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Cambridge Center for Smart Infrastructure & Construction

“Clare Hall and King’s College Chapel, Cambridge, from the Banks of the River Cam” / Joseph Mallord William Turner (1793)

 

Smart Infrastructure: Getting More From Strategic Assets

Dr Jennifer Schooling, Director of CSIC;

Dr Ajith Parlikad, CSIC Co-Investigator and Senior Lecturer;

Mark Enzer, Global Water Sector Leader,

Mott MacDonald; Keith Bowers, Principal Tunnel Engineer, London Underground;

Ross Dentten, Asset Information and Configuration Manager, Crossrail;

Matt Edwards, Asset Maintenance and Information Manager, Anglian Water Services;

Jerry England, Group Digital Railway Director, Network Rail;

Volker Buscher, Director, Arup Digital.

 

Smart Infrastructure is a global opportunity worth £2trn-4.8trn. The world is experiencing a fourth industrial revolution due to the rapid development of technologies and digital abundance.

Smart Infrastructure involves applying this to economic infrastructure for the benefit of all stakeholders. It will allow owners and operators to get more out of what they already have, increasing capacity, efficiency and resilience and improving services.

It brings better performance at lower cost. Gaining more from existing assets is the key to enhancing service provision despite constrained finance and growing resource scarcity. It will often be more cost-effective to add to the overall value of mature infrastructure via digital enhancements than by physical enhancements – physical enhancements add `more of the same’, whereas digital enhancements can transform the existing as well.

Smart Infrastructure will shape a better future. Greater understanding of the performance of our infrastructure will allow new infrastructure to be designed and delivered more efficiently and to provide better whole-life value.

Data is the key – the ownership of it and the ability to understand and act on it. Industry, organisations and professionals need to be ready to adjust in order to take advantage of the emerging opportunities. Early adopters stand to gain the most benefit. Everyone in the infrastructure sector has a choice as to how fast they respond to the changes that Smart Infrastructure will bring. But everyone will be affected.

Change is inevitable. Progress is optional. Now is the time for the infrastructure industry to choose to be Smart.

 

LEARN MORE:

Cambridge Centre for Smart Infrastructure and Construction


Perspective: Since this paper is general in its recommendations, we provide examples of specific campus infrastructure data points that are difficult, if not impossible, to identify and “make smart” — either willfully, for lack of funding, for lack of consensus, for lack of understanding or leadership:

    1. Maintenance of the digital location of fire dampers in legacy buildings or even new buildings mapped with BIM.  Doors and ceiling plenums are continually being modified and the As-Built information is usually not accurate.  This leads to fire hazard and complicates air flow and assuring occupant temperature preferences (i.e. uncontrollable hot and cold spots) 
    2. Ampere readings of feeder breakers downstream from the electric service main.  The power chain between the service substation and the end-use equipment is a “no-man’s land” in research facilities that everyone wants to meter but few ever recover the cost of the additional metering.
    3. Optimal air flow rates in hospitals and commercial kitchens that satisfies both environmental air hazards and compartmentalized air pressure zones for fire safety.
    4. Identification of students, staff and faculty directly affiliated with the campus versus visitors to the campus.
    5. Standpipe pressure variations in municipal water systems
    6. Pinch points in municipal sewer systems in order to avoid building flooding.
    7. How much of university data center cost should be a shared (gateway) cost, and how much should be charged to individual academic and business units?
    8. Should “net-zero” energy buildings be charged for power generated at the university central heating and electric generation plant?
    9. How much staff parking should be allocated to academic faculty versus staff that supports the healthcare delivery enterprises; which in many cases provides more revenue to the university than the academic units?
    10. Finally, a classical conundrum in facility management spreadsheets: Can we distinguish between maintenance cost (which should be covered under an O&M budget) and capital improvement cost (which can be financed by investors)

 

 

Fish and Chips and the British Working Class

“Fish and Chips” | Fred Laidler (1918–1988)

Fish and Chips and the British Working Class, 1870-1930

Fish and chips was in many ways the pioneer fast-food industry.  It became an essential component of working-class diet and popular culture in parts of London, and over wide areas of industrial midland and northern England and southern Scotland, in the early decades of the twentieth century…I propose to argue that the fish and chip trade was not only important enough in itself to justify sustained historical analysis, but also that it provides a useful vantage point for examining important changes in British society more generally.”

