The First Facility Management Blog

For many, a series of natural disasters all over the world illustrate the need for mankind to co-exist with nature. The onslaught of powerful hurricanes, tsunamis, earthquakes, tornados, and floods has shaken some people’s beliefs in man’s current environmental policies. These events and disasters have reminded them that we need to plan our world, keeping the environment in mind.

“The growth of large population centers, the industrialization of much of our agriculture, and our fascination with short-term economic return have put any long-term interest in the environment on the back burner,” says John M. Tettemer, civil engineer, environmentalist, and author of Creating the National Environmental Master Plan – 2006 (Juniper Springs Press, 2005). “The result is that we have no clear vision and no real plan”

In order to address this lack of focus, Tettemer advocates the implementation of a common-sense comprehensive master plan—one that respects man’s desires and nature’s requirements. “It is time to replace regulation with cooperation by implementing a clear vision of how man and nature will co-exist,” Tettemer says. “We need to bring together those currently involved in all levels of environmental regulation and use their expertise to develop the National Environmental Master Plan. It’s time to centralize the currently scattered responsibility for environmental management into the hands of Secretaries of the Environment at the local, state, and federal levels.”

Tettemer cites examples of successful regional environmental planning at the local level that can be used as guides for assembling the National Environmental Master Plan. He advocates a return to the development of locally prepared regional environmental plans. “We need to centralize authority over the problem and reassign environmental protection to local government under State and Federal Supervision,” Tettemer says.

He feels our current environmental protection strategy is out of date, since it is based on the regulation of possible near-future impacts without a comprehensive view of what a sustainable long-term relationship between man and nature looks like. Tettemer implores us think of the environment in a different manner than we are normally accustomed to. “It is time to honor the environment we rely on by planning our relationship with it the same way we do roads, sewers, rivers, the internet, and social programs,” he says. “We should acknowledge that our long-term relationship with Nature has not been given a place in our urban planning, and get to work on rectifying this oversight.”

Tettemer feels If we want to make the sweeping changes necessary, we have to start with our politicians. “The first step is to encourage one or many elected public officials across the country to step forward and declare themselves in favor of a locally developed, nationally administered Environmental Master Plan,” says Tettemer. “We must remember that few will welcome the change, but that change must come. We will upset the delicate status quo, but only for a short while, then reestablish balance as the regional objectives for the environment are adopted into the plan.”

He suggests that a new National Environmental Master Plan can serve as a shining example and an enduring legacy for generations to come. “By comprehensively planning our interrelationship with nature, we can set an example to the whole world,” Tettemer says. “We need to keep in mind that we will be leaving to our children what we create. That must include attention to nature, as she will demand it in one way or another.”

BuyerZone.com has released a new planning and purchasing resource for facilities managers – BuyerZone.com’s Office Moving Essentials guidebook. This guide includes great reminders for planning and executing an office move, in addition to comprehensive buyers’ guides that offer expert advice for finding the best vendors and prices for the most common office products and services.

Office Moving Essentials provides businesses with relocation planning advice compiled from interviews with dozens of relocating businesses, moving companies, and business relocation consultants. Features include pre-move checklists, planning timelines, advice on how to select the right moving service, and buyer’s guides for the most common purchases that businesses need to make at the time of a move.

The guide is a valuable resource for any business owner, office manager, or facilities manager involved in opening a new office or relocating an existing business to new space. The Office Moving Essentials guidebook (50+ pages) is available in both print and PDF format. And for a limited time, BuyerZone is offering free print copies (a $9.95 value). Individuals are encouraged to visit www.officemovingzone.com/essentials to request their free book.

SawStop Saws are equipped with a safety system that detects when someone accidentally contacts the spinning saw blade, and then stops the blade in milliseconds. In most cases, such an accident would result in just a nick on a SawStop saw, instead of the devastating injury which would likely occur on an ordinary saw. The video below shows what happens on a SawStop saw when a hotdog (representing a finger) hits the spinning blade at a speed of about 1 foot per second.

The SawStop safety system includes an electronic system that detects when a person contacts the blade. The system induces an electrical signal onto the blade and then monitors that signal for changes. The human body has a relatively large inherent electrical capacitance and conductivity which cause the signal to drop when a person contacts the blade. Wood has a relatively small inherent capacitance and conductivity and does not cause the signal to drop.

Visit the company’s Web site for more information, or check out this report from NPR’s Morning Edition.

