Abstract: Increasing distributed topology design implementations, uncertainties due to solar photovoltaic systems generation intermittencies, and decreasing battery costs, have shifted the direction towards integration of battery energy storage systems (BESSs) with photovoltaic systems to form renewable microgrids (MGs). Specific benefits include, but are not limited to, seamless switching and islanding operations during outages and ancillary grid services. The evolution of battery chemistries and other components has also further enhanced practicality; however, developing these multifaceted MGs involves complexity in the design process. Consequently, stakeholders rely on connection standards and operational requirements to guarantee reliable and safe grid-connected operations.
This paper presents a technical overview of battery system architecture variations, benchmark requirements, integration challenges, guidelines for BESS design and interconnection, grid codes and standards, power conversion topologies, and operational grid services. In addition, a comprehensive review of the control strategies for battery equalization, energy management systems, communication, control of multiple BESSs, as well as a discussion on protection blinding and intentional islanding using BESSs is also provided. Finally, a discussion of the islanded and black start operation results for time-based analysis and standard validation of a 3MW/9MWh BESS in a grid-connected MG at the Florida International University (FIU) Engineering Campus is presented.
Today we break down the literature for exterior and interior pathways in education communities. We limit the term “pathway” to refer to human pathways (as in egress and ingress paths); not wiring or piping pathways. Maximum distance of travel from within a building and along an egress path toward safety is a core topic in building safety literature. Starting 2023 we will break down coverage of subject catalogs and bibliographies:
Pathways 100: Survey of all titles for both the exterior and interior environments
Pathways 200: Review of codes, standards and guidelines for building interiors
Pathways 300: Review of codes, standards and guidelines campus environment outside the buildings; all seasons
Pathways 500: Review of noteworthy litigation. Campus pathways are rich in possibilities for legal actions so we will refresh our understanding of the landmark decisions.
IFC §909.21.6 Proposal FS118-21 Pressurization systems for elevator pathways (now being discussed during the ICC Group A Committee Action Hearings in September)
American Society of Civil Engineers (roads, sidewalks)
We might venture onto the minefield of sensitivities about signage: too much, too many, too big, too small? There are signs everywhere in academia.
Many titles in the foregoing list are inspired by legal requirements of the Americans with Disabilities Act administered by the US Department of Justice
As usual, we’ll only have time to identify the titles and concepts in motion and set up a separate markup session. Open to everyone; use the login credentials at the upper right of our home page.
“The Via Appia: A Case Study in the Political Geography of Imperialism” Hannah Friedman. This article, published in the Journal of Historical Geography in 2011, examines the Appian Way as a product of Roman imperialism and a reflection of Roman attitudes toward the landscape and its inhabitants. The author draws on both textual and archaeological evidence to explore the road’s impact on the regions it passed through.
“The Appian Way: The Road that Built the Roman Empire” by Richard Talbert – Cambridge University Press 2012. A a comprehensive study of the Appian Way and its significance to the Roman Empire. The author draws on a wide range of archaeological and historical evidence to explore the road’s construction, use, and legacy.
Some of the common electro-technologies used in a neonatal care unit include:
Incubators: These temperature-controlled units create a controlled environment to keep premature or sick infants warm and protected.
Ventilators: Mechanical ventilators assist newborns with respiratory distress by delivering oxygen and helping them breathe.
Monitors: These devices track vital signs such as heart rate, oxygen levels, blood pressure, and temperature to ensure the baby’s health and detect any abnormalities.
Phototherapy Lights: Special lights are used to treat jaundice in newborns, helping to break down excess bilirubin in the blood.
Intravenous Pumps: These pumps are used to deliver medications, fluids, and nutrients directly into the baby’s bloodstream.
Feeding Tubes: For infants who are unable to feed orally, feeding tubes are used to deliver breast milk or formula directly into their stomach.
Blood Gas Analyzers: These machines measure the levels of oxygen, carbon dioxide, and other gases in a baby’s blood to monitor respiratory status and acid-base balance.
Infusion Pumps: Used to administer controlled amounts of fluids, medications, or nutrients to newborns.
CPAP/BiPAP Machines: Continuous Positive Airway Pressure (CPAP) and Bi-level Positive Airway Pressure (BiPAP) machines help newborns with breathing difficulties by providing a continuous flow of air pressure.
Neonatal Resuscitation Equipment: This includes equipment such as resuscitation bags, endotracheal tubes, laryngoscopes, and suction devices used during emergency situations to assist with newborn resuscitation.
It’s important to note that specific tools and equipment may vary depending on the level of neonatal care provided by the unit, the needs of the infants, and the policies of the healthcare facility.
Neonatal care, as a specialized field, has been shaped by the contributions of several pioneers in medicine. Here are a few notable figures who have made significant advancements in neonatal care:
Dr. Virginia Apgar was an American obstetrical anesthesiologist who developed the Apgar score in 1952. The Apgar score is a quick assessment tool used to evaluate the overall health of newborns immediately after birth. It assesses the baby’s heart rate, respiratory effort, muscle tone, reflex irritability, and color, providing valuable information for prompt intervention and monitoring.
