Langeled Pipeline-Norway to Britain

The Langeled Pipeline project, spearheaded by Exxon Mobil, Stat Oil and Royal Dutch Shell, was undertaken to exploit one of the world’s largest reservoirs of natural gas in Norway’s Ormen Lange (in Norse mythology: “Giant Serpent”) field, located on the Norwegian Continental Shelf. The project included the construction of a new gas terminal at Nyhamna to process the gas coming from Ormen Lange. A consortium now exports natural gas from Nyhamna to Easington on the east coast of England through this state of the art marine pipeline.

The pipeline has a length of 1,166 km (745 miles) and delivers 26 billion cubic meters (900 billion cubic feet) of natural gas to the UK National Transmission System each year; the price tag came in at 1.7 billion pounds ($2.8 billion). At the time of completion it was longest sub-sea pipeline ever built.

Building the pipeline was an immense technological challenge. The North Sea bed is not a flat bottom but is a treacherous series of channels, trenches, and ridges and it has cyclical plate tectonic events, not to mention a number of existing pipelines. It plunges to depths of 5 km (3.2 miles) making water pressure a significant factor in design and construction. An autonomous underwater vehicle, Hugin, a product of Kongsberg Maritime, was employed to survey the sea bed, using advanced radar to determine the most cost effective route.

With an understanding of the features and hazards, design engineers went to work on plans to allow a 44 inch pipe, with 25mm (1 inch) thick walls, to negotiate the terrain while minimizing impact on fisheries and ecosystems.

Langeled pipeline simulated view

In order to lay the pipeline a remote-controlled underwater excavating vehicle called the Nexan Spider, capable of moving underwater mountains, prepared the seabed floor. Three million tonnes of rock was brought to areas of the sea floor to level the terrain where needed.

The pipeline was built using 100,000 pipe sections, each coated in asphalt to reduce corrosion and a stability coating of concrete. Two pipe laying ships, including Solitaire, the largest pipe laying ship in the world, laid 8 km (2.5 miles) of pipe a day. Once the pipe was laid, deep water hyperbaric welding teams welded the pipes together from inside a watertight enclosure called Pipeline Repair Habitat.

The project was completed in 2006 after three years of work and both Norway and the UK have benefited enormously from the project; the UK receives about 20% of its natural gas directly from the pipeline.

Automobiles and Aviation, Robots-Mechanical Engineering

Mechanical Engineering has been around for centuries and will be, for a long time to come, unless there is a miracle in science that allows humans to deny all laws of mechanics and still allow them to build stuff that can be used. As of now, the situation is unfathomable.

From basic objects like wheels to the ever useful screws and inclined planes, from cars to planes, from paperclips to ships, from bridges to skyscrapers, they all work under the foundations and principles laid out by the laws of mechanics.We have seen how machines have made our lives easier. Thanks to mechanical engineering, they have increased the efficiency of the machines that we use and also made it easier to make them. 

Automobiles and Aviation - Mechanical Engineering has helped in creating the fastest cars that are capable of traveling 400+ kph (248 mph) and in the making of the most comfortable vehicles on the planet that are used by millions. The huge aircraft that enable millions every day to reach from one corner of the globe to the other in a matter of hours all are the result of extensive improvement and implementation of mechanical engineering. The strength of the body and the way the automobiles and aircraft are built are results of extensive mechanical engineering and testing. Advancements in mechanical engineering are applied to automobiles to decrease their carbon footprint and make them more Eco-friendly and economical while simultaneously giving more efficiency. 

(Hennessey Venom GT)  

(Bugatti Veyron0)

Robots - Robots like ASIMO can walk, jog, climb stairs, greet people, and do a lot of other things. Robots like ASIMO are the future. For all those actions the robots need to work like humans and mechanical engineering helps in the functioning of the limbs and other body parts. The same principle of bio-mechanics is used in this area of science. Nano robots are also in the making that are said to be of immense use in the field of medicine, though many oppose the concept as they are also potential weapons of mass destruction and cannot be stopped easily

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Burj Khalifa-Dubai

Bringing Burj Khalifa to life required a combination of visionary ideals and solid science. In the process, the project amassed an awe-inspiring number of facts, figures, and statistics.

At 828 meters (2,716.5 feet) tall, Burj Khalifa is 3 times as tall as Eiffel Tower and twice as tall as the Empire State Building. Burj Khalifa holds the world Records on: tallest freestanding structure in the world, highest number of stories in the world, highest occupied floor in the world, highest outdoor observation deck in the world, elevator with longest travel distance in the world, and tallest service elevator in the world.It is said that the weight of concrete used to build the skyscraper is equivalent to 100,000 elephants and the steel used to construct the frame is equal to that of 5 Airbus 380 air crafts.

