Teams of lighting designers and electricians spent the last six months crawling across the granite ledges and steel suspension chains of London’s landmark Tower Bridge, stringing some 6,500 feet of energy-efficient LED linear lights, 18,000 LEDs, and 1,000 junction boxes with 16,500 feet of cable. There is one thing left to do.
This evening, London Mayor Boris Johnson will turn on the lights to celebrate the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee. The bridge will gleam in “diamond” white throughout the weekend for the royal celebration, but the light show’s just beginning. Next up: During the 45 days of the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games held in the British capital this summer, the bridge will sport giant Olympic rings and Paralympic agitos symbols.
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[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/DiamondBridge1.jpg"]
Bright Lights, Big City: The new LED lighting for London's Tower Bridge will be 40 percent more energy efficient than the legacy system it replaced.
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[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/DiamondBridge2.jpg"]
Bright Lights, Big City: The new LED lighting for London's Tower Bridge will be 40 percent more energy efficient than the legacy system it replaced.
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[/image]
[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/DiamondBridge3.jpg"]
Bright Lights, Big City: The new LED lighting for London's Tower Bridge will be 40 percent more energy efficient than the legacy system it replaced.
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[/image]
[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/DiamondBridge4.jpg"]
Bright Lights, Big City: The new LED lighting for London's Tower Bridge will be 40 percent more energy efficient than the legacy system it replaced.
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[/image]
[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/DiamondBridge5.jpg"]
Bright Lights, Big City: The new LED lighting for London's Tower Bridge will be 40 percent more energy efficient than the legacy system it replaced.
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[/image]
[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/DiamondBridge6.jpg"]
Bright Lights, Big City: The new LED lighting for London's Tower Bridge will be 40 percent more energy efficient than the legacy system it replaced.
[/image]
[/image]
[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/DiamondBridge7.jpg"]
Bright Lights, Big City: The new LED lighting for London's Tower Bridge will be 40 percent more energy efficient than the legacy system it replaced.
[/image]
[/image]
[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/DiamondBridge8.jpg"]
Bright Lights, Big City: The new LED lighting for London's Tower Bridge will be 40 percent more energy efficient than the legacy system it replaced.
[/image]
[/image]
[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/DiamondBridge9.jpg"]
Bright Lights, Big City: The new LED lighting for London's Tower Bridge will be 40 percent more energy efficient than the legacy system it replaced.
[/image]
[/image]
[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/DiamondBridge10.jpg"]
Bright Lights, Big City: The new LED lighting for London's Tower Bridge will be 40 percent more energy efficient than the legacy system it replaced.
[/image]
[/image]
[/slides]
The new lighting system, which is using GE architectural LED systems, will remain in place for the next 25 years. It replaces a quarter of a century old legacy system and will cut the landmark’s energy consumptions by 40 percent. The French firm Citelum, whose lighting designs illuminated the Eiffel Tower and the Notre Dame cathedral in Paris, and the Valley of the Kings in Egypt, built the lighting set up.
The GE LED technology lets Citelum blend many shades of colors of variable intensity. The lights can be “heat formed” to fit a variety of architectural needs and enhance the Victorian gothic turrets, stone towers, and walkways that make this the 117-year old bridge one of the world’s most recognizable sights.
GE, a sponsor of the 2012 London Olympics, partnered with EDF Energy on the project. GE's support for the games runs from uninterruptable power generators for the main Olympic stadium to advanced medical diagnostic equipment. GE will also provide a large number charging stations for a fleet of Olympic electric vehicles.
Wednesday, May 30, 2012
Tuesday, May 22, 2012
Facebook for the Body: Your Organs May Soon Report Their Status Over New Generation of Wireless Medical Sensors
Mike Harsh, chief technology officer for GE Healthcare, tells the story of a doctor who had trouble placing a stethoscope to the chest of a cardiac patient and listen his heart because of a tangle of cables coming from monitoring devices attached to his torso. “You sort of understand what the problem is,” Harsh says. “People wear so many wires. It just tethers them right to their beds.”