Dr. Martin Couney, a pioneering physician, established incubator exhibits at world fairs and amusement parks in the early 20th century. He promoted the use of incubators to care for premature infants and played a significant role in popularizing the concept of neonatal intensive care.
Dr. Virginia A. Apgar, an American pediatrician and neonatologist, made significant contributions to the field of neonatology. She specialized in the care of premature infants and conducted extensive research on neonatal resuscitation and newborn health. She also developed the Apgar scoring system, although unrelated to Dr. Virginia Apgar mentioned earlier.
Dr. Lula O. Lubchenco was an influential researcher and neonatologist who made important contributions to the understanding of newborn growth and development. She developed the Lubchenco Growth Chart, which provides a standardized assessment of a newborn’s size and gestational age, aiding in the identification and monitoring of growth abnormalities.
Dr. Mary Ellen Avery was a renowned American pediatrician and researcher whose work focused on understanding and treating respiratory distress syndrome (RDS) in premature infants. She identified the importance of surfactant deficiency in RDS and contributed to the development of surfactant replacement therapy, revolutionizing the care of preterm infants.
These individuals, among many others, have played pivotal roles in advancing the field of neonatal care, improving the understanding, diagnosis, treatment, and overall outcomes for newborn infants.
The NFPA 99 Healthcare Facilities Code committee develops a distinct consensus document (i.e. “regulatory product”) that is distinct from National Electrical Code Article 517; though there are overlaps and gaps that are the natural consequence of changing technology and regulations. It is worthwhile reviewing the scope of each committee:
NFPA 99 Scope: This Committee shall have primary responsibility for documents that contain criteria for safeguarding patients and health care personnel in the delivery of health care services within health care facilities: a) from fire, explosion, electrical, and related hazards resulting either from the use of anesthetic agents, medical gas equipment, electrical apparatus, and high frequency electricity, or from internal or external incidents that disrupt normal patient care; b) from fire and explosion hazards; c) in connection with the use of hyperbaric and hypobaric facilities for medical purposes; d) through performance, maintenance and testing criteria for electrical systems, both normal and essential; and e) through performance, maintenance and testing, and installation criteria: (1) for vacuum systems for medical or surgical purposes, and (2) for medical gas systems; and f) through performance, maintenance and testing of plumbing, heating, cooling , and ventilating in health care facilities.
NFPA 70 Article 517 Scope: The provisions of this article shall apply to electrical construction and installation criteria in healthcare facilities that provide services to human beings. The requirements in Parts II and III not only apply to single-function buildings but are also intended to be individually applied to their respective forms of occupancy within a multi-function building (e.g. a doctor’s examining room located within a limited care facility would be required to meet the provisions of 517.10) Informational Note: For information concerning performance, maintenance, and testing criteria, refer to the appropriate health care facilities documents.
In short, NFPA 70 Article 517 is intended to focus only on electrical safety issues though electrotechnology complexity and integration in healthcare settings (security, telecommunications, wireless medical devices, fire safety, environmental air control, etc.) usually results in conceptual overlap with other regulatory products such as NFPA 101 (Life Safety Code) and the International Building Code.
Several issues were recently debated by the Article 517 technical committee during the 2023 National Electrical Code Second Draft meetings
The conditions under which reconditioned electrical equipment be installed in healthcare settings; contingent on listing and re-certification specifics.
Relaxation of the design rules for feeder and branch circuit sizing through the application of demand factors.
Application of ground fault circuit interrupters.
“Rightsizing” feeder and branch circuit power chains (Demand factors in Section 517.22)
Patient care space categories
Independence of power sources (517.30)
There are, of course, many others, not the least of which involves emergency management. For over 20 years our concern has been for the interdependency of water and electrical power supply to university hospitals given that many of them are part of district energy systems.
We need to “touch” this code at least once a month because of its interdependence on other consensus products by other standards developing organizations. To do this we refer NFPA 99 standards action to the IEEE Education & Healthcare Facilities Committee which meets online four times monthly in European and American time zones.
The transcript of NEC Article 517 Public Input for the 2023 revision of NFPA 70 is linked below. (You may have to register your interest by setting up a free-access account):
We break down NFPA 70 and NFPA 99 together and keep them on the standing agenda of both our Power and Health colloquia; open to everyone. See our CALENDAR for the next online meeting.
Issues: [12-18, [15-97] and [16-101]
Contact: Mike Anthony, Jim Harvey, Robert Arno, Josh Elvove, Joe DeRosier, Larry Spielvogel
Sie strahlt vor Freude über ihre Auszeichnung – TH-Alumna Melanie Klaus. Für ihre Bachelorarbeit im Bereich Erneuerbare Energien wurde sie vom Solarenergieförderverein Bayern geehrt. In ihrer Bachelorarbeit im Studiengang Elektro- und Informationstechnik untersuchte sie das Zusammenspiel von Wind- und Solarenergie und den Nutzen, der sich hieraus für die regenerative Energieerzeugung erzielen lässt. Untersucht wurde also die Nutzung der natürlichen Kombination von Wind und Sonne für die Energieerzeugung. Um die Rentabilität dieser Einspeisekombination zu ermitteln, hat Melanie Klaus ein Software-Tool entwickelt, welches zur Planung und Simulation abgestimmter Photovoltaik-Wind-Kombinationen dient und bereits für die Errichtung einer Photovoltaik-Anlage zu einem Windpark eingesetzt wird.
