Performance
Comparison with HFC/Os, Other Natural Refrigerants and
Relevant Field Experience presented by Giacomo Pisano,
DORIN USA
• Improve Freezing Performance and Quality with
Companion Cryogenic Systems, presented by Chris
Johnson, Linde
• Beyond Freon: A Closer Look at the Next Generation
Refrigerants presented by Jeff Warther, Chemour
Refrigerants

Educational opportunities in Ammonia Safety, Combustion Safety and Energy Efficiency are among many offerings at this year’s Process Heating & Cooling
Show.
• Approaching Zero: Managing Cooling Water Discharge
presented by Tonya Chandler, BioLargo, Inc. and Kelle
Zeiher, Garratt-Callahan.
The 2nd Annual Process Heating & Cooling Show will take
place May 24-25 at the Donald E. Stephens Convention
Center in Rosemont, Ill. The conference and expo produced
by BNP Media’s Process Heating & Cooling magazine offer
a vibrant Exhibit Hall featuring dozens of exhibitors and an
education program with Association Partners: AMCA, IHEA,
IIAR, RETA. Registration is now open at bit.ly/3l77lRx. For
exhibitor and sponsorship information, visit
www.process-heating.com/heat-cool-show/become-exhibitor
Volume 88 · Number 3 | 63

Ashrae Update
Newly Released ASHRAE 90.1-2022
Includes Expanded Scope for Building
Sites
ATLANTA — ASHRAE has released its latest version of its
benchmark energy efficiency standard, ANSI/ASHRAE/IES
Standard 90.1-2022, Energy Efficiency Standard for Sites and
Buildings Except Low-Rise Residential Buildings. The latest
version includes an expanded scope for building sites and
major additions appearing for the first time in a minimumefficiency
U.S. model energy standard or code.
“We have identified some ambiguity in the standard by
offering guidance on regulating only buildings and not
sites,” said ASHRAE Standing Standard Project Committee
90.1 chair Don Brundage. “Examples include exterior and
parking lot lighting, which if not provided through the main
electric panel in the building, were not within the scope of
Standard 90.1 previously. Including sites also clarifies that
onsite renewables could count as credits towards energy
usage across the entire building project, even if located in
a parking lot or other onsite location, not only with in the
footprint of the building. We are continuing to improve
efficiency and reduce energy use through updates to
Standard 90.1, meeting the needs of the design community
and keeping Standard 90.1 pertinent, as demand grows for
reduced energy use and carbon emissions.”
Further major additions to Standard 90.1-2022 are as follows:
• A minimum prescriptive requirement for on-site renewable
energy. This change is representative of a more widely
adopted shift to renewable energy.
• An optional Mechanical System Performance Path allowing
HVAC system efficiency tradeoffs based on the new total
system performance ratio (TSPR) metric.
• New requirements to address the impacts of thermal
bridging.
Additional highlights of Standard 90.1-2022 include:
• New energy credit requirements for a customized
approach to improving energy efficiency.
• New informative guidance for using carbon emissions,
site energy, or source energy as alternative performance
metrics to the current energy cost metric
• Significant efficiency increases in IEER for commercial
rooftops and a new SEER2/HSPF2 metric for

ASHRAE Expands Commitment to
Reduce Greenhouse Gas Emissions
ATLANTA — ASHRAE recently announced its unwavering
commitment to reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions
with the launch of its redesigned building decarbonization
webpage and the release of a new Building Performance
Standards Technical Resource Guide.
The ASHRAE Task Force For Building Decarbonization (TFBD)
webpage includes technical resources, information, videos
and publications to expedite the adoption of climate change
mitigation policies and reaffirms the Society’s goals stated in
the ASHRAE Vision 2020 report, approved by ASHRAE’s board
of directors, as well as the ASHRAE Position Document on
Building Decarbonization, to achieve net zero GHG emissions
in operation for all new buildings by 2030.
“Over the years, ASHRAE has demonstrated its leadership
in reducing GHG emissions by addressing energy efficiency
and sustainability, as articulated in some of our most notable
technical guidance such as Standards 90.1 and 189.1,” said
ASHRAE TFBD chair Kent Peterson. “The TFBD is working
to provide vital technical guidance in new guidebooks and
the redesigned webpage. ASHRAE is helping accelerate the
transition from commitment to action in reducing global
built environment GHG emissions.”
Additional features of the redesigned Building
Decarbonization webpage include:
• Descriptions of seven new guidebooks focused on building
decarbonization.
• A list of related outside decarbonization resources.
• A list of key decarbonization terminology.