This Web Exclusive comes from Metal-Era, Inc.

The roof is widely recognized as one of the most vulnerable parts of a building. Of the various components of a roof, the roof edge is the most critical because of the way in which wind acts on a building.

Commonly the roof edge receives little attention. It is considered simply an add-on accessory; however, careful selection of an appropriately tested edge is necessary to guard against the effects of potential wind damage. In addition to longevity issues, a tested edge is required by building code in many states and municipalities. This guide will walk you through the often confusing landscape of testing standards, code requirements and key issues related to choosing the appropriately performance tested roof edge for each project.

The Sheet Metal & Air Conditioning Contractors Association (SMACNA) has long been involved in providing guidance on metal gauges, cleat gauge and fastener placement through its recommended details. It is important to note that they provide no performance numbers to match jobsite requirements. The details are not tested to any performance standards and are a prescriptive standard,not a performance standard.

The National Roofing Contractors Association (NRCA) has also long been instrumental in providing guidance to roofing contractors and other design professionals. The NRCA supplies details for edge metal terminations, but is not and has no plans to become a roof edge manufacturer.

The NRCA has created a sub-listing process that is offered to NRCA members, but only limited details and select gauges have been approved. As of January 2006, only one contractor has been sub-listed for ANSI/SPRI ES-1. In order for the ES-1 requirement to be met, a sheet metal fabricator (contractor) must be individually approved and listed by the NRCA and Intertek Testing Services (ITS).

An explanation of the NRCA’s program for listing sheet metal fabricators is found in Mark Graham’s response to “Reader Clarifies FM Approval Information.” The article explains the sub-listing process as follows:
1. Payment of fees to NRCA and FM and/or ITS and execution of sublisting agreements
2. Payment of initial setup fee to NRCA and execution of a sublisting agreement
3. NRCA authorizes FM and/or ITS to begin their sublisting processes,which generally requires:
• Payment of fees
• Factory audit manual reports
• Inspections of the sheet-metal fabricator’s shop
• Execution of sublisting agreements
• Use of FM and/or ITS labels on all listed
edge metal flashings
• Periodic follow-up inspections to ensure continued compliance
For a contractor to meet the FM guidelines and now the ES-1 requirement,they must achieve two things:
• Use an approved detail
• Be an approved contractor
Both items must be in place for a metal edge to meet the code.

Factory Mutual (FM) is formed of a conglomeration of insurance companies.In order to limit their exposure to loss, FM has developed testing standards for materials used on the properties they insure.

This standard became popular to use even on buildings that were not FMinsured, simply because the roofing industry had no standard of its own. Meeting the FM Loss Prevention data Bulletin 1-49 does not make the edge ANSI/SPRI ES-1 tested. FM testing should not be confused with ANSI/SPRIES-1 testing; they are two separate and unique testing methods. Specifiers should carefully list which testing requirement(s) are needed for each building project. Likewise, roofers should fully understand the different testing methodologies in order to supply the appropriate product for each project.

The American National Standard Institute (ANSI) is a non-profit organization that does third party endorsements of performance testing processes and procedures. The Single-Ply Roofing Industry (SPRI) is comprised of manufacturers and professionals in the single-ply roofing industry.

The standard was canvased throughout the industry to develop consensus and followed the below steps on its way to becoming an international code:
1. Developed by SPRI
2. Approved by ANSI
3. Approved by ICC
4. Added to the 2003 IBC

The 2003 version of the International Building Code (IBC) includes the requirement that roof edges be ANSI/SPRIES-1 tested:
2003 IBC § 1504.5: “Edge securement for low-slope roofs. Low-slope membrane roof systems metal edge securement, except gutters, installed in accordance with Section 1507, shall be designed in accordance with ANSI/SPRIES-1, except the basic wind speed shall be determined from Figure 1609.”

Over half the country has adopted the 2003 IBC statewide and countless municipalities have done likewise.The trend is clear, and ES-1 testing is something that all roofing and design professionals will need to become familiar with.

The ES-1 document is called “ANSI/SPRI ES-1 Wind Design Standard for Edge Systems Used with Low Slope Roofing Systems,”and it can be downloaded for free on SPRI’s Web site.

The ANSI/SPRIES-1 standard is comprised of three pull-off tests: two tests for fascia and one test for coping.

