Professional Engineering Societies Research Articles

Pure air's advanced flue gas desulfurization clean coal project

AbstractPure Air's Advanced Flue Gas Desulfurization (AFGD) Clean Coal Project successfully completed four and a half years of operation in December 1996 at Northern Indiana Public Service Company's (NIPSCO) Bailly Generating Station. This project received a $60 million grant from the DOE Clean Coal II program. Included in this was a three year DOE demonstration period. The facility was designed, built and is owned and operated by Pure Air of Allentown, Pennsylvania, through it's project company, Pure Air on the Lake, Limited Partnership. The project met or exceeded all performance criteria. It has averaged 95.3% SO2 removal, 99.9% availability and produced high quality commercial gypsum during this four and a half year period. It demonstrated many advanced technology features including a single, large absorber module serving two boilers, a wastewater evaporation system, and air rotary sparger for oxidation, and a new technology for agglomerating gypsum. The AFGD system will continue to serve NIPSCO's Bailly Station for at least another 15_years under an Own & Operate contact. The project enabled NIPSCO to cost effectively achieve full system wide compliance with the Phase 2 emission requirements for SO2 of the Clean Air Act Amendments (CAAA) of 1990 almost eight years before the target date. The project was the recipient of the Outstanding Engineering Achievement Award from the National Society of Professional Engineers in 1993 and the 1993 Powerplant Award from Power magazine. The data presented in this paper is based on performance during the first three years of operation.

Natural disaster

The theme of the seminar, panel discussion and open forum, organised by the EQC and the Insurance Council, was Natural Disaster: Finding, managing, and sharing people and information. Emphasis was placed on the recovery and reconstruction phases, beginning about 10 days after the disaster occurred. To provide a focus for discussion, the scenario chosen was the Great Wellington Earthquake, for which fairly detailed modelling has been done, most notably for the Wellington after the Quake Conference, 1995. (1) The seminar was, in fact, a follow-up to that conference, at which various recommendations for action had been made, such as:
 
 raising public awareness o f the recovery aspects of disasters; 
 planning for rebuilding, restoration, or relocation in advance of the disaster occurring so that the stress of immediacy and its effects on decision making are reduced; 
 ensuring that homeowners, the insurance and building industries, and owners of businesses and buildings have procedures in place to improve the effectiveness of efforts to restore normalcy to disaster-affected areas.(2) 
 
 The seminar was attended by about 100 participants, representing the insurance industry, territorial local authorities, emergency management/civil defence organisations (both local and central), the building industry, the engineering industry and professional engineering societies, and research organisations.

Toward a tradition of software engineering

Ever since Boehm's Letter from the Executive Committee, in October 1994, the question, "is software engineering really engineering?" has been raised many times. Apparently, the National Society of Professional Engineers would like to make it illegal for anyone to call himself or herself a "software engineer" because software engineering is not one of their 36 recognized disciplines. In response, we have been asking questions like: "Is software development the same as software engineering?" "If not, what is the difference?" and "What would it take for us to become software engineers?"In January 1997, I received a copy of Defining "Engineer" --- How to Do It, and Why It Matters by Davis. After reading it closely, I feel compelled to write the following notes about the role of tradition in engineering and about the prospect of software engineering becoming real engineering.

Reliability education: a historical perspective

The authors provides a historical overview of the development of reliability in the USA: where have we been? where are we today? and where are we heading? He presents the beginnings and the current status of: undergraduate and graduate courses being taught; graduate degree programs; short courses; institutes; training courses; symposia and their transactions; texts and other publications; newsletters; societies involved; videotapes; televised courses; and movies. It is stressed that textbooks of not too highly mathematical nature, emphasizing practical applications, are needed, as well as university courses in the product assurance technologies. Professional engineering societies should sponsor more sessions of papers; more courses in the product assurance technologies should be videotapes; and more such movies produced. More courses should be beamed live to local industry and government organizations. Summer institutes for college teachers sponsored by the National Science Foundation and other groups should be revived.