But Harsh is trying to cut those wires the way of the telephone receiver cord. GE's vision is to develop a new generation of wireless sensors that attach to the body like a Band Aid. They would draw power from a tiny integrated battery and use radio waves to communicate with a receiver either in the patient’s pocket or in his hospital room. Outside the hospital, the information aggregated locally from the sensors could be relayed into a cellular network and automatically provide doctors and hospitals with round-the-clock patient monitoring and an uninterrupted flow of data.
“It’s just like those hands-free Bluetooth head-sets, except we now transmit physiological signals rather than voice,” Harsh says. “That’s what makes this so interesting.”
[slides image_align="left"]
[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/MBAN1.jpg"]
Body Language: Wireless Medical Body Area Networks (MBANs) aim to eliminate tangles of cables transmitting data from monitoring devices placed on the patient’s body.
[/image]
[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/MBAN2.jpg"]
Body Language: Wireless Medical Body Area Networks (MBANs) aim to eliminate tangles of cables transmitting data from monitoring devices placed on the patient’s body.
[/image]
[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/MBAN3.jpg"]
Body Language: Wireless Medical Body Area Networks (MBANs) aim to eliminate tangles of cables transmitting data from monitoring devices placed on the patient’s body.
[/image]
[/slides]
This week, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), which regulates the use of U.S. radio spectrum, will rule on freeing up two radio bands for the devices. “You’ve heard people talk about the Internet of Things,” said FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski. “You’ve heard about machine-to-machine connected devices. Well, here’s an example of these concepts coming to life. This is a big deal and we’re just at the beginning.”
Scientists at GE Global Research and at GE Healthcare’s Life Care Solutions unit started developing wireless sensors for so-called Medical Body Area Networks (MBANs) several years ago. Harsh says the two proposed MBAN frequency bands are “sitting right next to” radio spectra used by Bluetooth and ZigBee technology. “The available silicon chipsets today can be pulled just a little bit” to cover the MBAN bands, Harsh says. “That opens up the consumer electronics space and the manufacturers of all the silicon would help us enter the space to really drive the costs down.”
As costs fall and always-on wearable medical monitors spread from hospitals to patient’s homes, their impact could be colossal. “This will allow us to look at a large amount of data and start to do analytics, not just on ECG, but we can pull in respiration, or pulse oximetry,” says Harsh.
GE’s analytical software then can start sifting the diverse data from many patients and look for patterns. “You look for the signature of something that might happen based on the data that is coming in,” Harsh says. “That’s really what we’re talking about. When you look at cost, access, and quality, it hits all three right in the sweet spot.”
Disclaimer: This is a technology in development that represents ongoing research and development efforts. These technologies are not products and may never become products. They are not for sale, and have not been cleared or approved by the FDA for commercial availability.
But Harsh is trying to cut those wires the way of the telephone receiver cord. GE's vision is to develop a new generation of wireless sensors that attach to the body like a Band Aid. They would draw power from a tiny integrated battery and use radio waves to communicate with a receiver either in the patient’s pocket or in his hospital room. Outside the hospital, the information aggregated locally from the sensors could be relayed into a cellular network and automatically provide doctors and hospitals with round-the-clock patient monitoring and an uninterrupted flow of data.
“It’s just like those hands-free Bluetooth head-sets, except we now transmit physiological signals rather than voice,” Harsh says. “That’s what makes this so interesting.”
[slides image_align="left"]
[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/MBAN1.jpg"]
Body Language: Wireless Medical Body Area Networks (MBANs) aim to eliminate tangles of cables transmitting data from monitoring devices placed on the patient’s body.
[/image]
[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/MBAN2.jpg"]
Body Language: Wireless Medical Body Area Networks (MBANs) aim to eliminate tangles of cables transmitting data from monitoring devices placed on the patient’s body.
[/image]
[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/MBAN3.jpg"]
Body Language: Wireless Medical Body Area Networks (MBANs) aim to eliminate tangles of cables transmitting data from monitoring devices placed on the patient’s body.
