Email #5 – Steam Pipe Update

Some of you might remember my rather inflammatory email titled "Steam Pipe or Time Bomb?" sent on June 14 to the ArchFaculty list and a few others. In that email I questioned the wisdom of placing the computer servers and other equipment directly under the Live Steam Pipe carrying steam to heat the buildings west of Architecture Hall. Did the HVAC design for the computer rooms account for the excess heat generated by the steam pipe?

At first, nobody in the front offices knew the answer. Then Mark Sweeters of the UW construction team consulted with the mechanical engineers, and here is what they told him verbally:

1. The heat produced by the steam pipe is minimal compared to the heat produced by the computers.

2. The HVAC design for the computer rooms takes into account the heat produced by the steam pipe.

3. The steam pipe might be moved anyhow for other reasons. If so, it would not be passing through the ceilings of the computer rooms.

I took the attached photo on June 16 showing the steam pipe as it passes underneath the auditorium. The server would be located directly under the pipe between the puddle and the snout of the machine.

Using a remote temperature gauge, I measured the surface temperatures of the pipe and the walls, etc of the room, and then marked the photo accordingly. As you can see, the pipe was about 15 degrees warmer than the rest of the room. And this was with a steady breeze in the room, both natural and fan-made. In the room to the east there was no steady breeze and the steam pipe temperatures were all in the upper 80's and low 90's.

This photo with data added was inspired by Edward Tufte's recent book "Beautiful Evidence." I don't know how Tufte would grade it, but it was fun doing it.

John Stamets
July 13, 2006

See also #ee, #49, #56 and #63