The building design takes after the Greek flower, Hymenocallis. The name is translated as Beautiful Membrane in Greek.The building was constructed by a South Korean Company called South Korean company, Samsung Engineering and Construction. Burj Khalifa was built at a cost of $1.5 billion, It is supplied with about 250,000 gallons of water daily, and its electricity needs can go up to 360,000 100-watt bulbs burning at once.During the peak of construction, at least 12,000 workers worked on the construction site per day.The tip of the sphere of Burj Khalifa can be seen from 95 kilometers away.The tower was to be called Burj Dubai but this was changed at the last minute to honor Sheik Khalifa bin Zayed al Nahyan, the ruler of Abu Dhabi for bailing out Dubai's bankrupt sovereign wealth fund with a $10 billion in 2009.Burj Khalifa has 54 elevators which have a speed of up to 40 miles per hour.

Here's a factoid that will blow your mind that you can see two sunsets in a day there. The Burj Khalifa is so tall that you can watch the sunset from the base of the building, get into an elevator right to the top, and watch the sunset all over again.In fact, if you are a Muslim living on top of the Burj Khalifa, you will have to fast longer during Ramadan because of this time difference: about three minutes between the time of the sunset on the ground and the sunset on the top.

Channel Tunnel-England to France

The Channel Tunnel is the longest undersea tunnel in the world. The section under the sea is 38km long. The three tunnels, each 50 kilometer long, were bored at an average 40 meter below the sea bed, and link Folkestone in Kent to Coquelles in Pas-de-Calais.

Eurotunnel shuttles, Eurostar and national freight trains run in the two single track and single direction tunnels. These are connected to a central service tunnel by cross-passages situated every 375m. The service tunnel allows access to maintenance and emergency rescue teams and serves as a safe haven if passengers need to be evacuated in an incident. The service tunnel is a road tunnel used by electric and diesel-powered vehicles. Air pressure is higher in the service tunnel to prevent the ingress of smoke in case of a fire in one of the rail tunnels.

The two rail tunnels are 7.6m in diameter and 30m apart. Each rail tunnel has a single track, overhead line equipment (catenary) and two walkways (one for maintenance purposes and the other for use in the event of an emergency evacuation and on the side nearest the service tunnel). The walkways are also designed to maintain a shuttle upright and in a straight line of travel in the unlikely event of a derailment.

The service tunnel is 4.8m in diameter and lies between the two rail tunnels 15m away from each of them. In normal operations shuttles use the south tunnel in the France – UK direction, and the north tunnel when travelling from the UK to France.Two undersea crossovers bring flexibility of operation as trains can pass from one tunnel to the other during night maintenance periods to isolate a section of tunnel.

The track in each rail tunnel has two continuously welded rails laid on pre-cast concrete supports embedded in the concrete track bed.
Fixed equipment in the tunnels comes under four categories: electricity and catenary, rail track and signaling, mechanical systems and control and communications.Cooling pipes, fire mains, signalling equipment and cables are fixed to the sides of the tunnels and are fed by cooling plants at Samphire Hoe in the UK and Sangatte in France.The overhead catenary supplies traction power to the shuttles as well as to other trains using the Tunnel, e.g. Eurostar and international rail freight trains. The catenary is divided into sections, so that maintenance work can be carried out in stages. Electrical power supplying the tunnels, drainage pumps, lighting and the trains, is provided by substations on each side of the Channel. In the event of loss of power from one side, the entire system can be supplied from the other side.The fixed lighting installations can be switched on from the control centre or manually from within the tunnels. Various fire-protection and detection systems are installed at points along the length of the tunnels.

For more info watch this video

Beijing National Stadium,The Bird's Nest-China

China's National Stadium known as the Bird's Nest is the world's largest steel structure and the most complex stadium ever constructed. It is one of the key engineering marvels in the world today.

The Bird’s Nest was designed by Swiss Architects, Herzog & de Meuron, and a Chinese Architect, Li Xinggang. The requirements for its design were that it had to be inspiring and be able to withstand an earthquake.In order to make the structure light weight but earthquake-proof, the strength in 110 000 tons of a new grade of steel, the purest ever developed in China, including 36 kilometer of steel struts, was combined with an inventive design.

It is saddle-shaped, but the interlocking steel parts resembling a lattice of twigs, make the name Bird's Nest an obvious alias.
The design came from the idea of a single thread wrapped round a ball. Layers of logical geometry give the appearance of randomness and an organic shape. Multiple pentagrams in the interlocking fabric of the elliptical structure are like the stars of the Chinese flag. An international steel shortage meant that the idea for a retractable roof was scrapped, saving 50 million US Dollars. The structure is covered with a polymer membrane, rain-proof but translucent, allowing sunlight for the grass.
Construction of the National Stadium started on 24 December 2003 and was completed in March, 2008. The total cost was more than 423 million dollars, a tiny fraction of the 40 billion US Dollars spent on Beijing in preparation for the Olympics. It is 333 meters long from north to south, 294 meters wide from east to west, and the highest point is 68.5 meters.