[/image]
[/slides]
This week, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), which regulates the use of U.S. radio spectrum, will rule on freeing up two radio bands for the devices. “You’ve heard people talk about the Internet of Things,” said FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski. “You’ve heard about machine-to-machine connected devices. Well, here’s an example of these concepts coming to life. This is a big deal and we’re just at the beginning.”
Scientists at GE Global Research and at GE Healthcare’s Life Care Solutions unit started developing wireless sensors for so-called Medical Body Area Networks (MBANs) several years ago. Harsh says the two proposed MBAN frequency bands are “sitting right next to” radio spectra used by Bluetooth and ZigBee technology. “The available silicon chipsets today can be pulled just a little bit” to cover the MBAN bands, Harsh says. “That opens up the consumer electronics space and the manufacturers of all the silicon would help us enter the space to really drive the costs down.”
As costs fall and always-on wearable medical monitors spread from hospitals to patient’s homes, their impact could be colossal. “This will allow us to look at a large amount of data and start to do analytics, not just on ECG, but we can pull in respiration, or pulse oximetry,” says Harsh.
GE’s analytical software then can start sifting the diverse data from many patients and look for patterns. “You look for the signature of something that might happen based on the data that is coming in,” Harsh says. “That’s really what we’re talking about. When you look at cost, access, and quality, it hits all three right in the sweet spot.”
Disclaimer: This is a technology in development that represents ongoing research and development efforts. These technologies are not products and may never become products. They are not for sale, and have not been cleared or approved by the FDA for commercial availability.
Friday, May 18, 2012
Cheese Lights the Whey: Biogas from Dairy Farm, Brewery and Landfill Turns Wisconsin Hospital into Renewables Powerhouse
The Crave Brothers dairy farm in Waterloo, Wisconsin, makes tubs of celebrated mascarpone cheese. Across the state, City Brewery in La Crosse brews millions of cases of winning ales and lagers. But Wisconsin’s Gundersen Lutheran Hospital gets excited about the stuff that doesn’t pass the smell test.
Gundersen takes biogas produced from cheese whey and brewing waste, as well as landfill methane, and turns it into megawatts of electricity in GE’s Jenbacher engines. The pioneering hospital has been investing in renewable electricity and conservation and has set a goal to become 100 percent energy independent by 2014.
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[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/JenbacherHospital6.jpg"]
Pretty on the Inside: Intermediate flanch from GE's Jenbacher engine. There are over 1,300 GE Jenbacher gas engines running on biogas installed around the world. They generate more than 6.8 million megawatt-hours of electricity per year.
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[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/JenbacherHospital2.jpg"]
Pretty on the Inside: Jenbacher engine block.
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[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/JenbacherHospital3.jpg"]
Pretty on the Inside: Jenbacher gas mixer cones.
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[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/JenbacherHospital4.jpg"]
Pretty on the Inside: Jenbacher crankshaft.
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[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/JenbacherHospital5.jpg"]
Drill, Baby, Drill: GE machinist is using a high-precision CNC drilling machine to manufacture a crankshaft for the Jenbacher engine.
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[/slides]
This helps the environment - the landfill and the brewery used to flare off the gas - and it’s also good for business. The U.S. Department of Energy estimates American hospitals spend $5 billion, or at least 15 percent of their profits, on energy costs. Hospital pavilions are also more than 2.5 times more energy and CO2 intensive than office buildings. “Our goal is to show that we can be environmentally sound and improve our finances at the same time,” Jeff Thompson, Gundersen’s CEO told Fast Company recently.
The hospital’s Jenbachers, which are part of GE’s ecomagination portfolio, started generating renewable power and heat at the dairy farm and the brewery in 2009. Last week, Gundersen’s 350,000 square-foot clinic in Onalaska became possibly the nation’s first energy-independent medical campus. The clinic gets all the power it needs from yet another Jenbacher burning methane produced by the La Crosse County landfill. For GE, the Onalaska story gets even better. The landfill Jenbacher powers two GE digital mammography screening units that the clinic installed last year.
