HGC Engineering - News

Monitoring Noise at Ontario's First Diamond Mine

In February, 2007, HGC Engineering commenced a program of environmental industrial noise monitoring and noise control for the new De Beers "Victor Project" diamond mine.  The Victor Project is located in the James Bay Lowlands of Northern Ontario, about 90 km west of the coastal community of Attawapiskat. Construction of the mine began in February 2006. The Victor mine will be the first diamond mine in Ontario and the second in Canada for De Beers.

The engineering and construction of the mine are being handled by AMEC, whose Earth & Environmental division retained HGC Engineering to look after the necessary acoustic assessments and conduct a noise measurement program during the construction and early operation of the mine.  There are traditional First Nations lands neighboring the site, which are still used for trapping and hunting, so industrial noise control is a key element of the environmental management program for the Victor Project.

Over the next three years, HGC Engineering will be monitoring the mining noise for several weeks during the each of the mid-winter and mid-summer periods, and assisting when noise control is needed.  The mine will have an expected life of 12 years and a total project life of 17 years.

Tougher Legislation in Ontario for Workplace Noise Exposure

In January, 2007, the government of Ontario, Canada, announced changes to the Occupational Health and Safety Act, introducing stricter limits for noise exposure in the workplace.  The changes affect virtually all workplaces in the Province.  The requirements will come into effect on July 1, 2007, and will toughen the regulation in three ways.

First, the limit for a worker’s daily exposure to noise will be reduced from 90 dBA to 85 dBA.  Second, the “exchange rate” will be reduced from 5 dBA to 3 dBA.  This means that for every increase in sound level of 3 dBA the allowable exposure time for the worker is halved.  (Previously, an increase of 5 dBA reduced the allowable exposure by half, which was less stringent.)  Third, the changes to the regulation will make explicit the responsibility to implement engineered noise control measures where sound levels exceed 85 dBA.

While these changes will be beneficial in terms of reducing the risk of noise-induced hearing loss in the workplace, the burden on some industrial noise makers may be onerous.  A decrease in sound level of just 5 dBA – from 90 dBA to 85 dBA, for example – requires a 47% reduction of acoustic energy, because of the logarithmic nature of sound.  And, with the new rules, it will be less acceptable to resort to the use of personal hearing protection as a method of reducing a worker’s exposure to noise.  Instead, the new regulations require that acoustical engineering be investigated to develop industrial noise control and vibration control measures.  Hearing protectors will only be accepted as a fallback when the company can demonstrate that engineered noise control measures are not feasible.

HGC Engineering will be co-authoring with audiologist Marshall Chasin an article in the May/June 2007 issue of Engineering Dimensions magazine, discussing these changes to the legislation and the increased responsibilities upon workplace managers.  Watch for it!

Happy New Year from Everyone at HGC Engineering

Our Holiday Lunch during the last week of December, 2006 seemed like the first time in a long time that we had our entire staff in the office all at once.  So -– we took a picture!  We would also like to take this opportunity to wish the best of the holiday season and a Happy New Year to all of our clients, colleagues and friends.  Here’s to a prosperous, safe and happy 2007!

Keep an eye on the HGC Engineering blog in the New Year for interesting noise-newsbites on boundary element modeling for mufflers and silencers; changes to the industrial noise regulations in Ontario; our latest projects in the Middle East, and more.

Celebrating One Year as Associate Owners at HGC Engineering

Just over one year ago we were fortunate to have three of our Senior Engineers become Associate owners of HGC Engineering.  Nick, Sheeba, and Alex have all been key members of our acoustical consulting team for several years, and over the last year have helped us take our management group to a higher level of performance.

Nick McCabe, PEng, joined HGC Engineering in 1997, and is part of our building vibration and industrial vibration group.  He completed his degree in Civil Engineering at the University of Waterloo, and has expertise in finite element methods (FEM) for analyzing the dynamics and vibration of buildings, industrial structures.  Nick also speicalizes in industrial noise assessments.

Sheeba Paul, MEng, PEng, has been with us since January 2000, working primarily in the field of noise assessment and noise control in land use planning.  She has particular expertise in analysis of traffic noise and assessment of rail noise and vibration.  While studying at the University of Guelph, Sheeba completed a bachelor degree in Environmental Engineering, and a Master’s degree in Environmental Engineering. 

Alex Lorimer, MEng, PEng, received his undergraduate degree in Mechanical Engineering from the Technical University of Nova Scotia (now Dalhousie University’s Dal-Tech) and Master’s degree in engineering from the Faculty of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at Carleton University in Ottawa.  Alex has been in acoustical consulting since 1990 and with us since 1999, working in the areas of architectural and mechanical system noise control in buildings, industrial noise assessment, and automotive and other product noise and vibration evaluation and control.

We are happy to celebrate this milestone with Nick, Sheeba and Alex!

HGC Engineering Congratulates Kana Ganesh and Pierre Godbout on Receiving Professional Engineer Licensure

This past summer, two members of our acoustical consulting team received their Professional Engineer licenses, after completing the requisite years of work experience in noise control and vibration control at HGC Engineering.

Kana Ganesh, PhD, PEng, joined us in the autumn of 2004 after having completed his PhD in vibration at the Institute of Sound and Vibration Research (University of Southampton, UK).  Kana also has undergraduate and Master’s degrees in mechanical engineering.  He spent about a year working in our industrial noise control division before moving to our building noise control and vibration control division.  Currently, Kana handles many of our building noise and architectural acoustics projects ongoing in the United Arab Emirates.

