Features
An opportunity to look in depth at some of the breaking stories in the industry, this section provides companies a chance to give more background to the design, development and innovation of their products and techniques.
A question of lending
Barclays’ Graeme Allinson discusses the current financial climate
Are banks lending?” It is the question my team is asked time and time again, by business groups, the media and even our clients. While I cannot speak for other banks, the answer at Barclays Commercial is a resounding “yes”. In fact our latest figures underline the fact that we are open for business, with average lending increasing 10 per cent in the first half of 2009, compared with the same period last year.
read more
Rays of Hope
Nick Lerner explains Oxford Technologies’ involvement in fusion energy
JET (Joint European Torus), located at Culham, UK, is a an experimental fusion energy device in which, by creating temperatures greater than that of the sun (around 100 million degrees C) and applying magnetic confinement, fusion of atomic nuclei takes place. The next stage of fusion technology development has started with the building of ITER, a fusion energy device, which is eight times larger in volume than JET. ITER is one of the most challenging scientific experiments ever undertaken, leading initially to a trial generating station followed by full-scale generators, supplying fusion energy to the grid by the end of this century.
read more
Power trip
The Drax power station is due to be retrofitted with a new system by June 2010. Mike Farish finds out more
The Drax power station in Yorkshire is one of the single most important elements in the whole of the UK’s electricity generation infrastructure. Its six generators have a maximum combined output of nearly 4,000MW, which means that by itself it supplies around seven per cent of the country’s electricity requirements. But the station is also coal-fired - it currently consumes around ten million tonnes of coal per year - something that inevitably puts a question mark over its future as governments worldwide commit themselves to the establishment of ‘low-carbon’ economies.
read more
For regular Engineering Week updates.
For a regular copy of Engineering magazine.