Courtesy Mack Trucks Mack plans to start building DME-powered trucks in 2015. Related Links: Truck Quality Suffers From Cleaner Diesels Are Clean-Diesel Engine Rules Stifling Innovation? Add U.S. construction-company fleet managers to the list of possible beneficiaries of the growing national gas boom, but the payoff is at least two years away. Dimethyl ether, a diesel replacement product that can be made from a variety of chemical feedstocks, could power a new line of heavy-duty trucks due in 2015 from a Volvo North America and Mack Truck partnership.Natural gas will be the primary raw material used in dimethyl ether (DME)
Courtesy California Expo Rail Authority Concrete is placed on a bridge deck last month for the light rail line expansion to Santa Monica. A Los Angeles light rail line being expanded by Skanska USA faces a court challenge that could shut down work.The state Supreme Court is scheduled to hand down a decision by Aug.7 in a challenge by local residents to Phase II of the Los Angeles Exposition Rail line, now under construction through the city’s west side and due to start operating in 2015.The main issue is whether a construction authority has the discretion to use existing or
Vitol Vitol, the world's largest oil trader, is building a new liquid freight terminal at Cyprus' port of Vasilikos. A new oil terminal being built by the Athens-based global contractor Joannou and Paraskevaides Ltd. for the world’s largest oil trader, the Vitol Group, is providing some hope to financially challenged Cyprus. The Mediterranean island is hoping a large energy investment will help to repay a $10-billion European Union loan intended to save the country from insolvency.The Vitol terminal and other energy-sector projects are providing some optimism in a depressed economic environment. “There’s euphoria over the energy projects ongoing in Cyprus
Related Links: Big Corrosion Problem May Affect New Bay Bridge Span Plan Enlists Custom Steel Saddles to Repair Broken Bay Bridge Bolts (subscribers only) Three problem projects may test the working relationship among California's Dept. of Transportation, Kiewit and elected officials. Tens of millions of dollars in payments ride on who is to be held responsible for delays and cost overruns on the new San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge, the expansion of the Interstate 405 Freeway in Los Angeles and the recently opened Devil's Slide Tunnel in San Mateo County.U.S. Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) and other officials throughout the state want
Related Links: If The Buildings Sector Slows, PCL Has Oil in the Backyard Albertas Booming Oil Sands Boast Cold Weather, Hot Market A $480-million dollar arena slated to house the National Hockey League’s Edmonton Oilers is emblematic of recent development and economic recovery in Alberta's capital city. Institutional projects top 2013's robust building permit activity and represent the highest increase in year-to-date construction value, up 684% compared to 2012, say city officials.“The arena is creating spinoff developments,” says Alan Kuysters, Edmonton district manager for PCL Construction Cos., the local firm handling project pre-construction work. “Several colleges in Edmonton are also
Photo Courtesy of Atikokan GS The contractor at a powerplant in Atikokan, Ontario, is erecting two 5,000-ton concrete silos for storage of white wood pellets, the new fuel source that will replace coal at the plant. Related Links: Biomass Plants Seek Toehold in U.S. Energy Market Utilities Repower Aging Coal Plants To Burn Biomass A $170-million retrofit at Atikokan Generating Station in Atikokan, Ontario, is transforming a 28-year- old coal plant to burn 100% biomass and represents a major trend in North American power engineering and construction efforts. "The Ontario Power Authority mandated that this facility be off coal by
Nearly 11% of the nation's animal fat waste, used cooking oil and other discarded grease streams will be turned into renewable diesel fuel when work is completed on the $368-million Diamond Green Diesel facility now under way in Norco, La., near New Orleans. The biomass project will nearly triple the amount of renewable diesel produced domestically, according to the U.S. Energy Dept., and may be the first of several such innovative technology projects planned in the state. Related Links: Valero Diamond Green Diesel The project, a joint venture between independent oil refiner Valero Energy Corp. and animal rendering and food
Los Angeles World Airports (LAWA), the owner of Los Angeles International Airport, is in the middle of a $4.1-billion capital improvement plan—one of the largest public works programs in California. A key element of the capital plan is a $438-million replacement for the airport's central utilities plant (CUP). The massive new facility has the complexity, scale and scope to present plenty of challenges for the project team. Related Links: Los Angeles World Airports Named ENR California Owner of the Year (4/19/2012) ENR California "There is something for every discipline: major operating systems, four electrical substations, miles of underground pipe and
With pipelines to terminals in short supply, North Dakota crude is moving by rail. Related Links: Bakken Oil-Shale Extraction Sparks a Construction Boom North Dakota Is Bakken Business Carbis Inc. Savage Services employment link Over the past month, at defunct oil refineries, industrial facilities and other brownfields on the East Coast, construction work has been accelerating to convert these sites into rail terminals to take crude oil from North Dakota's Bakken shale formation.The boomlet is gaining momentum. In Eddystone, Pa., Enbridge is turning the site of a shuttered coal plant into a rail terminal able to take delivery of about
Related Links: Butanol Backers Push Retrofit Effort as Ethanol Boom Fades China Backs Cellulosic Ethanol Producer That DOE Rejected North America’s largest anaerobic digester, which can take in 1,200 tons per day of waste matter, is in the midst of final construction and start-up activities at Western Plains Energy, an ethanol plant in Oakley, Kan. ICM Inc. performed construction services for the project designed by HiMark Biogas, Edmonton, Alberta. It is the highlight of an industrial-technology sector experiencing rapid growth.Using microorganisms, anaerobic digesters capture methane gas from waste streams to power generators and produce heat or even compressed natural gas.