Software engineering education: issues and alternatives

Postgraduate degree programs in “software engineering” have been in existence for some time and now undergraduate degree programs with this title are beginning to appear. A number of questions and issues of only moderate importance with respect to the postgraduate programs now become critical and of overriding importance. While one could (and did) by and large gloss over these issues earlier, this will be much more difficult, and probably impossible, in the future. These issues must be resolved in a wider context than that in which they have been dealt with before, involving engineering in the universities and professional engineering societies in the larger social context. Much of the disagreement regarding these issues can, ultimately, be traced back to differing fundamental views and definitions of the term “engineering” and whether “software engineering” should be treated as “just” another engineering discipline or in a significantly and fundamentally different way. After examining two different definitions and views of “engineering,” this paper states and discusses a number of the questions and issues which planners of new undergraduate software engineering degree programs must deal with. Some pros and cons of various alternative answers are presented and a few answers suggested. The issues discussed here begin with questions of general policy and concept (e.g., which culture – that of the traditional engineering disciplines or that of computer science – should be instilled in the students in these new degree programs), include organizational matters (e.g., the position of the new degree program in the university hierarchy) and end with selected, more detailed questions regarding the curriculum (e.g., how to deal with programming, design and management topics). It is conjectured that, although the scientific foundation for the undergraduate software engineering degree programs must and will come from computer science, their culture and orientation must come from engineering if they and their graduates are to be successful in satisfying society’s needs in the long term.

Octave Chanute and the Indiana Glider Trials of 1896

During the critical years 1885-1903, Octave Chanute served as the focal point of an international community of flying machine experimenters. One of the leading civil engineers in the United States, he corresponded with virtually every major figure in the field, from aging and inactive pioneers like Francis Herbert Wenham to such promising newcomers as Wilbur and Orville Wright. He personally linked his correspondents into an informal network, providing them with information, encouragement, and, on occasion, financial assistance. Chanute organized sessions of aeronautical papers for the professional engineering societies to which he belonged, gave lectures that attracted fresh talent and new ideas into the field, and produced critically important publications that helped to establish a baseline of shared information. In addition, working with Augustus Moore Herring, Chanute designed and built one of the most significant aircraft of the pre-Wright era, the famous two-surface glider of 1896. On the occasion of the 100th anniversary of that machine, and of the Chanute glider trials in the Indiana Dunes, attention is focused on the role of Octave Chanute in shaping the community of engineers/experimenters who gave birth to the airplane.

National Aerospace Design Competitions: Industry/University Partnerships

AbstractThis paper describes the growth of the individual and team national undergraduate and graduate AIAA/Industry design competitions. These design competitions have been developed primarily to enhance the university capstone design education experience of both undergraduate and graduate aerospace engineering programs. The competitions represent an Industry/University partnership to improve the design capability of individuals, corporations and the nation at large. The AIAA serves as the facilitator in this process. The student design teams respond to RFPs developed by AIAA Technical Committees. The competitions are funded by interested corporations. The AIAA design competition model or template could easily be implemented by any professional engineering society to nurture and encourage student capstone design efforts in that society's discipline. Students, corporations, the AIAA and the nation benefit from these competitions which enhance the competitiveness of all of the participants and thereby the competitiveness of the national community. The paper also includes an assessment of these competitions and some thought about their future direction.

Wooing a harsh mistress: Glenwood Canyon's highway odyssey

A mix of design challenges, daunting physical constraints and fiercely-promoted opposition made the 12.5-mile segment of Interstate 70 through Colorado's Glenwood Canyon a project of three full decades. This book is a narrative of the epic environmental, economic, political and cultural struggle over traversing the canyon, from the early wagon trails to the railroad and state highway and finally to the freeway. Glenwood Canyon Highway Awards include: 1993 Outstanding Civil Engineering Achievement Award, ASCE; One of 1993's top U.S. engineering achievements, National Society of Professional Engineers; and included in National Geographic Society's 1992 volume, The Builders: Marvels of Engineering.