The tests use a pull-release, pull-release method rather than a continuous pull. This allows for a realistic simulation of wind,which acts on a building in periodic gusts rather than one long, continuous gust. It is also important to understand that the corner of a building receives the most wind uplift stress, and that stress will suddenly increase and decrease with wind gust strength. The RE tests measure the following:
1. Ability of edge treatment to resist the pull of the roof material inwardly
2. Resistance of the edge to outward & upward forces which tend to blow or “peel”edge systems off

Roof Edge Test RE-1
• A static test with a 100 lb. load every foot
• The membrane is pulled at a 45˚ angle to the roof deck to simulate a billowing membrane
• The termination must withstand a minimum force of 100 lbs./foot

Roof Edge Test RE-2
• Determines the maximum load at failure
• Failure is the loss of securement of any component of the roof edge system

Roof Edge Test RE-3
• Simultaneously tests the vertical and horizontal wind gust load coefficient
• Failure is loss of securement of any component of the roof edge system

The equation for calculating the design pressure is found in “ANSI/SPRI ES-1 Wind Design Standard for Edge Systems Used with Low Slope Roofing Systems.” This calculation involves five key elements.

1. Building Height
The building height should be the height at which the roof edge is to be installed.If there are multiple roof levels, each level is considered a different building height.
2. Wind Speed
Use the ANSI/ASCE 7-02 document,“Minimum Design Loads for Buildings and Other Structures.” This document provides wind maps of the United States and its territories,which are to be used to determine the wind speed for a particular region.
3. Building Location (exposure level)
• Exposure A: Now classified as Exposure B
• Exposure B: Urban & suburban areas, single family dwellings
• Exposure C: Open terrain with scattered obstructions
• Exposure D: Flat, unobstructed areas; open water for one mile or greater
4. Building Occupancy Factor (importance factor)
• Category I: Buildings & other structures that represent a low hazard to human life in the event of failure (i.e.agricultural facilities, certain temporary facilities and minor storage facilities)
• Category II: All buildings & other structures except those listed in Categories I, III & IV
• Category III: Buildings & other structures that represent a substantial hazard to human life in the event of failure (i.e.buildings where more than 300 people congregate, elementary, secondary schools & daycare facilities with a capacity greater than 250 people, health care facilities with a capacity of 50 or more resident patients, but not having surgery or emergency treatment facilities and jails or detention facilities)
• Category IV: Buildings & other structures designed as essential facilities (i.e.hospitals & other health care facilities having surgery or emergency treatment facilities, fire, rescue & police stations & emergency vehicle garages and communication centers & other facilities required for emergency response)
5. Special Terrain Characteristics
Obstructions or special terrain characteristics such as hills, escarpments, etc. will influence the wind patterns on your building.

No area of the country is exempt from wind related roofing damage, and one of the leading causes of commercial roofing damage has proven to be improperly designed and installed edge details. Conservative estimates show that 75% of all wind-related roofing failures are attributed to insufficient or poorly installed perimeter metals.

It is important to check your local code requirements because additional states, counties and municipalities are in the process of adopting the 2003 IBC. Understandably, it can be difficult and sometimes confusing to keep track of each locality’s requirements, so in order to avoid the risk of not meeting the code, specify ES-1 tested roof edges.

In order to help design professionals choose a product that has been tested to meet the specific design requirements of each project, Metal-Era has developed a Wind Design Calculator. The calculator allows users to enter basic project data to receive the design pressure needed and a list of appropriate Metal-Era products. The testing provides customers with the piece of mind that they are not liable for a building code violation.

OSRAM SYLVANIA has introduced an online calculator tool to help applicants pursuing the U.S. Green Building Council’s (USGBC) LEED–EB certification determine the mercury content in their lighting. One of the major initiatives of the USGBC is its Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED®) program, which was created to establish a common standard of measurement for “green buildings,” promoting integrated, whole-building design practices.

LEED for Existing Buildings, or LEED-EB, is specifically tailored for retrofit and upgrade projects. LEED-EB addresses system upgrades to reduce the environmental impact of a building over its functional life cycle. Using a whole-building approach that includes both interior and exterior lamps, LEED-EB has a prerequisite that all mercury-containing lamps must achieve a total maximum mercury level of 100 picograms per lumen hour, calculated on a weighted average based on lumen output, lamp life, and mercury content.