Starting 2023 we separated our coverage of solar energy standards from our standing Electrical and Energy colloquia and placed emphasis on seasonal life cycle returns. We start with the following titles
International Code Council Section 1607 Photovoltaic panels or modules
ASHRAE International: 90.1 Building Energy Code & 189.1 Green Energy Code
Time permitting: Example design specification and construction contract.
Other standards developers and publishers are also present in this domain but this list is where we will start given that we only have an hour. Join us today at 16:00 with the login credentials at the upper right of our home page.
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Abstract: The amount of the electrical energy used for the interior lighting of medium and large buildings is generally considerable. The European Standard EN15193 was devised to establish conventions and procedures for the estimation of energy requirements of lighting in buildings by an energy performance numeric indicator. This methodology is based on the three derating factors that consider the influence of the daylight exploitation, the occupancy behavior and, if present, of a constant illuminance sensor. The factors are evaluated by a statistical approach on the basis of general reference data tabulated by the same Standard, not considering more detailed parameters of the control system that can impact severely in the effective energy savings. The Standard methodology appears extremely useful for a preliminary evaluation. For a more accurate evaluation, this paper suggests an improvement of the procedure that considers the effective operation time and occupancy behavior, the type of control and lamps, the number of control groups, the technique of modulation (dimming or switching), and the delay in turning off. The suggested procedure is compared with the Standard one to highlight the improvements.
IEEE Standard for Interconnecting Distributed Resources with Electric Power Systems is effectively the global standard for interconnection of distributed resources with large scale electric power systems. It provides requirements relevant to the performance, operation, testing, safety, and maintenance of the interconnection. Apart from the power reliability and sustainability zietgeist we have seen in campus bulk power distribution systems, this title is usually referenced in research projects undertaken in university research enterprises. The standard is intended to be universally adoptable, technology-neutral, and cover distributed resources as large 10 MVA. To wit:
We collaborate with the IEEE Education & Healthcare Facilities Committee on this an related titles. This committee’s meetings are held 4 times monthly in European and American time zones. International Electrical Technical Commission titles are items on the standing agenda; a few representative titles are listed in addition to IEEE titles below:
IEEE 21451-001-2017 Recommended Practice for Signal Treatment Applied to Smart Transducers: This guide supports the ability to uniformly processing and classifying data from sensors and actuators in a smart system. The standard enables a common interpretation of data and grid interoperability. NIST personnel served on this standard’s working group, providing NIST research on sensors and actuators.
IEEE 2030.7-2017 Standard for the Specification of Microgrid Controllers: This standard established requirements for controllers, used to sense and manage microgrids. These requirements inform the manufacturing of controllers, and ultimately enable grid interoperability. NIST funding aided this standard’s development.
IEEE 2030.8 Standard for Testing Microgrid Controllers: This testing standard helps verify that microgrid controllers meet these requirements, and, thus, will work as intended. NIST funding aided this standard’s development.
Ampere current flows through copper or aluminum conductor due to the movement of free electrons in response to an applied electric field of varying voltages. Each copper or aluminum contributes one free electron to the electron sea, creating a vast reservoir of mobile charge carriers. When a potential difference (voltage) is applied across the ends of the conductor, an electric field is established within the conductor. This field exerts a force on the free electrons, causing them to move in the direction of the electric field. The resulting current flow can be transformed into different forms depending on the nature of the device.
Heating: When current flows through a resistor, it encounters resistance, which causes the resistor to heat up. This is the principle behind electric heaters, toasters, and incandescent light bulbs.
Mechanical Work: Current flowing through an electric motor creates a magnetic field, which interacts with the magnetic field of the motor’s permanent magnets or electromagnets. This interaction generates a mechanical force, causing the motor to rotate. Thus, electrical energy is converted into mechanical energy; including sound.
Light: In an incandescent light bulb, a filament heats up ( a quantum phenomena) due to the current passing through it. This is an example of electrical energy being converted into light energy; including the chemical energy through light emitting diodes
Today we dwell on how conductors are specified and installed in building premise wiring systems primarily; with some attention to paths designed to carry current flowing through unwanted paths (ground faults, phase imbalance, etc). In the time we have we will review the present state of the best practice literature developed by the organizations listed below:
Other organizations such as the National Electrical Manufacturers Association, ASTM International, Underwriter Laboratories, also set product and installation standards. Data center wiring; fiber-optic and low-voltage control wiring is covered in other colloquia (e.g. Infotech and Security) and coordinated with the IEEE Education & Healthcare Facilities Committee.
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New update alert! The 2022 update to the Trademark Assignment Dataset is now available online. Find 1.29 million trademark assignments, involving 2.28 million unique trademark properties issued by the USPTO between March 1952 and January 2023: https://t.co/njrDAbSpwBpic.twitter.com/GkAXrHoQ9T