Early History of Professional Registration in United States

The history of professional registration in the United States is closely connected with both the history of engineering as a profession and the creation of the professional engineering societies, both of which were influenced by developments in Western Europe. The role of ASCE in the evolution of the registration process is of particular interest as both a positive and negative influence. ASCE vigorously resisted registration legislation during the formative years as one state after another adopted registration procedures. Nevertheless, ASCE was responsible for the first model law, and greatly influenced the evolution of professional registration. Registration is an important factor in the recognition of engineering as a profession by both practitioners and the general public. The early history of the development of registration laws is considered herein, along with the many factors that significantly influenced this development.

Mandatory Continuing Professional Development for Relicensing of Engineers

We are in an age of continuous innovation, and engineering, like all professions, is constantly changing. Engineers need to keep abreast of these changes and expand their knowledge to maintain their professional status, both in the eyes of the public and their colleagues. Also, the Code of Ethics of most, if not all, professional/technical organizations require that the individual continue their professional development throughout their careers. Many believe that the lack of mandatory continuing professional development is the essential element that keeps engineering from being viewed as a true profession. In addition, there is a national trend toward requiring continuing professional development for maintenance of licensure. The National Society of Professional Engineers reports that 14 states have laws in place requiring continuing education of engineers or are considering enactment. Mandatory continuing education for relicensing of engineers is upon us, are we prepared to accept this requirement?

Programs Seek To Draw More Women Into Engineering and Science

A number of innovative approaches are afoot that aim to draw more women to careers in engineering and science. Some of the approaches are programs designed to retain women's interest in science and math in the years when it's most likely to wane. Another approach suggests ways to make the science curriculum more female friendly. Several such programs were described at the fourth annual Women in Engineering Conference held late last month in Washington, D.C. The conference focused on increasing enrollment and retention of women in engineering and was sponsored by the Women in Engineering Program Advocates Network. There are hard-core business reasons for recruiting more women into engineering, says Lynn E. Bertuglia, an engineer with Black & Veatch (an architectural and engineering consulting firm in Kansas City, Mo.) and chairman of the National Society of Professional Engineers' Women in Engineering Task Force. For example, if businesses are to compete globally in coming years, they ...

Structural Failures and Engineering Ethics

Major engineering failures act as a catalyst for change in standards of practice and therefore create the opportunity for establishing better ethical practices for the profession. When examining ethics in engineering practice, it is useful to make the distinction between ethics in engineering and ethics of engineering. Ethics in engineering deals with the ethics of actions of individual engineers. Ethics of engineering deals with ethical issues that involve the role of engineers in industry, the ethics of the organizations in which they work and of professional engineering societies, and the ethical responsibilities of the profession. This paper presents case studies of two major structural disasters—the 1907 Quebec Bridge collapse and the 1981 Kansas City, Mo. Hyatt Regency walkway failure. The effect of each failure on engineering ethics is examined from the viewpoint of both ethics in engineering and of ethics of engineering. In response to failures, engineers need to change professional procedures and...

Ethics in Practice

Based upon a recent history of events, a close look is given to the meanings and the relationships between ethics, personal morality, codes of ethics and rules of professional conduct, and what is happening in the engineering profession. The behavior of some professional engineering societies versus their expectations of the behavior of their members is questioned as a possible double standard. It is suggested that codes of ethics have been, and can be, more than principles of behavior based on moral values that are good and right. It is demonstrated that it is the duty of every professional engineer to participate in the continuing development of enforced codes of ethics, and particularly rules of professional conduct adopted by their state boards of registration. This action is necessary to protect the public and themselves.

