National Institutes of Health (NIH) – Tertiary Bridge Control and system Re-Piping for the Building 10 Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR)
NIH presented an issue with the tertiary pumping system that provides chilled water for the NMR in Building 10 Clinical Research Center in Bethesda, MD. Impyrian worked with NIH and determined that the NMR Facility tertiary bridge control valve was incorrectly installed on the supply side of the pumps, rather than the return side. Due to the current conditions, NIH could not properly maintain differential pressures and chilled water temperatures in this critical facility.
Additionally, Impyrian noted that the pipe sizing to the pumps needed to be increased due to the chilled water flows being higher than the maximum flow of the current pipe size. Impyrian developed a scope of work and rough order of magnitude pricing to NIH to correct the problem, which NIH subsequently turned into an RFP. Impyrian pre-fabricated much of the piping due to the magnets in the NMR and the stringent requirements for shutdown times in the facility. Impyrian was contracted as the Turnkey Design-Build Contractor. The scope involved providing a design for the new piping configuration as well as controls drawings and sequence of operations for the new control valve as well as installation of the new pipe configuration and installation of the new control valve. The scope also included full testing and commissioning of the systems. The new bridge return control valve was designed to control the temperature and limit the flow of water from the building tertiary piping to the secondary chilled water system. The new bridge control valve resulted in better building operations and energy efficiency for the critical space at NIH.