The newly released Building Performance Standards (BPS): A
Technical Resource Guide was created to provide a technical
basis for policymakers, building owners, practitioners
and other stakeholders interested in developing and
implementing a BPS policy. The first in a series of seven
guidebooks by ASHRAE on building decarbonization, this
guide focuses on reducing building operating energy use and
resulting emissions in existing commercial and multifamily
buildings, as established by leading U.S. cities and states.
Jointly developed by ASHRAE, the U.S. Department of
Energy (DOE) and its national laboratories, the BPS guide is
meant to provide the information needed to make informed
policy design decisions that drive deeper existing building
decarbonization and provide equitable outcomes for all
involved.
• Analysis Methods for BPS Policy Design
“So much collaboration brought this guide to fruition, which
we hope will establish some much-needed consistency across
the buildings industry to set these types of goals and targets
— and then work toward meeting them,” said DOE’s Harry
Bergmann, who led DOE’s involvement in the collaborative
effort. “These methodologies and approaches are a critical
starting point for moving our building stock toward a highperformance,
decarbonized future, and we’re intentionally
doing everything we can to reduce the barriers stakeholders
have to engage with this content wherever possible.”
“The BPS Guide provides policymakers with a technical
foundation upon which to build better policies, which play
a key role in decarbonizing existing buildings,” said BPS
working group initiator and ASHRAE TFBD member Bing Liu.
“This guidebook is a testimony to the collaborations and
commitments of 21 working group members who provided
expertise and recommendations from a wide swath of
stakeholders across the buildings sector, from policymakers
and building industry experts, to utilities, researchers and
more. In less than 12 months, the working group completed
this guide after countless hours of volunteered time under
the stellar leadership of Adam Hinge and Andrea Mengual as
chair and co-chair, for which I am so grateful.”
• Members of the ASHRAE TFBD are as follows:
• Kent W. Peterson, P.E., Presidential Fellow ASHRAE, chair
• Donald G. Colliver, Ph.D., P.E., Presidential Fellow ASHRAE,
vice chair
• Blake E. Ellis, P.E., Fellow ASHRAE
• Luke Leung, P.E., P.Eng., BEMP, Fellow ASHRAE
• Bing Liu, P.E., Fellow ASHRAE
• Clay Nesler
• Stet A. Sanborn
• Ginger Scoggins, P.E., Fellow ASHRAE, 2022-23 ASHRAE
President-Elect
ASHRAE is furthering its commitment to reducing GHG
emissions by strengthening the building decarbonization
components of ASHRAE standards, including in ANSI/
ASHRAE/IES Standard 90.1, Energy Efficiency Standard for
Sites and Buildings Except Low-Rise Residential Buildings and
to reach net-zero-energy by 2031.
Highlighted topics covered in the guide include:
• BPS Metrics and Terminology
• Performance Targets
• Major Policy Considerations
Volume 87 · Number 11 | 65

American Street Guide
It Was ‘Haunting’: Ballard Recalls
Mission to Titanic Site
By Rodrique Ngowi and Mark Pratt | Associated Press
FALMOUTH, Mass. (AP) — The sheer size of the vessel
and the shoes were what struck Robert Ballard when he
descended to the wreckage of the RMS Titanic in 1986,
the year after he and his crew from the Woods Hole
Oceanographic Institution helped find the ocean liner that
struck an iceberg and sank in the North Atlantic in 1912.
“The first thing I saw coming out of the gloom at 30 feet
was this wall, this giant wall of riveted steel that rose
over 100 and some feet above us,” he said in an interview
from Connecticut on Wednesday, Feb. 15 the same day the
WHOI released 80 minutes of never-before-publicly seen
underwater video of the expedition to the wreckage.
“I never looked down at the Titanic. I looked up at the
Titanic. Nothing was small,” he said.
The crew of Alvin, the three-person submersible he was in,
headed to the surface when it started taking water into its
batteries, and as it rose Ballard saw the Titanic’s portholes.
There were no human flesh or bones left, but he saw shoes,
including the footwear of what appeared to be a mother
and a baby, that looked like tombstones marking the spot
where some of the roughly 1,500 people who perished came
to rest on the ocean floor.
“After the Titanic sank, those that went into the water that
didn’t have lifejackets died of hypothermia and their bodies
came raining down,” he said.
The liner sank on its maiden voyage from Southampton,
England, to New York City after hitting an iceberg in the
early morning hours of April 15, 1912.
The WHOI team, in partnership with the French
oceanographic exploration organization Institut Francais de
Recherche pour l’Exploitation de la Mer, discovered the final
resting place of the ship in 12,400 feet of water on Sept. 1,
1985, using a towed underwater camera.