Pierre Godbout, MBA, PEng, has been with HGC Engineering since January, 2005.  Prior to joining HGC Engineering, Pierre completed his undergraduate degree in mechanical engineering at the Royal Military College, and a Master of Business Administration degree at the University of Victoria.  Pierre is a member of our industrial noise control division, where he specializes in environmental assessments of industrial facilities and power transmission infrastructure.  He also looks after calibration and upkeep of our multitude of precision acoustic testing and sound/vibration measurement instrumentation.

Our compliments to Kana and Pierre!  We are proud that they are part of our engineering team, and we welcome each into the responsible and respected role of Professional Engineer.

HGC Engineering - Expertise in Noise from Wind Energy Facilities

HGC Engineering has been very active in the past year conducting environmental noise impact assessments of wind farms – a fast growing renewable energy sector. We have prepared reports supporting applications for Certificates of Approval from the Ontario Ministry of the Environment for several wind farms in conformance with their criteria, and have provided acoustical engineering for wind  farms in other Canadian and US jurisdictions. We have also assisted municipalities in formulating Official Plan policies and in peer reviewing environmental noise studies. On behalf of Natural Resources Canada, we completed a study of the Pubnico Point Wind Farm in Nova Scotia – a very interesting and contentious situation involving both audible noise and infrasound. The results of the study, (click here to download), were presented at the Canadian Wind Energy Association (CanWEA) conference in Winnipeg this fall.

We are currently completing an overview and “best practice” guideline for sound from wind turbines for CanWEA that will be published in order to help educate developers and the public.

Through our work in assessing and controlling noise pollution from wind farms, we have a strong familiarity with the operational characteristics of wind turbines and the international standards relevant to wind turbines; the acoustic noise measurement techniques defined in IEC 6140-11 and the modelling techniques defined in ISO 2631-2. We often conduct measurements using real time frequency analyser systems that are well suited for determining and defining the audible and infrasonic characteristics of the sound from wind turbines.

Award for Excellence Goes to HGC Engineering

We were pleasantly surprised both to be nominated and to win the Top Performers Platinum Award in the category of engineering, from the Mississauga Business Times!  The engineering category of this award is not specific to acoustical consulting, and given the size and calibre of some of the other engineering firms in our region who would also be candidates for this award, we at HGC Engineering are much honored to receive this distinction.  Our mission statement is Engineering Excellence in Noise Vibration and Acoustics, and it is something we take to heart and work toward every day.  An acknowledgement from the Business Times, along with compliments from our many long time clients makes us feel that our commitment to excellence is worth the effort.  Thank you from everyone at HGC Engineering!

VNoise Boundary Element Analysis Software for Acoustical Modeling and Noise Control Design

HGC Engineering has upgraded to the VNoise suite of software as a tool for acoustical modeling of complex systems, such as mufflers, absorptive silencers, resonators, expansion chambers and acoustic plenums.  The VNoise software package is based on the boundary element method (BEM), a computational technique which allows fast, efficient analysis for acoustical research and design of noise control devices.  Similar to finite element methods (FEM), a model is created by dividing the acoustic system into a mesh of tiny elements, which can be analyzed numerically.  However, while FEM requires that the entire acoustic domain of interest be analyzed, BEM only considers the boundary of the acoustic domain, making it an ideal tool to assess automotive noise in passenger cabins or exhaust systems, and industrial noise in piping and ducting systems.

Recently, HGC Engineering used VNoise software to design, model and optimize a large-scale acoustic expansion chamber to control low frequency noise from a mine shaft ventilation fan  in West Virginia.  The fan was producing a strong tone at 15 Hz, which was shaking and rattling homes at a distance of more than 600 feet.  Using the BEM analysis capabilities of VNoise, HGC Engineering tuned the chamber (approximately a 30 foot cube, see graphic ) to provide maximum noise reduction at 15 Hz.  Following the computer optimization, a one-tenth scale model was constructed and tested by HGC Engineering to verify the design (see graphs ).  Construction of this unique expansion chamber silencer is in progress.

HGC Engineering Migrates to Brüel & Kjær Pulse System for Sophisticated Sound and Vibration Measurement

The increasing demand for intricate sound measurement techniques – such as sound intensity methods – and for complex vibration measurement techniques has prompted HGC Engineering to add the Brüel & Kjær Pulse System to its arsenal of measurement and test equipment.  The unmatched flexibility and power of the Pulse instrumentation represents the cutting edge of technology in noise, vibration and acoustics.

Coupled with a ruggedized notebook computer, the Pulse processor can serve as sound intensity analyzer for accurate measurement of source sound power levels in-situ, or a tool for automotive noise / vibration / harshness measurements, or a high-end instrument for architectural acoustics and building acoustics measurements.

Noise and Vibration Problems on a Luxury Super-Yacht in Dubai Resolved by HGC Engineering and Medyan Acoustical Consultancy

Construction of the Ashena, an all teak-wood luxury "super-yacht", began in India.  The 110 foot long ship was brought to Dubai for interior finishing.  In February, 2006, a month before the scheduled launch, severe noise and vibration problems became evident in the cabins near the engine rooms, including the dining room, bar, guest bedrooms, and crew rooms.  The joint venture partnership between HGC Engineering and Medyan Acoustical Consultancy (MAC), which provides noise and vibration solutions in Dubai and throughout the United Arab Emirates, was urgently called in  to investigate the problems.

Detailed acoustical measurements of sound insulation and structure-borne noise transmission were conducted by HGC Engineering and MAC.  The investigation revealed problems with the supporting mounts of the two diesel-engine driven generators, and the connections between the ceiling beams of the engine room and the exhaust piping of the generators and the main engines.  HGC Engineering and MAC developed recommendations for specially selected marine vibration isolator mounts for the engines, exhaust systems and mufflers.  The excessive noise and vibration problems were resolved and the Ashena quietly sailed its maiden luxury passenger voyage in March of 2006!