The evolution of the structure and application of U.S. NRC regulations and standards

NRC regulations and standards and their implementation have evolved from early adaptations of conventional engineering practices to a mature, cohesive set of regulations that govern NRC regulation of nuclear power plant safety in the United States. From a simple set of rules and design criteria and from the standards of the professional engineering societies, a hierarchy of practices, standards, guides, rules and goals has developed. Resting on a foundation of industrial practices, this hierarchy rises through levels of national standards, regulatory guides and standard review plans, policy statements and NRC regulations. The licensing process is evolving today toward one that permits both site approval and standard design certification before the plant is constructed. At the present time, NRC is reviewing five standard designs for certification for a period of 15 years. NRC focuses its regulation of operating nuclear plants on inspections conducted from five regional offices. Resident inspectors, specialist inspectors, and multi-disciplinary inspection teams examine specific plant situations. The results of all these inspections are used to develop a complete understanding of a plant's physical condition, its operation, maintenance and management. To improve safe operation of nuclear plants in the U.S., a most important program, the Systematic Assessment of Licensee Performance, measures operational performance, using a broad spectrum of functional areas.

The Need for a New View of the Profession

THE IEEE, representing the electronics engineering profession worldwide but primarily in the United States, has grown from infancy in the 1940's to the largest professional engineering society in the world. It is a loosely coupled federation of technical societies on the one hand and geographical entities on the other.

Practitioners in Classroom: Viable Tool in Civil Engineering Education

The impending shortage of civil engineering professionals and the deteriorating quality of our educational system pose critical problems for our nation. To alleviate the impact of these issues on our society, professional practitioners must become more directly involved in the education process. At the university level, practicing professionals make a valuable contribution when they address the day‐to‐day issues faced by professionals—business, management, human relations, marketing, communication, law, and ethics. These issues, more than technical engineering experience, prove to be the areas that beginning professionals are least equipped to manage. To address the longer‐term problem of a shortage of engineering professionals, practitioners must also intervene at elementary and secondary school levels to stimulate basic curiosity in math, science, and engineering. Through the students engaged in engineering (SEE) program of the American Consulting Engineers Council (ACEC), along with similar initiatives begun by the National Society of Professional Engineers (NSPE), the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, and the Associated General Contractors of America, practicing professionals can interact with public school students in a meaningful way.

Nazi “Coordination” of Technology: The Case of the Bavarian Polytechnical Society