Electricity from biogas and wind now covers about 30 percent of Gundersen’s total power demand. The La Crosse landfill project alone will produce more than $7 million in revenue over the next decade, the hospital estimates. Those are real savings which Gundersen can pass to patients. “The landfill requires initial investment, but in six-and-a-haIf years it will be completely paid for, and we’ll have several hundred thousand dollars less each year in energy costs,” CEO Thompson told Fast Company. “If the cost of energy skyrockets, it won’t hurt our patients and our community.”
Gundersen takes biogas produced from cheese whey and brewing waste, as well as landfill methane, and turns it into megawatts of electricity in GE’s Jenbacher engines. The pioneering hospital has been investing in renewable electricity and conservation and has set a goal to become 100 percent energy independent by 2014.
[slides image_align="left"]
[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/JenbacherHospital6.jpg"]
Pretty on the Inside: Intermediate flanch from GE's Jenbacher engine. There are over 1,300 GE Jenbacher gas engines running on biogas installed around the world. They generate more than 6.8 million megawatt-hours of electricity per year.
[/image]
[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/JenbacherHospital2.jpg"]
Pretty on the Inside: Jenbacher engine block.
[/image]
[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/JenbacherHospital3.jpg"]
Pretty on the Inside: Jenbacher gas mixer cones.
[/image]
[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/JenbacherHospital4.jpg"]
Pretty on the Inside: Jenbacher crankshaft.
[/image]
[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/JenbacherHospital5.jpg"]
Drill, Baby, Drill: GE machinist is using a high-precision CNC drilling machine to manufacture a crankshaft for the Jenbacher engine.
[/image]
[/slides]
This helps the environment - the landfill and the brewery used to flare off the gas - and it’s also good for business. The U.S. Department of Energy estimates American hospitals spend $5 billion, or at least 15 percent of their profits, on energy costs. Hospital pavilions are also more than 2.5 times more energy and CO2 intensive than office buildings. “Our goal is to show that we can be environmentally sound and improve our finances at the same time,” Jeff Thompson, Gundersen’s CEO told Fast Company recently.
The hospital’s Jenbachers, which are part of GE’s ecomagination portfolio, started generating renewable power and heat at the dairy farm and the brewery in 2009. Last week, Gundersen’s 350,000 square-foot clinic in Onalaska became possibly the nation’s first energy-independent medical campus. The clinic gets all the power it needs from yet another Jenbacher burning methane produced by the La Crosse County landfill. For GE, the Onalaska story gets even better. The landfill Jenbacher powers two GE digital mammography screening units that the clinic installed last year.
Electricity from biogas and wind now covers about 30 percent of Gundersen’s total power demand. The La Crosse landfill project alone will produce more than $7 million in revenue over the next decade, the hospital estimates. Those are real savings which Gundersen can pass to patients. “The landfill requires initial investment, but in six-and-a-haIf years it will be completely paid for, and we’ll have several hundred thousand dollars less each year in energy costs,” CEO Thompson told Fast Company. “If the cost of energy skyrockets, it won’t hurt our patients and our community.”
Monday, May 14, 2012
Mother of Invention: Sixty Years Ago, Pat Leary Helped Build GE’s First Supersonic Jet Engine
The week before Mother’s Day, Mark Leary called his mom, Patricia. Mark, who works on GE’s new GEnx engines, has been an engineer at GE Aviation for almost 30 years. Six decades ago, Patricia, who is 83 and the mother of six, helped develop GE’s first jet engines. She still keeps tabs on them. “I look at the pictures of the engines today and they don’t look like anything the engines then,” Patricia said. “I’m sure some of [your] engines are still flying across the country,” said her son.
Patricia joined GE as an engineering assistant in 1949. At the time, there were just 4,000 female engineers in the entire country, and no more than a handful at GE’s aviation unit, then based outside of Boston in Lynn, Massachusetts. “They were looking for people to hire for the Lynn plant," Patricia said. She had a fresh degree in mathematics from Emmanuel College and started in a “calculating pool,” crunching engine test data with a slide rule and a couple of “really fancy” calculators. “I liked the idea that math was being used to produce something,” Patricia said.
