Plant Services - March 2008 - (Page 13)

UP AND RUNNING Ohio students design winning Future City Engineering includes condition monitoring and maintenance city of the future, named “RA,” engineered by students from Heritage Middle School in Westerville, Ohio, has won the 2008 National Engineers Week Future City Competition. Teams from 36 middle schools nationwide, winners of regional competitions in January, participated in the national finals Feb. 18-20 in Washington, D.C. The students – Glen Gainer, Emma Henderson and Jeremy Boyd, all age 13 – teamed up with their teacher, Debra Pellington, and mentor, Ted Beidler, P.E., from Franklin County Engineers. Celebrating its 16th year, Future City asks middle school students to design cities of the future, first on a computer and then in large tabletop models. Working in teams with a teacher and volunteer engineer mentor, students develop their cities using the SimCity 3000 videogame donated to participating schools by Electronic Arts, Inc. The contestants write a city abstract and an essay about using engineering to solve an important social issue. This year’s essay asked them to describe how nanotechnology will monitor their city’s structures and systems to keep its infrastructure healthy. Then, they present and defend their cities before engineer judges at the competition. Some 30,000 students from more than 1,100 schools participated. Despite the fact that they must consider harsh realities such as aging infrastructure, climate change and economic difficulties as they gaze into the future, their overall outlook is one of promise and hope. “Life will be a lot easier,” predicts Gabrielle Rocco, a member of the team from Islip Middle School in Islip, N.Y. “Engineers will invent robots to help us. There will be less pollution, more alternative fuels, the air won’t be as polluted and there won’t be so much global warming.” For one of the winning regional teams – Westridge Middle School in Shawnee Mission, Kan., – working for a better future is particularly realistic. Their model is based on rebuilding Greensburg, the small Kansas town virtually wiped from the map by a tornado last year. For team member Amy Marie Hocker, 14, the effort is more than just rebuilding a physical city. “We want to open people’s eyes that there is hope after a natural disaster.” For Melissa Doan, 13, from St. Philip Neri, the school that represented Oklahoma at National Finals, working on Future City was a glimpse into a not-too-distant horizon. March 2008 A Heritage Middle School students Glen Gainer, Emma Henderson and Jeremy Boyd take 2008 National Champion honors with engineer mentor Ted Beidler, P.E., and teacher Debra Pellington (Photo: Ben Zweig/DCEventphoto). “We’re researching and writing about technology that one day will actually be part of our lives.” In the words of the winning Heritage team’s Future City abstract, “Like the glorious temple Amon-Ra, honoring the Egyptian Sun God RA, the ultimate city of the sun rises out of the vast sands of majestic Egypt. An engineering marvel, the city of RA was designed to provide an ideal quality of life for its citizens. A flourishing economy is evident in the revolutionary mixed-use Green Living Modules (GLM) and the state-of-the-art EIRS 3000 Educational System. The EIRS provides interactive learning experiences using the latest in educational intercommunication, the Nanosence Glove.” Heritage Middle School’s essay describes using nanotechnology to monitor RA’s wastewater. “To maximize efficiency,” the students write, “microelectromechanical machines oversee nanosensors implanted within pipes … nanosensors, robotic nanopigs, nanosponges, carbon nanotubes, nanodigibots, nanosensor stress bots and smart table technology have been used throughout the system.” The Future City National Finals is hosted by engineering software company Bentley Systems, which also provides first prize for the Heritage team – a trip to U.S. Space Camp in Huntsville, Ala. For more about the competition, photos and links to video coverage, see www.futurecity.org. 13 www.PLANTSERVICES.com http://www.futurecity.org http://www.PLANTSERVICES.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Plant Services - March 2008

Plant Services - March 2008 Contents From The Editor Letters The PS Files Up and Running Crisis Corner What Works Asset Manager: Enterprise Thinking Technology Toolbox: Hydrogen In Action Cover Story: Get Real Electrical: Reliable Distribution Power Transmission: When the Belt Breaks Web Hunter: Tooting Horns In the Trenches Product Picks Classifieds Fast Facts Energy Expert: Energy versus Sustainability

Plant Services - March 2008

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