Research Note NAZI “COORDINATION” OF TECHNOLOGY: THE CASE OF THE BAVARIAN POLYTECHNICAL SOCIETY DONALD E. THOMAS, JR. In recent years a number of studies have dealt with the fate of technology and the engineering profession under National Socialism. The most exhaustive of these works is Karl-Heinz Ludwig’s Technik und Ingenieure im Dritten Reich, which examines, among other things, the Nazi “coordination” {Gleichschaltung}' of professional engineering societies and the cooperation of engineers with both peacetime and wartime policies of the Third Reich.2 While Ludwig has studied the process of coordination on the national level, it may be of interest to test his results on the local level by looking at one of Germany’s Dr. Thomas is professor of history at the Virginia Military Institute arid author of Diesel: Technology and Society in Industrial Germany (University, Ala., 1987). He thanks Dr. Michael Davidis, now of the Landesmuseum fur Technik und Arbeit, Mannheim, for suggesting research on the coordination of the Polytechnical Society, and the staff of the Deutsches Museum, Munich, who aided his research, especially Frau Margret Nida-Rümelin of the Research Institute, Dr. Rudolf Heinrich of the Special Collections Department, and Frau Zdenka Hlava of the Public Relations Office. He is further indebted to the VM1 Research Committee for financial assistance, to Dr. Paul Wilson of Fairfield, Virginia, and to the Technology and Culture referees for their insightful comments. 'Gleichschaltung was the Nazi expression for the destruction of independent political, social, economic, or other institutions and their incorporation into Nazi-controlled front organizations. Interestingly enough, it was originally “an engineering term meaning ‘putting into the same gear’ ” (Cordon Craig, The Germans [New York, 1982], p. 326). Tarl-I Icinz Ludwig, Technik und Ingenieure im Dritten Reich (Düsseldorf, 1974). Ludwig has also discussed the history of the German Engineers’ Association (VDI) under the Nazis in two essays: “Der VDI als Gegenstand cler Parteipolitik 1933 bis 1945,” and “Vereinsarbeit im Dritten Reich 1933-1945,” in Karl-Heinz Ludwig and Wolfgang Kônig, eds., Technik, Ingenieure und Gesellschaft: Geschichte des Vereins Deutscher Ingenieure 1856-1981 (Düsseldorf, 1981), pp. 407-54. Two other works that deal in part with engineers and the Nazis are Gerd Hortleder’s book on the VDI, Das Gesellschaftsbild des Ingénieurs: Zum politischen Verhalten der Technischen Intelligent in Deutschland (Frankfurt am Main, 1970); and Jeffrey Herf's Reactionary Modernism: Technology, Culture, and Politics in Weimar and the Third Reich (Cambridge, 1984).© 1990 by the Society for the History of Technology. All rights reserved. 0040-165X/90/3102-0003$01.00 251 252 Donald E. Thomas, Jr. foremost regional technical organizations, the Bavarian Polytechnical Society (Polytechnischer Verein in Bayern). The Polytechnical Society was not strictly speaking a professional engineering organization, but many of its members were engineers, and a number of its objectives, such as furthering technological development and advising in patent matters, were similar to those of engineering groups. The fate of the Polytechnical Society is an instructive example of Nazi policy toward local technological organizations and the response of such organiza­ tions to dictatorial control. According to Ludwig, the attitude of professional engineering societies to the Nazi takeover in 1933 was one of accommodation. In return for being allowed to maintain their professional identities and independence, groups such as the German Engineers’ Association (Verein Deutscher Ingenieure, or VDI) were willing to vote Nazis onto their governing boards and to give verbal backing to Nazi ideas such as the “fiihrer” principle. The professional organizations were able to avoid further Nazi coordination in 1933—34, partly because the Nazis themselves had not developed a firm plan for such a takeover and also because the Nazi bureaucrats fought among them­ selves for control of the engineers. The Nazi economic theorist Gottfried Feder, who was himself a civil engineer, wished to include engineers in an anticapitalist technologi­ cal front. Feder’s ideas were too radical for a regime trying to win the confidence of industrialists and engineers for the upcoming rearma­ ment program. He was finally removed from his offices in late 1934. In late 1933, Robert Ley, head of the German Labor Front (Deutsche Arbeitsfront), also tried to assume control of German technological organizations. His...

Nazi "Coordination" of Technology: The Case of the Bavarian Polytechnical Society

In recent years a number of studies have dealt with the fate of technology and the engineering profession under National Socialism. The most exhaustive of these works is Karl-Heinz Ludwig's Technik und Ingenieure im Dritten Reich, which examines, among other things, the Nazi (Gleichschaltung)' of professional engineering societies and the cooperation of engineers with both peacetime and wartime policies of the Third Reich.2 While Ludwig has studied the process of coordination on the national level, it may be of interest to test his results on the local level by looking at one of Germany's

Dialogue on Political Contributions and Engineering

The National Society of Professional Engineers has initiated a dialogue on political contributions and their relationships to engineers' contracts with governmental agencies. Triggered by newspaper headlines and stories that link the two, the dialogue is a sensitive exercise. The profession is forced to question its constituent behavior, or the relevance of codes of ethics that prohibit these relationships. To a man, individuals deny participation in quid pro quo arrangements, but the existence of institutional quid pro quo systems of acceptability for contracts can hardly be disputed. From important quarters, the dialogue is punctuated by silence on a subject that deserves much greater general understanding. Because of the dialogue, NSPE contributes to understanding, and meets a test of self‐regulation. The profession of politics itself is addressing campaign spending and fund‐raising as a national issue of great concern. Greater participation by associated engineering societies is urged.