To help customers meet the Materials and Resources/MR Prerequisite #2 “Toxic Material Source Reduction — Reduced Mercury in Light Bulbs” standard of the LEED-EB rating system, OSRAM SYLVANIA developed a simple LEED-EB calculator to run the calculation and help customers choose their lighting upgrades to comply with this requirement.

“This tool will not only save our customers time on their LEED-EB application, but it will also help them make lighting choices that achieve their green building strategies, for both energy efficiency and mercury content,” Jennifer Dolin, environmental marketing manager for OSRAM SYLVANIA’s General Lighting division, said.

The calculator tool allows users to select lamps from a drop-down menu or research SYLVANIA lamp types and NAED codes. Once the user inputs the quantity of each type of lamp used in the project, the spreadsheet runs the calculation.

Turner Construction Company today announced the formation of Quality Planning Solutions, LLC. This new subsidiary will become one of the nation’s largest critical path method (CPM) scheduling groups.

Designed to meet the increasing demands placed on construction professionals to deliver complex projects in a timely manner, this Turner subsidiary will provide professional scheduling services to meet contract requirements and deliver dynamic, powerful management solutions.

“QPS offers the advanced schedule development, change management expertise, schedule recovery planning and change recovery analysis that is required on many of today’s complex projects at very cost effective rates,” said William M. Brennan, executive vice president of Turner Construction Company.

Quality Planning Solutions will offer a full range of scheduling services to supplement jobsite information, resulting in a more efficient process and a higher quality schedule for owners, developers and general contractors. QPS will troubleshoot high-risk projects, prepare recovery schedules, provide claims evaluations and conduct training programs across the country.

David W. Ambrose has been appointed to serve as president of Quality Planning Solutions to oversee the national group and provide his expertise on program-level scheduling issues. Quality Planning Solutions will be headquartered in Reston, VA.

With the list of tasks facility managers tackle each day, most are accustomed to the feeling of dealing with “moving targets.” But, imagine if your building itself was the moving target. That’s what the facilities staff at the Dinosaur National Monument in Vernal, UT are dealing with each and every day.

Run by the National Park Service, the Quarry Visitor Center there is facing substantial structural issues. The building, which houses a rock wall containing 1,500 fossil bones, a paleontology lab, exhibits, and a bookstore, is shifting on a daily basis. Facets of the building’s construction are contributing to the problems, including its partial positioning on a sandstone ridge and the nature of the soil. Unfortunately, any real solution to these issues are not in the foreseeable future, since funding is subject to approval from the U.S. Congress.

Paul Foy of the Associated Press wrote:

With no money yet to replace it, the National Park Service can only watch as a visitor center that was built over a dinosaur bone quarry slowly splits apart, making do with patchwork repairs as the building slowly crumbles.

It’s been a problem at the center at Dinosaur National Monument since it was built in 1957, but officials say the pace of the disintegration is picking up. Gummy, clay soil under the building swells when wet and the concrete basement floor has warped into something like ocean rollers. When the bentonite clay soil dries, it crackles like popcorn and shifts parts of the building again.

“It’s like a fun house,” said Dan Chure, chief paleontologist at the monument. “There’s some everyday work that needs to be done to make sure the doors close.”

The Quarry Visitor Center, about 2w0 miles east of Vernal, is considered safe — for now. Officials keep it open with stopgap repairs, and keep track of a spider web of cracks on exterior walls.

Plans to fix or rebuild the building are on a wish list subject to congressional approval. The National Park Service wanted to start work in 2008, but last summer’s Gulf Coast hurricanes and the war in Iraq forced a reallocation of federal spending that delayed the work at least until 2010, said Becky Nebs, who supervises building projects for the Park Service’s Intermountain Region.

An extensive rehabilitation is estimated to cost $6.9 million and would anchor the center to bedrock with 80-foot-deep foundation pillars. It would cost more to tear the building down and replace it, a subject of debate inside the Park Service because that would strip the building’s designation as a National Historic Landmark.

The center, shoehorned between a pair of sandstone ridges near the Green River, is the only place at the monument to see dinosaur fossils and gets about 300,000 visitors a year — a figure that briefly shot up to a half-million after the movie “Jurassic Park” was released in 1993.

It was built partly over a sandstone ridge where in 1909 Carnegie Museum paleontologist Earl Douglass spotted eight fossilized Brontosaurus tail bones.

