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| Drawing future
fliers and saving the drips win awards |
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| Minister
for Transport Yeo Cheow Tong posing
with the winners of the art contest. |
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How do you encourage the young travellers
of today to make Changi their favourite
airport hub when they grow up in future?
What a waste it was to see condensed water
from MRT air-conditioning systems flowing down
the drain!
Two teams from the Civil Aviation Authority of Singapore
(CAAS) and the Land Transport Authority (LTA) tackled
the above issues, winning for themselves the Ministry
of Transport — Minister Innovation Award. Another
eight teams also achieved this distinction.
Have you ever noticed the growing number of children
who travel with their parents, be it for a family
holiday or to accompany their parents on a business
trip? In the near future, these children will grow
up to be important travellers at Changi Airport!
Ever wondered what we can do to help make Changi
their favourite airport hub?
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art contests met with enthusiastic response. |
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Well, the year 2003 marked the centennial year of
powered flight by the Wright Brothers. To coincide
with the worldwide celebration of this event, a
team of CAAS officers from the Events Promotion
Unit decided to organise an activity specifically
targeted at a group of very special travellers —
children! And what better way to get our future
travellers involved than through an art competition?
Children between the ages of four and eight
from all over the world were invited to participate
in The International
Flight of Friendship
Centennial Children Art
Contest.
“The theme ‘Flight
of Friendship’ was
selected because air
travel has brought the
world closer together
and allowed new
friendships to be forged
between people and countries of different
cultures,” said members of the team.
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| Children having fun at the art competition that
was held locally. |
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To reach out to as many children as possible, publicity
materials were sent to 1,183 schools in the cities
with air links to Singapore. Art competitions were
held in six of Singapore’s key city links to increase
awareness of the contest in these countries. At
the same time, a children’s corner was set up in
Changi Airport’s transit area to encourage participation
from children passing through the airport.
By the time the contest closed, more than
8,000 entries had been received from 44 cities in
23 countries. Ten winners were picked. One of
them was Miss Lee Jia Yi, a Malaysian who is only
4 years old! Describing her drawing, Jia Yi said: “I
imagined myself in a hot air balloon, watching
the earth from high up in the sky.… Different
clouds represent different countries, like Malaysia,
Singapore and Thailand, which I have visited
before.”
The young winners each received an all-expense paid
tour to Singapore as well as $1,000 in Changi Airport
shopping vouchers. In addition, schools of the winners
were also awarded $1,000 cash each.
Instead of packing away the entries after the
contest, CAAS staff exhibited some of them on
banners and stands at high-traffic areas in Changi
Airport’s terminal buildings to give the travelling
public an opportunity to view the artworks.
During your daily ride on the MRT, have you ever
wondered how our underground MRT stations are
kept cool? Or imagined just how much energy is
used to keep them cool?
Underground MRT stations have centralised
air-conditioning systems which produce
condensed water as the air flows through the
cooling coils of the air handling units. During their
routine inspections of the MRT stations, officers
from the Building Control Unit of LTA noticed that
the amount of condensed water produced was
substantial. However, the water was simply
discharged into drains! The officers then thought
of recycling the water.
Detailed studies showed that the bulk of water
consumption at an MRT station goes to
replenishing water loss at the cooling towers of
the air-conditioning system. The team decided to
recycle the condensed water to compensate for
the water loss. The condensed water is first
channelled to a collection tank, where it is then
pumped into the cooling tower’s make-up water
tank. Implementation cost was kept minimal.
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| LTA staff have found a way to recycle the water
used in the air-conditioning systems of
underground MRT stations. |
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How was the idea implemented? For underground civil
defence (CD) stations, the team made use of existing
CD equipment and the network of pipes to circulate
the condensed water to the make-up water tank, thus
incurring minimal additional cost. For non-CD stations,
where there are no such provisions, the estimated
cost of implementation was $18,500 per station.
However, the savings far outweigh the cost.
Estimated savings per year work out to $108,400
for CD stations along the East-West, North-South
and Circle Lines. The project has also helped the
rapid transit operators to cut waste and reduce
their operating costs.
In fact, the project has been so successful
that it is being progressively implemented in
other existing CD stations. It will also impact
the design of air-conditioning systems for our
future MRT lines. |
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“Creativity
involves breaking out of established
patterns in order to look at things
in a different way.”
Edward
de Bono |
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“I
imagined myself in a hot air balloon,
watching the earth from high up in the
sky…. Different clouds represent different
countries, like Malaysia, Singapore
and Thailand, which I have visited before.”
Lee Jia Yi, 4-year-old
winner of the art contest |
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Ministry
of Transport — Minister Innovation Award
Deserving teams are awarded for their
innovative and creative projects that
have made significant improvements within
the organisation, brought benefits to
the public
or industry that the organisation is
serving,
and yet are also cost and time effective!
In 2004, 10 teams are honoured, bringing
it to a total of 25 awards given since
the awards's inception in 2002. |
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