Because of Beijing's location, the stadium had to be able to withstand an earthquake. The purest steel ever developed in China allowed the designers to combine light weight with strength to provide maximum resistance to seismic forces. Welders had to be specially trained to join the interlocking steel sections together due to the low sensitivity to welding of the new type of metal. The 11200 ton roof was supported by temporary columns until the moment of truth when the jacks were released and the web of the Bird's Nest held its own weight.
The Bird's Nest was the main venue of the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, when it had a capacity of 91,000 spectators. The stadium now has a capacity of 80,000, after temporary seating was removed.

Millau Viaduct-France

Bridges are often considered to belong to the realm of the engineer rather than that of the architect. But the architecture of infrastructure has a powerful impact on the environment and the Millau Viaduct, designed in close collaboration with structural engineers, illustrates how the architect can play an integral role in the design of bridges. It located in southern France, the bridge completes a hitherto missing link in the A75 AutoRoute from Clermont-Ferrand to Beziers across the Massif Central. The bridge crosses the River Tarn, which runs through a spectacular gorge between two high plateau. Interestingly, alternative readings of the topography suggested two possible structural approaches: to celebrate the act of crossing the river; or to articulate the challenge of spanning the 2.46 kilometers from one plateau to the other in the most economical and elegant manner. Although historically the river was the geological generator of the landscape, it is very narrow at this point, and so it was the second reading that suggested the most appropriate structural solution. 

A cable-stayed, masted structure, the bridge is delicate, transparent, and has the optimum span between columns. Its construction broke several records: it has the highest pylons in the world, the highest road bridge deck in Europe, and it superseded the Eiffel Tower as the tallest structure in France. 

Each of its sections spans 342 meters and its piers range in height from 75 meters to 245 meters, with the masts rising a further 87 meters above the road deck. To accommodate the expansion and contraction of the concrete deck, each column splits into two thinner, more flexible columns below the roadway, forming an A-frame above deck level. The tapered form of the columns both expresses their structural loads and minimizes their profile in elevation.

Client:
French Ministry of Equipment, Transport, Housing, Tourism and Sea
Collaborating Architect:
Chaplet-Defol-Mousseigne
Structural Engineer:
EEG (Europe Etudes Gecti), Sogelerg, SERF
Landscape Architect:
Agence TER

Akashi Kaikyō Bridge-Japan

From the first day of the human history, it seems that he is of nature to make more and more special kind of stuff. Astonishing construction became a permanent part of human nature. Technology progress creates some new amazing wonders rather than some old wonders of the world. Mega structures are now a days commonly seen almost everywhere in the world. Because of the advancement of technology and the improvement of machinery, tall sky scrapers and many other infrastructures are already made possible. Engineering wonders, such as bridges, tunnels or railways that connect cities and even countries, a spacecraft that sends man to the moon or a skyscraper built to withstand an earthquake, all have one thing in common. They are made to solve a problem and to make life easier for humankind. 

Also known as the Pearl Bridge, is a stunning sample of the modern civil engineering. Located in Japan, this bridge is the world’s largest cable bridge and there are no pillars for the supports. It has the longest central span of any suspension bridge in the world, at 1,991 meters (6,532 ft.). It was completed in 1998. The bridge links the city of Kobe on the mainland of Honshu to Iwaya on Awaji Island by crossing the busy Akashi Strait. It carries part of the Honshu-Shikoku Highway.

The Akashi Kaikyo Suspension Bridge is the longest suspension bridge in the world and it is  probably Japan’s greatest engineering feat.  It took two million workers ten years to construct the bridge, 181,000 tonnes of steel and  1.4million cubic metres of concrete. The steel cable used would circle the world seven times. It has six lanes and links the island of Awaji and the mainland city of Kobe, a distance of four  miles. The concept of building a bridge across the Akashi Straits became urgent after a disaster in  1955. A ferry carrying over one hundred children sank after colliding with another ferry, in the  busy shipping lane. One hundred and sixty eight children and adults died in the disaster. Political  pressure for a bridge increased and in 1988 construction began.

The Akashi Straits is four miles wide at the bridge site with sea depths of one hundred metres and currents averaging fourteen kmph. The Akashi Straits is one of the busiest sea lanes in the world with over a thousand ships per day travelling through it. Furthermore, the bridge is in a typhoon region in which winds can reach speeds of 290 kmph.