Douglass spent 15 years excavating what turned out to be a bounty of bones from an area barely the size of a basketball court. In the 1930s, a WPA crew split open the ridge to reveal more dinosaur fossils and the National Park Service reopened the quarry in 1953 for careful excavation. Today more than 2,000 bones are still embedded in a tilting slab of sandstone inside the visitor center’s atrium.

Read the rest of the story here…

Finally, an online reality series for the cube dweller.

Life in middle management has its benefits. Working in a cubicle is not one of them. Flimsy walls, harsh lights and cheap furniture conspire to create a Post-It Note nightmare.

In the online reality show Cube Fabulous Jeff and Megan, the Cube Fabricators, surprise an unsuspecting cube dweller by remodeling his veal pen into a penthouse.

Each episode will feature a different design theme to downsize office monotony: beach party, Vegas casino, 60’s swank and more. For more on this concept, see the FacilityBlog “Friday Funny” from April 7, 2006. You should also read the lead story for this month’s issue of Today’s Facility Manager.

Skilling and Lay convicted in Enron case. See the full report on CNN.com.

If you can imagine it, here’s an amusing sidebar to the story…
In the wake of Ken Lay receiving over 100 years of prison time, the world wonders how an “Enron” could have ever happened. Addressing this question is former Arthur Anderson CPA Chris Sernel who got fed up with auditing companies like Enron and quit to become a rock star!

Said Sernel, “It’s no surprise that something like Enron could happen when 75% of all audit work of big firms is done by 24 and 25-year-olds who are just a few years out of college. While at Arthur Anderson, I’d be sitting across the desk from CEOs of a multi-billion dollar companies. It was an intimidating experience having to ask them tough questions, like hey, this doesn’t look right.

“I’m actually amazed that there are not more corporate scandals against CEOs of big companies since we’re relying a lot on what the likes of the Ken Lays and Jeff Skillings of the business world represent as true.”

Sernel is referring to the standard operating procedure in the world of accounting that only requires an auditing firm to obtain a management representation letter signed by a CEO stating that they and their employees were truthful in all their communications with their auditors and that they provided full disclosure of any and all documents necessary to complete the audit.

“Your audit is only as good as the information you receive. It’s like garbage in, garbage out in a computer. You can’t find an error on documents that were selectively never provided.”

Sernel added, “Between the scandals and tons of new rules, it was frustrating. While at Anderson, I just got sick and tired of working 100 hour weeks finding potential errors and issues, only to see that the client ultimately was given an auditor’s ‘clean opinion’ by Anderson managers. This was due in large part to the pressure of knowing that the client is paying the auditor’s bills. In Rock and Roll, our fans pay our bills. The pressures are the same to give people their money’s worth but rising up to meet the pressures in the world of Rock and Roll are more in intellectually honest and rewarding.”

With the new attitude of, “when the going gets tough, the tough pick up a guitar and go on tour”, CPA Chris Sernel left the Arthur Andersen accounting firm to become a fulltime Rock Star, touring with multi-platinum acts like Switchfoot, Ryan Cabrera, Hanson, Taproot and others.

Sernel and his band, “Escape From Earth”, (which has also been nicknamed “Escape from Enron” and “Escape from Anderson”), were featured in a Coca-Cola/MTV commercial.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

In other Enron news…

Fast Company has dusted off an interview (circa 2001) with Jeff Skilling that never ran in the magazine. Chuck Salter (the author) writes, “The interview didn’t make the cut - it was heavy on platitudes and self-promotion - but the transcript reads better now than it did then, especially in light of [the recent] convictions.”

You can read the post here.

Images courtesy of Associated Press.

At approximately 8 a.m., a major power outage hit the train system that links New York City and Washington, DC. In addition to the thousands of commuters from New Jersey who depend on NJ Transit, Amtrak travelers and commuters from the Queens borough of New York were also stranded en route. SEPTA lines in Philadelphia and MARC lines in Maryland were also hit by the outtage.

This report comes from Wayne Parry of the Associated Press,

Five trains are stuck inside tunnels, and many passengers have been forced to get out and walk to the nearest station. Three NJ Transit trains and one Amtrak train were stuck in a tunnel under the Hudson River heading into New York. A fifth train was stuck in a rail tunnel in Baltimore.

Commuter trains are back in operation, but nothing can get moving until the stuck trains are out of the way. Amtrak is investigating the source of the outtage and is working to restore operations along the busy Northeast Corridor.

Happy travels, everyone. (Just be glad it’s not a terrorist attack.)

Photo courtesy of the Associated Press.