[slides image_align="left"]
[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/Leary.jpg"]
Art and Patricia Leary: Patricia helped develop a key part for GE's first supersonic engine, the J79, in the early 1950s. GE estimates that more than 1,300 J79 engines are still in service, and many are projected to continue through 2020. Art spent 37 year working for GE.
[/image]
[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/SlideRuleSisters.jpg"]
Slide Rule Sister: Patricia started out in a "calculating pool," analyzing engine test data with a slide rule. "There were no computers then," she said. "Just a couple of really fancy calculators."
[/image]
[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/NeumannBurgess.jpg"]
Patricia's bosses Gerhard Neumann and Neil Burgess led the J79 development.
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[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/J79Engine4.jpg"]
Patricia's son Mark Leary stands in front of a J79 engine at GE's learning center in Evendale.
[/image]
[/slides]
Her boss in Lynn was Gerhard Neumann, a jet propulsion legend and innovator. She borrowed books and took GE classes in aerodynamics and gas turbine theory. But she also kept math close and enrolled for an advanced degree at Boston University. “This was well before the string theory,” she laughed. “Complex variables and the Kutta-Joukowski theorem were about as high as we ever got.” The theorem just happens to be the corner stone of aerodynamics.
The new skills came handy quickly. Neumann just started working on GE’s first supersonic jet engine, the J79. The key part of the engine that permitted speeds as high as Mach 2, twice the speed of sound, was a compressor that modulated the amount of air coming inside the engine. “It’s ridiculous that I should remember this, but I was assigned to write a report on the annular shroud, a second ring placed around the middle of the compressor blades to eliminate turbulence,” Patricia said. “We now call it mid-span shroud,” Mark jumped in.
She also analyzed data from compressor tests. The tests did not always go smoothly. “At one point the research compressor was cantilevered from the back wall of a test cell,” she recalled. “We ran it beyond its strength, it came off the wall and chewed up the floor.”
In 1949, GE started moving the aviation unit to Evendale, Ohio. The plant grew from 1,200 to 12,000 employees in just a couple of years. When Patricia first arrived in the summer of 1952, everything was still in flux. “They ran a bus directly from the downtown hotels to the plant,” she said. “So many people were transferring.”
One of them was her husband, Art, a fellow young Bostonian who worked for GE in logistics. They married, and in 1955 Patricia left jet engines for motherhood. “We were a nuclear family, just my husband, myself and the baby, with no relatives nearby,” Patricia said.
Art spent 37 years with GE, and Mark’s older brother also worked for the company. The J79 went to serve on a number on fighter planes like the F-4 Phantom. GE estimates that more than 1,300 J79 engines are still in service, and many are projected to continue through 2020.
Just before they hung up, Patricia asked Mark how long he’s been at GE. “Since 1983,” Mark answered.
“God bless you,” she said. “Time gets by.”
Patricia joined GE as an engineering assistant in 1949. At the time, there were just 4,000 female engineers in the entire country, and no more than a handful at GE’s aviation unit, then based outside of Boston in Lynn, Massachusetts. “They were looking for people to hire for the Lynn plant," Patricia said. She had a fresh degree in mathematics from Emmanuel College and started in a “calculating pool,” crunching engine test data with a slide rule and a couple of “really fancy” calculators. “I liked the idea that math was being used to produce something,” Patricia said.
[slides image_align="left"]
[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/Leary.jpg"]
Art and Patricia Leary: Patricia helped develop a key part for GE's first supersonic engine, the J79, in the early 1950s. GE estimates that more than 1,300 J79 engines are still in service, and many are projected to continue through 2020. Art spent 37 year working for GE.
[/image]
[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/SlideRuleSisters.jpg"]
Slide Rule Sister: Patricia started out in a "calculating pool," analyzing engine test data with a slide rule. "There were no computers then," she said. "Just a couple of really fancy calculators."
[/image]
[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/NeumannBurgess.jpg"]
Patricia's bosses Gerhard Neumann and Neil Burgess led the J79 development.
