Search results

Manual monitoring is a conventional method for monitoring and managing construction safety risks. However, construction sites involve risk coupling - a phenomenon in which multiple safety risk factors occur at the same time and amplify the probability of construction accidents. It is challenging to manually monitor safety risks that occur simultaneously at different times and locations, especially considering the limitations of risk manager’s expertise and human capacity.

To address this challenge, an automatic approach that integrates point cloud, computer vision technologies, and Bayesian networks for simultaneous monitoring and evaluation of multiple on-site construction risks is proposed. This approach supports the identification of risk couplings and decision-making process through a system that combines real-time monitoring of multiple safety risks with expert knowledge. The proposed approach was applied to a foundation project, from laboratory experiments to a real-world case application.

In the laboratory experiment, the proposed approach effectively monitored and assessed the interdependent risks coupling in foundation pit construction. In the real-world case, the proposed approach shows good adaptability to the actual construction application.

The core contribution of this study lies in the combination of an automatic monitoring method with an expert knowledge system to quantitatively assess the impact of risk coupling. This approach offers a valuable tool for risk managers in foundation pit construction, promoting a proactive and informed risk coupling management strategy.

South Africa is the highest consumer of commercial energy per capita in Africa, ranking 16th in the world for primary energy consumption. It is also ranked among the bottom 50 of the 150 countries regarding energy efficiency. The cold chain is a large contributor through refrigerated transport vehicles. To comply with the changing climate regulations, cryogenic and eutectic systems are systems with great potential for small distance refrigerated transport. The purpose of this paper is to introduce eutectic system to medium distance refrigerated transport.

This study presents the potential use of Eutectic plates inside a medium refrigerated transport vehicle, by numerically investigating the characteristics of phase change material eutectic plates applied at low-temperature ranges. A physical model and a mathematical model for three-dimensional transient natural flow were developed as proposed by Xiaofeng and Zhang. Using the governing equation of mass, momentum and energy conservation, three Eutectic plate configurations were modeled and simulated in ANSYS Fluent for 5 h.

A uniform heat transfer and airflow condition inside a refrigerated compartment were predicted using the Reynolds stress model. The configuration with eutectic plates placed at the top and side showed great potential for the system functioning in the South African climate.

Medium refrigerated transport vehicle.

This configuration had a high-temperature distribution across the compartment and promoted high air circulations, showing that it could be ideal for medium refrigerated transport vehicles delivering perishable foodstuffs or non-food goods.