A chef who imagined making fresh food affordable realized her dream in Greenville, S.C. Read on to discover the Feed & Seed food hub, its mission to connect local farmers with the community, and its water conservation goals.

In Part 3 of this three-part series, learn about closed-loop, open-loop and direct-exchange geothermal systems. The geothermal provisions addressed in the Uniform Solar, Hydronics and Geothermal Code are the industry’s most advanced and updated provisions.

Plumbing in office buildings — typically mixed use — is designed differently than in health-care facilities, senior-living communities or multifamily buildings. Automation and digital monitoring through a building management system can aid an overwhelmed facilities staff in keeping water safe.

Instrument air and service compressed air — compressed air systems found in health-care facilities — are often an afterthought as they are not considered life safety systems. Yet they are critical in operating rooms and sterile processing areas.

Creating our building codes includes much research and documents from subject matter experts across the building industries. It is important to learn how these different standards affect each other. Read on to discover how the new earthquake protection codes can impact water-based fire protection systems.

Municipalities across the country are moving to new policies to decarbonize buildings. In Part 3 of this series, learn how sanitary waste energy exchange systems (wastewater heat pumps) can increase DHW efficiency and reduce carbon emissions.

Technical Information Report 34 is a standard published by the Association for the Advancement of Medical Instrumentation. It details the importance of the sterile processing of medical devices and the effects of poor water quality on these processes. 

An efficient project can save time and money. Coordination efforts during the design phase of the fire protection system can reduce the number of conflicts in the field, keep the project budget in line and construction progress on schedule by minimizing delays.

A geo-exchange system either extracts energy from the ground for heating or pumps it back into the ground for cooling. Energy companies and large construction firms can use this technology to help decarbonize our buildings and remain profitable. BF Nagy describes a few such North American projects in this month’s column.