APRIL 2008 Issue
world watch
Desalination Booms Hits Australia
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TOLL OF THE TUNNELS |
BY GAIL HELGASON
Freelance Writer
With the dry continent of Australia growing drier all the time, the country’s major cities are stepping up desalination efforts to keep the drinking water flowing.
The Engineering News-Record (New York) reports that Australia’s historic drought of the last five years is expected to cause drinking water shortages for decades. To meet this challenge, Adelaide, Brisbane, Melbourne and Sydney are all constructing desalination facilities, and Perth is working on a second plant.
The publication quotes Lisa Hen-thorne, president of the International Desalination Association, as saying that Australia’s desalination boom is the first directly linked to climate change.
India Heads for the Moon
India is expected to launch a lunar orbiter this year, Aerospace America (Reston, Va.) reports. The Chandrayaan 1 mission will carry instrument packages for the United States and Europe, along with its own, and will also drop a 30-kilogram probe to break through the moon’s surface.
The country plans a manned spaceflight for 2014 and a lunar landing by 2020.
Warm Reception
For Antarctica Map
More than 1,000 images taken between 1999 and 2001 have been collected to form a high-resolution map of Antarctica with far better delineation than previous maps. An item in Civil Engineering (Reston, Va.) says the nearly cloudless view means the resolution is 10 times greater than previously attained.
The map was unveiled recently by NASA, the U.S. Geological Survey, the National Science Foundation and the British Antarctica Survey. It is expected to “revolutionize research” by giving geologists unprecedented detail on rock formations, and by improving researchers’ plans for scientific expeditions.
Chalk That Up
To Engineering Experience
Engineers in Britain are tackling some unusual challenges in stabilizing Silbury Hill, a chalk mound in the county of Wiltshire constructed about 4,400 years ago. The mound, which is of cultural and archeological significance, is 40 metres high and 165 metres wide, and was formed around the time of nearby Stonehenge.
The mound has been destabilized by tunnelling efforts in previous centuries, and its summit recently collapsed six metres.
Stabilization efforts require that the mound be filled with material similar to the original material, and that the tunnel be left as unsupported as possible. Moreover, the use of any construction vehicles or equipment that would harm the surrounding fields is prohibited.
Project engineer Mark Kirkbride says that locally quarried chalk paste mixed to a consistency of toothpaste will be used to fill the voids. The paste will be mixed with hydraulic lime and a bit of plasticizer so it can be pumped into the voids.
Diamonds in the Dishwater?
The watery sludge known as liquid brown trap grease — recovered from dishwashing operations in restaurants — is about to be transformed into feed for biofuel, reports Chemical Engineering (New York). The Bio Solutions Manufacturing plant is scheduled for startup this year in Elizabeth, N.J.
Also on the biofuels front, the same publication reports that construction has begun in Hawaii on a pilot facility to grow marine algae. The algae will be harvested for vegetable oil, which will in turn be converted to biofuels. Project partners are Royal Dutch Shell and HR BioPetroleum.
Pickle of a Problem
According to Food Engineering (Troy, Mo.), the pressure is on the largest privately held pickle company in the U.S. to operate more efficiently and beat out competitors. To help meet the challenge, Mt. Olive Pickle Company has found that a new type of filtering technology reduces maintenance and materials costs.
Brine wash solutions must be filtered before each reuse, and in the past filter bags had to be changed about one every hour — stopping production for about five minutes. The company has adopted a new self-cleaning Eco filter system, which uses a spiral wiper design to keep the filter element continuously clean.
Cleaning the filter between batches is now fast and easy.
Bomb-Resistant Wood Unveiled
Engineers and faculty at the University of Maine have developed a specialized coated wood that can stand up to explosive blasts and severe weather, reports Maine’s Bangor Daily News. The university’s Advanced Engineered Wood Composites Center unveiled a small building made of the product.
The patented material could have military applications — in fact it was developed at the request of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.