PRACTICAL TRAINING IN THE CURRICULUM OF THE CIVIL ENGINEERING EDUCATION

Abstract This paper is intended to show the importance of the practical training activities in the civil engineering education process. The incorporation of such activities within the undergraduate curriculum, allows students to face real engineering problems in early stages, which provide them a valuable experience for their future professional career

T5-B: Overcoming the Challenges of Offshore Wind Energy Through Research and Education

Wind energy installations in the United States have grown from 1,800 MW in 1990 to over 35,000MW by the end of 2009. Furthermore, a number of innovative offshore wind designs will be constructed in the near future. This growth is guided by a need for further technological development and research in critical areas such as grid penetration, reliability, cost, and performance. Since offshore wind turbines operate under harsh environmental conditions, research is ongoing to develop new materials capable of abating wear, corrosion, bio-fouling under extreme loading conditions. Gearboxes, electrical machines and power electronics have been used in wind turbines. Due to lack of reliability in offshore turbines, interdisciplinary research involving key manufacturers of wind turbines is being conducted on failure analyses of the gear box, the generator and the electrical system. However, despite these advances, a longterm perspective to develop offshore wind energy beyond the state of the art is imperative. This is driven by knowledge gaps in areas such as materials and structures, electrical conversion, electromechanical conversion, design methods, and soil-structure interaction. Moreover, challenging aspects of offshore wind energy such as predicting hydrodynamic effects for offshore wind turbines more efficiently is important. Thus the present study attempts to proclaim that there is a strong need for research in offshore wind energy. The project plan is to present the research challenges to be overcome for future development of offshore wind energy, discuss current research approach and propose pioneering research that if implemented would accelerate the development of offshore wind energy development. One of the key findings of this paper is that through research and development the fundamental design of wind turbine could be modified to mitigate the harsh environmental concerns of offshore wind turbines. Offshore wind power stations have to accomplish the L3 conditions: low cost, long-lasting and low service requirement. The objective of this paper is to achieve these through research and this research work should provide educational values to researchers as well

Construction Simulation Using Virtual Reality

Two main simulation methodologies namely, the network-based simulation and the graphical simulation technique are being used in the construction industry. While the network-based simulation technique, which was originally developed for manufacturing processes, is very tedious, complex, and time consuming, the graphical simulation technique is taking many forms and it is gaining more support within the construction industry. The graphical simulation technique, which was originally derived from what is called the Visual Interactive Simulation (VIS). Tthe Virtual Reality (VR) technology may be used to model, design, and simulate construction operations. There are some attempts in that direction, however, these attempts have either been or are being made within research institutes and large construction companies where expensive computer hardware were purchased and sophisticated software were developed. There is no indication that these attempts were made on non-expensive computer workstations or on the PC platform. This paper describes some state of the art techniques by which construction operations (such as earth removing operations, material handling, manipulating building components.. etc.) can be modeled, visualized, and graphically simulated in real-time 3D environments on the PC. The construction industry will benefit from this study since it introduces new software and hardware technologies that are capable of delivering comparable workstation performance on the PCs at a fraction of the cost

Factors Influencing Intersection Crash Severity

The objective of this paper is to develop intersection crash severity prediction model using ordered probit model. Motor vehicle fatalities is reported the major cause of death for people aging from 15 to 44. Moreover, intersections are recognized as the most hazardous locations on the roads. It is estimated that approximately 2.4 million intersection-related crashes occurred, representing 40 percent of all reported crashes and 21.5 percent of traffic fatalities in 2007. Furthermore, study shows that comprehensive cost of crash increases sharply with the aggregation of crash severity. Thus there is an urgent need to explore the significant factors influencing intersection crash severity. The explanatory factors in the paper include the characteristics of the environment, vehicle, and the driver. The estimated model captures the marginal effects of all important explanatory factors simultaneously. For example, the model indicates the impacts of geometry elements, alcohol/drug use, and etc on the severity of intersection crashes. Thus the results can assist engineers and government officials to have better understanding and find solutions to eliminate fatal crashes at intersections

GT2004-54194 CO-UTILIZATION OF FOSSIL AND RENEWABLE FUEL: BIOMASS GAS/NATURAL GAS

ABSTRACT Recently natural gas prices have increased very substantially and USA's imports have reached 19% of consumption. These trends are due, in part, to the growing number of low capital cost natural gas combined cycle (CC) electrical generating systems. A way of alleviating high NG prices would be to convert local biomass into a biomass gas (BG) for co-utilization with NG. Essentially, construct a biomass integrated gasifier (BIG) CC system or co-generator system (CG) to matched the nearby biomass supply to deliver supplementary BG to an existing NGCC system or an old steam plant to be repowered. If the combustion turbine is robust, retrofitting costs of the NGCC should be modest. The BG might also be used as a supplementary fuel for the heat recovery steam generator (HRSG) and provide added electrical capacity. We consider the technological and economic circumstances required for these forms of co-use to benefit all participants and serve as a sensible use of biomass as a CO 2 neutral fuel. As an illustrative case we consider an adaptation of the Kelly plant in Gainesville Florida that has already been partially re-powered with a NGCC system. We conclude that in rural areas with nearby access to good biomass supplies BG-NG-CC or BG-NG-CG can produce cost competitive electricity particularly when NG prices exceed $4/MBU

COMMITTEE ON BRIDGE MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS (A1C17)

community to bear on national problems through its volunteer advisory committees