The newly released footage was from a return expedition
the following year.
There had been prior efforts to find the wreck. But the
1985 discovery and the 1986 trip were made possible by
sophisticated underwater vehicles that could withstand the
unforgiving conditions, said WHOI engineer Andy Bowen,
who helped develop them.
“The water is near freezing temperatures and probably the
biggest challenge is the remoteness of the location, and in
particular the harsh environment with regard to the pressure
our equipment is exposed to,” he said.
Ballard said he went through the gamut of emotions during
the 1985 mission.
He was concerned that the public would figure out that he
was a Naval intelligence officer who was on a top-secret
Cold War mission funded by the Navy to study the wrecks
of two nuclear submarines that had also gone down in the
North Atlantic. The search for the Titanic was a bit of an
afterthought.
The ship sank at about 2:20am. The 1985 discovery using the
underwater camera occurred at about 2:00am.
Ballard recalled one of the crew glancing at the clock and
saying: “She sinks in 20 minutes.”
“We actually stopped the operation and raised the vehicle to
gather my thoughts and I said, ‘I’m going to go outside and
just get myself back together’ and everyone else followed,”
he said. “We had a small memorial service for all those that
had died. But we were there, we were at this spot.”
It was hallowed ground, like at the Gettysburg battlefield,
he said.
The video, much of it haunting and grainy interiors of the
ship taken by the remotely operated underwater exploration
vehicle Jason Jr., was released in conjunction with the 25th
anniversary release on Feb. 10 of the remastered version of
the Academy Award-winning movie, Titanic.
The story of the Titanic fascinates people to this day for
many reasons, Ballard said. It was at the time the world’s
largest ocean liner and was supposed to be virtually
unsinkable. Its passengers included some of the world’s most
wealthy and famous. And in the aftermath, the world heard
remarkable stories of heroism and bravery by the crew and
passengers.
He said: “I think everyone wonders in their own mind, ‘If I
were there, what would I have done?’”
66
| Chief Engineer

This image provided by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution shows the bow of the Titanic 12,500 feet below the surface of the ocean, 400 miles off
the coast of Newfoundland, Canada in 1986. Rare and in some cases never-before-publicly seen video of the dive was released on Wednesday, Feb. 15,
2023, by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. (Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution via AP)
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Volume 88 · Number 3 | 67

ACROSS ACROSS
1 Plant 1 fiber Plant used fiber in
ropes used in
5 Tax agency ropes
8 Engage 5 Tax in agency
espionage 8 Engage in
11 Doublereed espionage
instrument 11 Double-
15 Summary reed
17 Wretchedness instrument
18 Unrefined 15 Summary metal
19 Clank 17 Wretchedn
20 Old Testament ess
prophet 18 Unrefined
22 Turkishmetal
24 __ Rico 19 Clank
25 First 20 day Old of wk.
26 Cover Testament
28 Cheddarlike prophet
cheese 22 Turkish
29 Stray 24 __ Rico
30 Goddess 25 First day of
31 School wk. group
33 Period 26 Cover
35 Former
28 Cheddarpresident
of U.S.
like cheese
29 Stray
36 Arctic
30 Goddess
37 Viper
31 School
38 Mr.
group
40 Tennis player
33 Period
Steffi
35 Former
42 Royalty
president
44 Clever
of U.S.
45 Twitch
36 Arctic
47 Soccer position
37 Viper
49 Chart
38 Mr.
52 Frail
40 Tennis
54 Humble
player
55 Fight
Steffi
58 Water (Spanish)
42 Royalty
60 Metal tip
44 Clever
on the
end
45
of
Twitch
a lance
61 Inanimate
47 Soccer
62 American position state
63 Assent
49 Chart
65 Escudo 52 Frail
66 Limited 54 Humble (abbr.)
67 Encrypt 55 Fight
69 Celibate 58 Water
70 Spelling (Spanish) contest
71 Reviser 60 Metal tip
74 Trudgeon the end
77 Geniusof a lance
80 Cloth 61 Inanimate
maker62 American
83 Green state
Gables63 Assent
dweller 65 Escudo
84 Philippine 66 Limited
dish with (abbr.)
marinated
chicken or
pork
86 Recipient
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15 16 17 18 19
20 21 22 23 24
25 26 27 28 29 30
31 32 33 34 35 36 37
38 39 40 41 42 43 44
45 46 47 48
49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57
58 59 60 61 62
63 64 65 66 67 68
69 70
71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82
83 84 85 86 87 88
89 90 91 92 93
94 95 96
97 98 99 100 101 102
103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110
111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118
119 120 121 122 123 124
125 126 127 128
129 130 131 132
www.CrosswordWeaver.com
67 88 Encrypt Roman emperor 95 Trickery
69 89 Celibate Label 97 Take to
70 90 Spelling Getting older court
91 contest Misters 98 Corporatio
71 93 Reviser Scarlet
n (abbr.)