[/image]
[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/J79Engine4.jpg"]
Patricia's son Mark Leary stands in front of a J79 engine at GE's learning center in Evendale.
[/image]
[/slides]
Her boss in Lynn was Gerhard Neumann, a jet propulsion legend and innovator. She borrowed books and took GE classes in aerodynamics and gas turbine theory. But she also kept math close and enrolled for an advanced degree at Boston University. “This was well before the string theory,” she laughed. “Complex variables and the Kutta-Joukowski theorem were about as high as we ever got.” The theorem just happens to be the corner stone of aerodynamics.
The new skills came handy quickly. Neumann just started working on GE’s first supersonic jet engine, the J79. The key part of the engine that permitted speeds as high as Mach 2, twice the speed of sound, was a compressor that modulated the amount of air coming inside the engine. “It’s ridiculous that I should remember this, but I was assigned to write a report on the annular shroud, a second ring placed around the middle of the compressor blades to eliminate turbulence,” Patricia said. “We now call it mid-span shroud,” Mark jumped in.
She also analyzed data from compressor tests. The tests did not always go smoothly. “At one point the research compressor was cantilevered from the back wall of a test cell,” she recalled. “We ran it beyond its strength, it came off the wall and chewed up the floor.”
In 1949, GE started moving the aviation unit to Evendale, Ohio. The plant grew from 1,200 to 12,000 employees in just a couple of years. When Patricia first arrived in the summer of 1952, everything was still in flux. “They ran a bus directly from the downtown hotels to the plant,” she said. “So many people were transferring.”
One of them was her husband, Art, a fellow young Bostonian who worked for GE in logistics. They married, and in 1955 Patricia left jet engines for motherhood. “We were a nuclear family, just my husband, myself and the baby, with no relatives nearby,” Patricia said.
Art spent 37 years with GE, and Mark’s older brother also worked for the company. The J79 went to serve on a number on fighter planes like the F-4 Phantom. GE estimates that more than 1,300 J79 engines are still in service, and many are projected to continue through 2020.
Just before they hung up, Patricia asked Mark how long he’s been at GE. “Since 1983,” Mark answered.
“God bless you,” she said. “Time gets by.”
Friday, May 4, 2012
Good Vibrations: Turbine Doctors Take Pulse of Global Wind Farms
Doctors know the power of data in making a good diagnosis. Each patient seems unique, but treat many and patterns will emerge. What works for humans is true for technology, too. Take wind turbines. Weather battered and wind blasted, they are easy to run but much harder to fix. But what if you could tell from the comfort of an office before things go awry? Engineers at GE Energy decided to find out. “We were looking for clues that a turbine is sick,” says John Mihok, advanced monitoring and diagnostics engineer at GE Energy.
Mihok’s quest started in 2009, after a blade shifted at a U.S. wind farm. “During the investigation we analyzed the data for what might have caused it,” Mihok says. “We realized that there was a very clear data signature for what the issue was.”
The team then searched and sifted a pool of turbine data. They looked for patterns, first in Excel spreadsheets and then in an online database. “We found other turbines with the exact same data signature for the exact same problem,” Mihok says. “We took them off-line, did a quick repair, and got them back going again.”
The engineers then widened their net. They built proprietary software and algorithms to spot odd vibrations, hot bearings, low power production and other anomalies. “We mine the data for features that let us know that there is a sick turbine out there,” Mihok says. GE knows the game. For many years it’s been remotely monitoring jet engines, helicopters, locomotives, and rotating oil and gas equipment.
Sensors inside each turbine perform an automatic check-up every 10 minutes. They send the information to a central database, which holds gigabytes of data from 12,000 turbines around the world. Some 150 unique rules and algorithms then analyze it and the system automatically sends out an alert when an anomaly is detected. The alert includes specific information about the problem, what needs to be corrected, and how soon to react. It travels to a field technician who will fix it to avoid failure.
GE has built more than half the wind turbines in the U.S. The company estimates that the system that the GE Energy team developed, called PulsePOINT, has saved over $30 million in avoided repairs, lost production, and maintenance costs.