— John Walken, 1998, Journal of Social History


Tea

“Monday morning” as a concept since the modern idea of weekdays, including Monday as the start of the workweek, is a relatively recent development. In ancient times, different cultures had their own systems for organizing time, often based on astronomical or religious cycles rather than the structured workweek we’re familiar with today.

From ancient writings, however, we learn about the start of the week in various contexts. For instance, in Greco-Roman literature, there are numerous references to the beginning of the day and the importance of starting tasks early. Additionally, certain religious texts, such as the Bible, may contain references to the first day of the week, which could be interpreted in a similar context to Monday.

 

“No matter where you are in the world,

you are at home when tea is served.”

– Earlene Grey

 

There is an American way for drinking tea, a British way of drinking tea, a Japanese way of drinking tea and so forth and so on. However, the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) section ISO 3103 concludes upon an “international way” of drinking tea. The ISO even created a standard on how to run a standard organization. Their goal for this standard, no matter where you are in the world, is to have one way to play it safe in terms of making tea. To maintain consistent results, the following are recommendations given by the standard:

  • The pot should be white porcelain or glazed earthenware and have a partly serrated edge. It should have a lid that fits loosely inside the pot.
  • If a large pot is used, it should hold a maximum of 310 ml (±8 ml) and must weigh 200 g (±10 g).
  • If a small pot is used, it should hold a maximum of 150 ml (±4 ml) and must weigh 118 g (±10 g).
  • 2 grams of tea (measured to ±2% accuracy) per 100 ml boiling water is placed into the pot.
  • Freshly boiling water is poured into the pot to within 4-6 mm of the brim.
  • The water should be similar to the drinking water where the tea will be consumed
  • Brewing time is six minutes.
  • The brewed tea is then poured into a white porcelain or glazed earthenware bowl.
  • If a large bowl is used, it must have a capacity of 380 ml and weigh 200 g (±20 g)
  • If a small bowl is used, it must have a capacity of 200 ml and weigh 105 g (±20 g)
  • If the test involves milk, then it can be added before or after pouring the infused tea.
  • Milk added after the pouring of tea is best tasted when the liquid is between 65 – 80 °C.
  • 5 ml of milk for the large bowl, or 2.5 ml for the small bowl, is used.

If you travel out of the country and are not informed on the countries traditions and practices for drinking tea, according to the ISO, you can’t go wrong by using the above standards. Their standards does not make your way of making tea wrong. It just sets a default and reproducible cup for everyone to make.

More

The International Standard Cup of Tea

BS 6008:1980 ISO 3103:1980

ISO 1839 Tea Sampling

NSF International: Drinking Water Quality

A Closer Look at Water for Tea

There are several universities around the world that specialize in tea research. Some of the most well-known include:

University of North Carolina at Greensboro (USA): The UNCG has a Center for Applied Research in Tea and is dedicated to tea research in the areas of health, culture, and sustainability.

Huazhong Agricultural University (China): Huazhong Agricultural University has a Tea Science Institute that conducts research in the areas of tea breeding, tea processing, tea quality, and tea culture.

University of Shizuoka (Japan): The University of Shizuoka has a Faculty of Agriculture that includes a Department of Tea Science, which conducts research in the areas of tea production, processing, and quality.

University of Darjeeling (India): The University of Darjeeling has a Department of Tea Science and Technology that offers courses in tea science and conducts research in the areas of tea cultivation, processing, and marketing.

University of Colombo (Sri Lanka): The University of Colombo has a Department of Plant Sciences that conducts research in the areas of tea breeding, cultivation, and processing.

Anhui Agricultural University (China): Anhui Agricultural University has a Tea Research Institute that conducts research in the areas of tea breeding, cultivation, processing, and marketing.

 

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