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Articles 271 - 300 of 684

Full-Text Articles in Civil Engineering

Legal Issues In Green Construction, Namrata Shrestha May 2012

Legal Issues In Green Construction, Namrata Shrestha

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The most recent "green construction movement", made a significant impact on the design and construction industry in the United States. Organizations such as the American Institute of Architects (AIA) have lobbied governmental entities to provide financial incentives to promote green construction. The green construction community also promotes the notion that a healthier working and living environment is achieved. Due to finical incentives coupled with projected long-term energy cost savings, many owners of new construction are considering green construction as an option. Accompanying the "green construction movement", new kinds of legal issues, particularly relating to green aspects such as certification, energy …


Quantifying The Life Cycle Benefits Of Performance-Based Design In Sustainable Design, David Isaac Carmona Mar 2012

Quantifying The Life Cycle Benefits Of Performance-Based Design In Sustainable Design, David Isaac Carmona

Master's Theses

ABSTRACT

Quantifying the Life Cycle Benefits of Performance-Based Design in Sustainable Design

David Carmona

For this thesis, a method is developed and tested for use with performance based design to quantify the sustainable and financial benefits of designing buildings to a structural performance level higher than Life-Safety. This paper starts to answer the question, “which would be a better investment: build structures to a performance level of Immediate Occupancy (IO) with the likelihood of less damage and downtime after an earthquake or continue to build to the building code’s implied minimum performance level of Life-Safety (LS)?”

An ASCE 7-05 designed …


Bs News March/April Mar 2012

Bs News March/April

Building Services Engineering

No abstract provided.


Bs News January/February Jan 2012

Bs News January/February

Building Services Engineering

No abstract provided.


Bs News November/December Nov 2011

Bs News November/December

Building Services Engineering

No abstract provided.


Bs News September/October Sep 2011

Bs News September/October

Building Services Engineering

No abstract provided.


Comparison Of Design-Build And Design-Bid-Build Performance Of Public University Projects, James David Fernane Aug 2011

Comparison Of Design-Build And Design-Bid-Build Performance Of Public University Projects, James David Fernane

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

With an unsure market and scarce work, owners across the United States, especially universities, are finding themselves in situations where they are unable to complete their projects within cost and schedule using the traditional delivery method: Design-Bid-Build (DBB). Under the DBB project delivery method, many competent contractors are electing to send low bids on projects just to keep work on their books, with plans to receive change orders once the project is underway; this practice is leading to cost and schedule overruns. Public universities across the United States are beginning to elect to use Design-Build (DB) as an alternate project …


Bs News July/August Jul 2011

Bs News July/August

Building Services Engineering

No abstract provided.


The Impacts Of Road Capacity Removal, Jason E. Billings May 2011

The Impacts Of Road Capacity Removal, Jason E. Billings

Master's Theses

The road infrastructure of North America is aging, and many governments are faced with a critical decision:  do we repair or remove freeways from our urban centers?  Freeway repair is exceptionally expensive, but removing a freeway is widely seen as a risky venture which may result in negative traffic effects.  Therefore, it is necessary to gain a clearer understanding of how removing road capacity effects traffic distribution.  Three freeway segments were ultimately selected for case study analysis: two in San Francisco and one in Milwaukee.  This analysis consisted of identifying changes in the traffic volumes and volume-capacity (V/C) ratios in …


Bs News May/June May 2011

Bs News May/June

Building Services Engineering

No abstract provided.


Bs News March/April Mar 2011

Bs News March/April

Building Services Engineering

No abstract provided.


A Financial Impact Assessment Of Ld 1725: Stream Crossings Presentation, New England Environmental Finance Center Jan 2011

A Financial Impact Assessment Of Ld 1725: Stream Crossings Presentation, New England Environmental Finance Center

Economics and Finance

This report looks at the potential financial impact of LD 1725 on the estimated 30,000 stream crossings in the State of Maine that would be affected by the law. Our research for this report included the analysis of nearly 2000 stream crossings and the data collection necessary for the development of extensive stream crossing replacement cost models. We found that the 1.2 bankfull requirements in LD 1725 would result in a 75% ‐ 250% increase in structure widths for stream crossing projects across the state. An upsize of this magnitude would increase the cost of replacing stream crossings statewide by …


Methodology To Convert A Transportation Planning Origin-Destination Matrix Into A Microscopic Traffic Simulation Origin-Destination Matrix, Jose Osiris Vidana-Bencomo Jan 2011

Methodology To Convert A Transportation Planning Origin-Destination Matrix Into A Microscopic Traffic Simulation Origin-Destination Matrix, Jose Osiris Vidana-Bencomo

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Microscopic traffic simulation (MTS) is a cost-effective approach for the evaluation of traffic conditions in urban highways networks. In MTS models, traffic demand that is entered into the network is specified by one or several Origin-Destination (O-D) matrices. A major challenge in the application of MTS for large urban networks is the specification of the O-D matrices. This dissertation proposes a methodology that may be used to transform a O-D matrix from a transportation planning model (which is based on Traffic Analysis Zone, or TAZ, and is readily available) into a O-D matrix for a MTS model (which is traffic …


Bs News January/February Jan 2011

Bs News January/February

Building Services Engineering

No abstract provided.


Culvert Material Cost Comparison, New England Environmental Finance Center Nov 2010

Culvert Material Cost Comparison, New England Environmental Finance Center

Economics and Finance

The following tables provide a detailed look at the role that culvert material and culvert diameter play in the overall cost of a culvert replacement project. Table 1 displays the cost per foot purchase price arranged by diameter size for the various culvert materials that are currently available. Table 2 displays the average additional culvert pipe material cost (increased cost to upsize minus original in-kind replacement cost) that would be incurred when upsizing a given diameter of culvert with a 50 foot length by factors of: 200%, 250% and 300%.