The Doctor Will See You Now: New GE system uses data from 12,000 turbines to spot trouble before it happens.
Mihok’s quest started in 2009, after a blade shifted at a U.S. wind farm. “During the investigation we analyzed the data for what might have caused it,” Mihok says. “We realized that there was a very clear data signature for what the issue was.”
The team then searched and sifted a pool of turbine data. They looked for patterns, first in Excel spreadsheets and then in an online database. “We found other turbines with the exact same data signature for the exact same problem,” Mihok says. “We took them off-line, did a quick repair, and got them back going again.”
The engineers then widened their net. They built proprietary software and algorithms to spot odd vibrations, hot bearings, low power production and other anomalies. “We mine the data for features that let us know that there is a sick turbine out there,” Mihok says. GE knows the game. For many years it’s been remotely monitoring jet engines, helicopters, locomotives, and rotating oil and gas equipment.
Sensors inside each turbine perform an automatic check-up every 10 minutes. They send the information to a central database, which holds gigabytes of data from 12,000 turbines around the world. Some 150 unique rules and algorithms then analyze it and the system automatically sends out an alert when an anomaly is detected. The alert includes specific information about the problem, what needs to be corrected, and how soon to react. It travels to a field technician who will fix it to avoid failure.
GE has built more than half the wind turbines in the U.S. The company estimates that the system that the GE Energy team developed, called PulsePOINT, has saved over $30 million in avoided repairs, lost production, and maintenance costs.
Thursday, May 3, 2012
The Hard Road to Frankfurt: New Lufthansa Flight Caps Epic GEnx Journey
Airlines are queuing up for GE’s GEnx jet engines for many reasons. They’re thrifty with fuel, quiet, and so efficient that jumping a dozen time zones threatens to become a routine. Just two days ago, Lufthansa flew the first passenger GEnx-powered Boeing 747-8 jumbo from Seattle to Frankfurt. Another GEnx set, slung under the wings of a Japan Airlines Dreamliner, now commutes between Boston and Tokyo.
But the road to Frankfurt wasn’t easy. “There for a while we were biting our nails,” says Tom Brisken, general manager in charge of large aircraft customer strategies at GE Aviation.
[slides image_align="left"]
[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/GenxGermany-2.jpg"]
Guten Tag, Your Majesty: Four GEnx-2B engines power Lufthansa's new "Queen of the Skies" jumbo. The airline ordered twenty 747-8 Intercontinental passenger jets from Boeing. They will all use GE engines.
[/image]
[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/GenxGermany-3.jpg"]
Guten Tag, Your Majesty: Four GEnx-2B engines power Lufthansa's new "Queen of the Skies" jumbo. The airline ordered twenty 747-8 Intercontinental passenger jets from Boeing. They will all use GE engines.
[/image]
[/slides]
GE engineers started working on GEnx in 2003. Boeing was building a new generation of advanced passenger planes, the Dreamliner and the 747-8 Intercontinental, and wanted engines to match them. “Boeing was pushing hard on weight, so we really pushed hard on engineering,” Brisken says.
GEnx is the offspring of GE90, the largest and most powerful passenger engine ever built and itself an advanced specimen of flying machinery. But GE engineers went to their computers and calculators and started hacking at the elder engine. They reduced the number of the man-sized composite fan blades from 22 to 18, and took more blades out of the engine’s compressor. Still too heavy, they slashed by a third the amount of airfoils in the low pressure turbine at the back end of the engine. “We just went too far,” Brisken says. “When we ran the engine, we were down significantly from where we wanted to be.” The engineers ended up putting 200 pounds worth of airfoils back inside to get performance on target.
It was a victory but it didn’t win the battle. The engine’s high-tech lean combustion system was causing more trouble. “We were getting pressure spikes in the combustion chamber that were creating stalls in the compressor and breaking components,” Brisken says. “It was a real showstopper for the program.”
