Insights

Bite-sized, industry insights

Guest User Guest User

Good design is location-specific

Moving to the tropics can be a shock – often you’re left sweaty and frustrated as your body slowly climatises to the increased humidity and almost constant, year-round heat. It can be overwhelming.

Designing in this new environment after spending your career designing for temperate climates may give you a similar feeling. However, just as your body adjusts and begins to flourish in the lack-of-winter, so will you.

Read More
Guest User Guest User

If you can’t stand the heat, go net zero

While it appears that the Federal Government is not committing to Net Zero Emissions by 2050, most of the private sector are doing their part to reach this goal. This is because, in many cases, it’s essential for their business, but also because it’s actually not that difficult to achieve.

So, what role does HVAC play in a Zero Emission Economy?

Read More
Guest User Guest User

She took the midnight train goin’… regional?

Up-and-coming engineers who want to make their mark tend to set their sights on big cities. That’s where there are multitudes of major projects, and major projects mean major opportunities, right? While the skills you develop in these roles are valuable, they can be very niche.

Read More
Guest User Guest User

Cold room design on the back burner

Unlike the air conditioning industry which has seen significant improvements in energy efficiency standards through multiple iterations of the NCC, cold rooms have had almost no advancements in terms of technology or energy efficiency.

Read More
Guest User Guest User

How VR is reshaping the way we manage remote assets

The evaluation and management of remote assets can be challenging. Accessing remote sites can be costly and time-consuming for the client, invasive and often inconvenient for the resident, and risky for both the assessor and the remote community.

Read More
Guest User Guest User

Remote housing – engineering for durability

After decades of remote housing programs, one of the greatest challenges continues to be durability of the housing stock. Based on inspection of over 200 remote dwellings, it is clear there are engineering changes that can be made which will greatly improve durability.

Read More
Guest User Guest User

Vapour barriers and air-conditioned spaces in the tropics

Air-conditioning reduces the temperature down to comfort conditions, however in the tropics this is generally at or below the ambient dew point temperature. This means that when the ambient outdoor air is introduced into the air-conditioned space, the moisture in the air condenses into water droplets on any surfaces that are at or below the dew point.

Read More
Guest User Guest User

Designing HVAC for the tropics

Achieving a healthy indoor environmental quality with effective air conditioning and ventilation isn't always as clean-cut as the NCC and the Australian Standards' framework suggests. With the arrival of La Niña, the theory behind 'tropic-proofing' is about to be put to the test.

Read More
Guest User Guest User

She'll be right – my house is 'cyclone coded'

Cyclones pose a very real threat to communities across coastal areas of northern Australia. This isn’t news; people living in these areas are aware of the threat and there is frequent talk of buildings, particularly houses, being ‘cyclone coded’ – but what does that actually mean?

Read More