74 94 Trudge Car’s __ control 100 Exploiter
77 95 Genius Trickery 101 Caesar's
80 97 Cloth Take to court three
98 maker Corporation (abbr.) 103 Her
83 100 Green Exploiter 104 Quill
101 Gables Caesar’s three 105 Hotel
103 dweller Her 107 Vegetable
84 104 Philippine Quill
dunk
105 dish Hotel with 109 Head
107 marinated Vegetable dunk motion
109 chicken Head motion or 111 Expression
111 pork Expression of surprise of surprise
86 112 Recipient That woman112 That
88 113 Roman Ridiculing remark woman
115 emperor Drink 113 Ridiculing
89 117 Label Washout remark
90 119 Getting Gab 115 Drink
121 older Crew 117 Washout
91 123 Misters Where 119 Gab
93 Egypt Scarlet is 121 Crew
94 located Car's __ 123 Where
125 control Devour (2 Egypt is
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127 Nail
128 Present time
129 Poke located 7 Made 32 Sky out
130 125 Decade Devour (2
131 East wds.) southeast
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132 126 Antes Freudian
term
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9 Implore out
10 Shekel 37 Baboon
11 Bullfight 39 Ump
41 Wheel
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43 Represent
128 Present
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2129 Fable Poke writer
3130 Stints Decade
cheer 41 Wheel holders ative
12 Most 43 Representative 44 Cause of
uncovered 44 Cause of sickness
13 Upon 46 Be (2 afraid46 Be afraid
4131 Thai East
wds.) 48 Slow 48 Slow
5 The southeast other half of 14 Freudian 49 IBM Competitor 49 IBM
132 JimaAntes
selves 50 Past Competitor
6 Reserve Officers
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16 Bud 51 Making puns 50 Past
19 Pooch 53 And so forth 51 Making
7 Made angry
8 Grave 1 Edge
9 Implore 2 Fable
21 Lurked 54 Cc
23 Hoary 55 Anyone
24 Jimmy 56 Assist
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53 And so
forth
10 Shekel writer
11 Bullfight 3 Stints cheer
27 Sharp 57 Fish eggs54 Cc
angled 59 Angle less 55 than Anyone 90
12 Most 4 Thai uncovered path degrees 56 Assist
13 Upon 5 The (2 other wds.) 29 Custard 62 Large water 57 Fish bodyeggs
14 Freudian half of selves Jima filled 64 pastry Card game 59 Angle less
16 Bud 6 Reserve 32 Sky 68 Compass point than 90
19 Pooch Officers 34 Threefold 71 Consume degrees
21 Lurked Training 36 Took 72 the Genetic code 62 Large
23 Hoary Corps.
wrinkles 73 Prego’s competition water body
24 Jimmy
74 Murder “weapon”
27 Sharp angled 75 Lil’ __ (cartoon
path
character)
29 Custard filled 76 House pet
pastry
77 Admiral (abbr.)
78 64 Dorm Card game dwellers
79 68 Turned Compass out
80 “as point you __”
81 71 Bard’s Consume before
82 72 Pole Genetic
85 Heater code
87 73 Clothing Prego's brand
name competition
90 74 Be Murder
92 __ "weapon" Lanka
94 75 Remind Lil' __
96 Yang’s (cartoonpartner
97 Brand character) of soda
99 76 Small House gear pet
100 77 Unfastened
Admiral
102 Iodine (abbr.) compound
103 78 Hog Dorm
104 Spiritedness
dwellers
106 79 Goose Turned egg out
108 80 Pod "as you vegetable __"
110 81 Ticket
Bard's
111 Gets
before
older
112
82
Haunch
Pole
85 Heater
113 Sensible
87 Clothing
114 Long time
brand
periods
name
116 Furthest back
90 Be
118 24 hour periods
92 __ Lanka
120 Hero sandwich
94 Remind
121 Lay
96 Yang's
122 South by east
partner
124 Knock off
97 Brand of
soda
99 Small gear
100 Unfastened
102 Iodine
compound
103 Hog
104 Spiritednes
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106 Goose egg
108 Pod
vegetable
110 Ticket
111 Gets older
112 Haunch
113 Sensible
114 Long time
periods
116 Furthest
back
118 24 hour
periods
120 Hero
sandwich
121 Lay
122 South by
east
124 Knock off
68
| Chief Engineer

d
Boiler Room Annex
When Experiments Go Fowl
Source: www.workjoke.com
Scientists at NASA developed a gun built specifically to
launch dead chickens at the windshields of airliners, military
jets and the space shuttle, all traveling at maximum velocity
— the idea being to simulate the frequent incidents of
collisions with airborne fowl to test the strength of the
windshields.