With little time to spare, it was back to the design desk. “You’ve got a hurricane going on in that combustor,” Brisken, says. “Any disruption is like turning the hurricane on and off. You can just imagine the pounding on the components inside.” The team redesigned fuel manifolds, splitter valves, and other parts to smooth out the pressure flows. “It was like going from a four-speed transmission to a continuous transmission,” Brisken says. “It totally resolved the issues. We turned the pounding off.”
GE makes two types of the GEnx engine, the larger GEnx-1B, which powers the Dreamliner, and its slightly smaller brother GEnx-2B, for the Intercontinental jumbo. The smaller engine entered freighter service last year and today they power 15 cargo planes. Brisken’s already gotten some feedback. Pilots told him the engines are so quiet that they have to look at their gauges to make sure they are running. They are also more efficient. “One pilot flying to Riyadh had to lower his landing gear and circle the airport to burn off fuel because too much fuel remained on board and put him over the maximum landing weight limit,” Brisken says. In fact, new data pushed Boeing to improve its fuel burn estimate by 1 percent, potentially saving airlines millions of dollars. Says Brisken: “That is like heaven for us, to get a result like that.”
But the road to Frankfurt wasn’t easy. “There for a while we were biting our nails,” says Tom Brisken, general manager in charge of large aircraft customer strategies at GE Aviation.
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[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/GenxGermany-2.jpg"]
Guten Tag, Your Majesty: Four GEnx-2B engines power Lufthansa's new "Queen of the Skies" jumbo. The airline ordered twenty 747-8 Intercontinental passenger jets from Boeing. They will all use GE engines.
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[image src="http://files.gereports.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/GenxGermany-3.jpg"]
Guten Tag, Your Majesty: Four GEnx-2B engines power Lufthansa's new "Queen of the Skies" jumbo. The airline ordered twenty 747-8 Intercontinental passenger jets from Boeing. They will all use GE engines.
[/image]
[/slides]
GE engineers started working on GEnx in 2003. Boeing was building a new generation of advanced passenger planes, the Dreamliner and the 747-8 Intercontinental, and wanted engines to match them. “Boeing was pushing hard on weight, so we really pushed hard on engineering,” Brisken says.
GEnx is the offspring of GE90, the largest and most powerful passenger engine ever built and itself an advanced specimen of flying machinery. But GE engineers went to their computers and calculators and started hacking at the elder engine. They reduced the number of the man-sized composite fan blades from 22 to 18, and took more blades out of the engine’s compressor. Still too heavy, they slashed by a third the amount of airfoils in the low pressure turbine at the back end of the engine. “We just went too far,” Brisken says. “When we ran the engine, we were down significantly from where we wanted to be.” The engineers ended up putting 200 pounds worth of airfoils back inside to get performance on target.
It was a victory but it didn’t win the battle. The engine’s high-tech lean combustion system was causing more trouble. “We were getting pressure spikes in the combustion chamber that were creating stalls in the compressor and breaking components,” Brisken says. “It was a real showstopper for the program.”
With little time to spare, it was back to the design desk. “You’ve got a hurricane going on in that combustor,” Brisken, says. “Any disruption is like turning the hurricane on and off. You can just imagine the pounding on the components inside.” The team redesigned fuel manifolds, splitter valves, and other parts to smooth out the pressure flows. “It was like going from a four-speed transmission to a continuous transmission,” Brisken says. “It totally resolved the issues. We turned the pounding off.”
GE makes two types of the GEnx engine, the larger GEnx-1B, which powers the Dreamliner, and its slightly smaller brother GEnx-2B, for the Intercontinental jumbo. The smaller engine entered freighter service last year and today they power 15 cargo planes. Brisken’s already gotten some feedback. Pilots told him the engines are so quiet that they have to look at their gauges to make sure they are running. They are also more efficient. “One pilot flying to Riyadh had to lower his landing gear and circle the airport to burn off fuel because too much fuel remained on board and put him over the maximum landing weight limit,” Brisken says. In fact, new data pushed Boeing to improve its fuel burn estimate by 1 percent, potentially saving airlines millions of dollars. Says Brisken: “That is like heaven for us, to get a result like that.”
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