A History of the Institution of Electrical Engineers 1871–1971 by W. J. Reader

TECHNOLOGY AND CULTURE Book Reviews 479 to assess the role of invention in the business accomplishments of a major British machine-tool producer, as well as to discuss sources of capital and the contribution made by business partners and employees to the firm’s success. Nasmyth served as personal assistant to Henry Maudslay between 1829 and 1831, then returned to Edinburgh to make preparations for establishing himself as an independent engineer. By 1834 he had sufficient machine tools and capital to commence on his own; after a short period of indecision about whether to base himself in Liverpool or Manchester, he selected the latter. Manchester was the mecca for a number of engineering firms in the early 19th century. The growth in the demand for self-acting tools, added to the improved commu­ nications consequent on the opening of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, made the city a happy choice for the young and ambitious Nasmyth. One of Cantrell’s main contributions is his careful assessment of the many claims made by Nasmyth to enhance the hero image. For example, Nasmyth failed to mention the role of the Birley family as initial sleeping partners in the firm. In the fraught area of the inven­ tion of the steam hammer, Cantrell considers the role of the French firm of Le Creuzot and the contribution ofthe general works manager, Robert Wilson. Nasmyth’s highly uncharitable behavior in regard to Wilson resulted in public acrimony and doubt. But there is no doubt about the hammer’s contribution in the success of Nasmyth’s Bridgewater Foundry. “We are quite throng making them for all quarters. The demand is rising rapidly,” Nasmyth wrote in 1844. British gov­ ernment contracts represented 17 percent of sales by value between 1843 and 1856, and 148 hammers were exported, including ten to India and three to Australia. This is a most useful contribution to the history of engineering. In the light of Contrell’s researches, Nasmyth’s reputation as inventor must be qualified, but his achievement as entrepreneur has been clearly established. Jennifer Tann Dr. Tann is director of the Centre for Continuing Education at the University of Newcastle upon Tyne. A History of the Institution of Electrical Engineers 1871—1971. By W. J. Reader. London: Peter Peregrinus for the Institution of Electrical Engineers, 1987. Pp. x + 327; illustrations, tables, notes, appendixes, index. $30.00. In 1871, at a time when British economic power was near its pin­ nacle, British engineers in the telegraph industry created the Society of Telegraph Engineers to promote technical and social interaction 480 Book Reviews TECHNOLOGY AND CULTURE among themselves. The Society of Telegraph Engineers expanded in the 1880s to include the growing number of electrical engineers en­ gaged in electric power supply for lighting and industry, changing its name to the Institution of Electrical Engineers (IEE) in 1889. By 1921, when the IEE secured a royal charter, it had become the largest of Britain’s professional engineering societies, a position it still holds today. The story of the IEE was initially told by Rollo Appleyard in 1939. W. J. Reader’s work both retells and updates Appleyard’s account. Institutional histories can be dull, largely of interest only to mem­ bers. Reader’s history of the IEE, however, is not dull. There are at least two good reasons for this. First, he constantly places the history of the IEE into its social and professional context. Second, he does not attempt to hide or avoid controversies, something too prevalent in histories sponsored by engineering societies. For example, Reader ties the mundane matter of changing IEE member grades to the evolution of engineering training in Britain, in particular the long persistence of, and continuing sympathy for, apprenticeship training (p. 119). On an even broader level, he dem­ onstrates how prevailing national concerns such as declining British industrial strength, post—World War II planning, and trade union activism influenced the activities of the institution. He also discusses how internal IEE developments influenced the organization’s ability to interact with the outside world. Following the terms of the royal charter granted in 1921 that emphasized the lEE’s role as a noncom­ mercial, learned organization, the IEE...