British engineers heard about the gun and were eager to
test it on the windshields of their new high-speed trains.
Arrangements were made to loan it out and send it overseas,
and when the gun finally was fired, the engineers were
horrified as the chicken hurtled out of the barrel, crashed
into the shatterproof shield, smashed it to smithereens,
crashed through the control console, snapped the engineer’s
backrest in two and embedded itself in the back wall of the
cabin.
Horrified Britons sent NASA the disastrous results of the
experiment, along with the designs of the windshield, and
begged the U.S. scientists for suggestions. NASA replied with
just one sentence: “THAW THE CHICKEN!”
Salary Theorem
Source: http://hutnyak.com/Jokes.htm
Dilbert’s “Salary Theorem” states that, “Engineers and
scientists can never earn as much as business executives,
salespeople, accountants and especially liberal arts majors.”
This theorem can now be supported by a mathematical
equation based on the following two well-known postulates:
Postulate 1: Knowledge is Power.
Postulate 2: Time is Money.
As every engineer knows: Power = Work / Time.
Since: Knowledge = Power,
then Knowledge = Work / Time,
and Time = Money,
then Knowledge = Work / Money.
Solving for Money, we get: Money = Work / Knowledge.
Solution:
C R I M P A B S L E O S P R I G
R A C E R A C A P P E L L A A T O L L
A M I N O J E R U S A L E M M A N I A
P I E P E A N I P O D E D A D
S E R F T R U E S A K I M O D E
B O A N A B R O D D A H
E M I R O R O T U N D E Z R A
A P E B U T G I N T A R I N C
D I N S S W Q U E E N I C Y C A N
O D O R S O I L S S E E D S B E E S
E P A F L U W H Y O A R
W R A P C O L B Y E L F I N P R O S
E M U E E L E A R L Y N B A O B I
D I S M O D P O E G E L N I X
S E A M A S P E C T S E R I C
C A D S H Y T O E A S P
A V I V N U K E M E A D M A I M
W A N J A N A F T T S P L O O
A L A T E I T I N E R A N T L O T T O
R U P E E T H R O W A W A Y A R E A S
D E T E R Y E N P L Y T E R S E
FEBRUARY SOLUTION
Thus, as Knowledge approaches zero, money approaches
infinity, regardless of the amount of work done.
Solution to a Burning Problem
Source: www.reddit.com
An engineer, a mathematician, a statistician and a physicist
are staying in a hotel room. Late at night, a spark emerges
from the electrical socket, and soon enough, flames begin
shooting out. All four wake up in a panic. The engineer
thinks to douse the flames using anything but water. The
physicist thinks to shut off all power and rushes down to the
hotel lobby. The mathematician is convinced that no solution
exists and goes back to bed. But the statistician looks a
moment thoughtfully at the growing conflagration and
decides to light the curtains of the room on fire, saying, “We
need more data.”
Volume 87 · Number 12 | 69

Dependable Sources
Addison Electric Motors & Drives 63
Sprinkler Fitters Local 281 Inside Front Cover, 4
Advanced Boiler Control Services 33
Syserco 48
Air Filter Engineers
Back Cover
United Radio Communications, Inc. 23
Airways Systems 57
Altorfer Power Systems 61
Universal Lighting of America 47
Western Specialty Contractors 48
American Combustion Service Inc. 64
AMS Mechanical Systems, Inc. 51
Beverly Companies 35
Building Technology Consultants, Inc. 58
Bullock, Logan & Associates, Inc. 67
Chicago Backflow, Inc. 23
Chicago Cooling Tower 55
ClearWater Associates, Ltd. 59
Competitive Piping Systems 61
Door Service, Inc. 54
Dreisilker Electric Motors 29
F.E. Moran Fire Protection 49
Glavin Security Specialists 57
Hard Rock Concrete Cutters 33
Hart, Travers & Associates, Inc. 32
Hayes Mechanical 18
Hudson Boiler & Tank Co. 56
Kroeschell, Inc. 58
Metropolitan Industries, Inc. 46
MVB Services, Inc. 35
Neuco 60
NIFSAB 31
Olympia Maintenance 47
Preservation Services 21
Reliable Fire Equipment Co. 53
Rotating Equipment Specialists 13
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