An Investigation Of The Influence Of Diaphragm Flexibility On Building Design Through A Comparison Of Forced Vibration Testing And Computational Analysis, Blake Alan Roskelley Nov 2010

An Investigation Of The Influence Of Diaphragm Flexibility On Building Design Through A Comparison Of Forced Vibration Testing And Computational Analysis, Blake Alan Roskelley

Master's Theses

An assessment of the validity of idealizing a concrete diaphragm as rigid was performed through the modal analysis of three existing buildings. Modal analysis was performed both by physical experimentation and computational analysis. Experimental determination of the mode shapes shows that two of the three buildings’ diaphragms exhibited flexible behavior. The experimental results were compared to computational analysis results and were shown to be similar, confirming that that the two building diaphragms are not rigid. As a standard, diaphragms with aspect ratios less than three are permitted to be idealized as rigid per ASCE 7-05. To determine the effect of …


Bs News November/December Nov 2010

Bs News November/December

Building Services Engineering

No abstract provided.


Bs News September/October Sep 2010

Bs News September/October

Building Services Engineering

No abstract provided.


Construction Cost Models, Barry Dikeman Aug 2010

Construction Cost Models, Barry Dikeman

Economics and Finance

The following are a series of cost estimate models similar in format to a typical engineer’s estimate that were developed in support of our financial impact assessment report for LD 1725. The models us current material costs, labor costs, and equipment costs for the region to provide a comparative cost analysis of seven culvert replacement scenarios. The models provide information about what the cost impact of LD 1725 would be for typical culvert replacements in Maine. However, due to the inherent restrictions of the cost modeling framework we were not able to include the abundance of variables that would be …


Bs News July/August Jul 2010

Bs News July/August

Building Services Engineering

No abstract provided.


Bs News May/June May 2010

Bs News May/June

Building Services Engineering

No abstract provided.


Sustainable Portland: Implementation Series 3, New England Environmental Finance Center Apr 2010

Sustainable Portland: Implementation Series 3, New England Environmental Finance Center

Climate Change

This report is the third in a series of efforts by students at the Muskie School of Public Service, Community Planning and Development Master’s program, in a core class called “Sustainable Communities.” In this course students seek to understand principles of sustainability and how efforts to implement Sustainability programs can become more successful. The report assembles term papers students completed on particular efforts by municipalities, universities, and other groups to achieve sustainability goals. Students worked on each project in a service learning format with real world clients. They were asked to fashion their papers around lessons learned by other organizations …


Bs News March/April Mar 2010

Bs News March/April

Building Services Engineering

No abstract provided.


Identification Of Physical Changes To A Steel Frame, Daniel Eric Means Feb 2010

Identification Of Physical Changes To A Steel Frame, Daniel Eric Means

Master's Theses

The thesis utilized physical testing and computer modeling to determine the feasibility of identifying a change to the mass or stiffness of a steel frame. Physical testing was performed using an accelerometer, linear shaker, and arbitrary function generator. Two methods of laboratory testing were developed: ambient vibration testing (AVT) and forced vibration testing (FVT). AVT was able to preliminarily identify the natural frequencies and mode shapes of the frame. FVT was able to precisely identify four distinct natural frequencies, mode shapes, and damping ratios. The baseline frame then underwent two physical changes: the addition of mass to its roof, and …


A Study Of The Economical Feasibility Of Installing Heating, Ventilation, And Air-Conditioning Condensate Recovery System, Rafid M. Kully Jan 2010

A Study Of The Economical Feasibility Of Installing Heating, Ventilation, And Air-Conditioning Condensate Recovery System, Rafid M. Kully

Theses

The objective of this study is to establish a guide line or an analytical frame work to predetermine the economic benefits associated with the installation of Heating, Ventilation, and Air-Conditioning (HVAC) condensate recovery systems to capture the air-handler’s condensate water and use it as makeup water for the cooling tower. Some factors should be considered such as; the location, building operation, amount of outside air required, type of energy recovery system, and indoor conditions setup. Experimental data was used from Emory University in Georgia, where a condensate recovery system was installed and the condensate water from four air-handler units at …


B S News January/February Jan 2010

B S News January/February

Building Services Engineering

No abstract provided.


Design And Performance Of Load Bearing Shear Walls Made From Composite Rice Straw Blocks, Kevin Robert Camann Dec 2009

Design And Performance Of Load Bearing Shear Walls Made From Composite Rice Straw Blocks, Kevin Robert Camann

Master's Theses

Although rice straw and other grains have been used in building since pre-history, in the past two decades, there has been a move to utilize this rapidly renewable, locally available, agricultural byproduct as part of the sustainable construction movement. Up to this point, this has been done by simply stacking up the full straw bales. Stak Block, invented by Oryzatech, Inc., is a modular, interlocking block made of a composite of rice straw and binding agent that serves as an evolution in straw construction. This study investigates the feasibility of using these Stak Blocks as a structural system. The report …


Material Sustainability, Jessica Meadows, Natasha Morris Dec 2009

Material Sustainability, Jessica Meadows, Natasha Morris

Architectural Engineering

This paper addresses the sustainability of the materials used to construct buildings today. Timber, concrete and steel are analyzed for carbon output, cost, and recyclable-ability.


Bs News Dec 2009

Bs News

Building Services Engineering

No abstract provided.


Bs News Oct 2009

Bs News

Building Services Engineering

No abstract provided.