Search results for "CONSTRUCTION"

Case study: developing campus spaces through co-creation

2016

ABSTRACTHigher education institutions are designed to support their core processes – learning, teaching, research, and societal impact. In order for university facilities to support these activities, it is crucial to determine together with the users what these activities are and how they are supposed to be developed in the future. This article examines the relationship between user needs and the service level in construction projects through a case study where a university cafeteria was renovated using a participatory design (PD) method called charrette. The aim of this case study was to study the effects of collaborative ways of working when applied to a space retrofit project, and how th…

Evaluation of the laboratory prediction of surface properties of bituminous mixtures

2009

Abstract An experimental and analytical investigation was carried out both in laboratory and in situ on wearing courses. The approach presented in this paper aims to predict the in situ density and surface properties of bituminous layers, during the phase of mix design in laboratory. Therefore, the main attempt of this study is to identify, amongst the commonly available laboratory equipments, the most adequate for producing specimens that, used for carrying out simple and reliable laboratory test, allow the prediction of the surface characteristics of the mixture as laid on site. This is done by comparing the data collected from an experimental site with those calculated from laboratory sp…

Mechanical construction and installation of the ATLAS tile calorimeter

2013

This paper summarises the mechanical construction andinstallation of the Tile Calorimeter for the ATLASexperiment at the Large Hadron Collider in CERN, Switzerland. The TileCalorimeter is a sampling calorimeter using scintillator as the sensitivedetector and steel as the absorber and covers the central region of the ATLASexperiment up to pseudorapidities ±1.7. The mechanical construction ofthe Tile Calorimeter occurred over a periodof about 10 years beginning in 1995 with the completionof the Technical Design Report and ending in 2006 with the installationof the final module in the ATLAS cavern. Duringthis period approximately 2600 metric tons of steel were transformedinto a laminated struc…

Principles as a Bridge Between Theory and Practice

2020

Six-years-long effects of the Italian policies for photovoltaics on the grid parity of grid-connected photovoltaic systems installed in urban contexts

2017

Abstract The purpose of this study is investigating the grid parity (GP) time and the levelized cost of energy (LCOE) of grid-connected photovoltaic (PV) systems installed in densely urbanized contexts. The analysis, which was elaborated for three Italian cities, considered the effects of the promoting policies enacted by the Italian government from June 2010 to May 2016. An appropriate methodology was applied with the aim of realistically defining the energy produced by PV systems installed on buildings with different roof types and number of floors. The calculus of the disbursements considered the operating, maintenance and insurance costs and the wear of PV panels and inverters. The resu…

Towards more sustainable airfield pavements using life-cycle assessment of design alternatives

2020

Airports are critical infrastructures and their success is paramount to development through tourism, trade and connectivity. Within the airport, the runway pavement must always be in a pristine condition. Consequently, pavement design and maintenance decisions are vital. Authorities must make decisions concerning preferred materials for design and maintenance. Decisions should be balanced by both economic and environmental factors. This paper considers a case study at Falcone Borsellino Airport (PMO), Palermo, Italy, where air traffic has been steadily increasing. Different pavements are proposed: flexible Asphaltic concrete designs with both traditional Asphaltic concrete and using reclaim…

Plastic load capacity and stability of frames in fire

1997

The behaviour of real construction materials in different predictable conditions is so complex that it is difficult to describe it precisely in terms of mathematical equations. The problem of the mathematical modelling of materials is, therefore, to be solved rationally by taking into consideration the material type, construction method, load value and external conditions (e.g. temperature). In ambient temperatures there is an interaction of elastic form and plastic form of steelwork failure. This interaction is described by the Merchant-Rankine formula. An analogous interaction should be expected at elevated temperatures. This paper puts forward an interaction formula for elasto-plastic cr…

New simplified approach for obtaining a reliable plateau value in fatigue analysis of bituminous materials

2017

The Plateau Value (PV) based on the Ratio of Dissipated Energy Change (RDEC) approach has been proven to provide a unique relationship with the fatigue life, N-f, independent of loading mode, temperature and frequency. In this paper, a new simplified approach is proposed to compute the unique energy parameter PV. The results of this study show that applying the proposed method allows a unique fatigue power law to be produced and eliminates the ambiguity and variability in calculating PV. However, the study also shows that the PV-N-f fatigue curves for bituminous materials are dependent on material type which is contradictory to other studies dealing with PV. The study also highlights the im…

Use of Concrete for Road Infrastructure: A SWOT Analysis Related to the three Catchwords Sustainability, Industrialisation and Digitalisation

2019

This paper aims at identifying the direction for more sustainable development of the use of concrete in road infrastructure in an industrialised context. The increase in the global mean temperature is one of the most severe challenges today. The concrete industry is responsible for significant emissions of greenhouse gases, most attributable to cement production. However, concrete is one of the most important building materials in the world and indispensable for the societal development in countries at all development stages. Thus, the concrete industry needs to take measures for reducing emissions. This paper investigates possible directions for the development of the concrete industry, to…

Multi-step ahead electricity price forecasting using a hybrid model based on two-layer decomposition technique and BP neural network optimized by fir…

2017

In the deregulated competitive electricity market, the price which reflects the relationship between electricity supply and demand is one of the most important elements, making it crucial for all market participants to precisely forecast the electricity price. However, electricity price series usually has complex features such as non-linearity, non-stationarity and volatility, which makes the price forecasting turn out to be very difficult. In order to improve the accuracy of electricity price forecasting, this paper first proposes a two-layer decomposition technique and then develops a hybrid model based on fast ensemble empirical mode decomposition (FEEMD), variational mode decomposition …