A new chilled water plant in Baltimore that is a collaboration among Veolia Energy Baltimore Cooling, the Baltimore Convention Center, and the Maryland Stadium Authority has eliminated 6,137 tons of carbon and saves the city nearly $190,000 in electricity costs annually.

The project has been called a win for sustainable district energy infrastructure and the potential for green technology to improve energy efficiencies and customers’ quality of life while also stimulating the local economy.

The Baltimore Convention Center is now home to a 5,400-ton capacity Plant 1 facility and will provide chilled water to the convention center, Camden Station at Oriole Park, and more than 50 major customers in the city. The plants are operated by Veolia, a subsidiary of Veolia North America, a leading provider of environmental solutions and optimized resource management.

As for the numbers, the plant eliminates 60,000 pounds of R-22, an ozone-depleting refrigerant, and will save the city an estimated $189,172 in annual electricity costs due to the plant’s new efficient infrastructure. By utilizing nighttime electricity reserves to produce up to 48,000 ton-hours of ice storage capacity, the plant maximizes additional equipment efficiencies.

Long-time IAVM member Peggy Daidakis, executive director of the Baltimore Convention Center, is thrilled about the new water plant and addressed her thoughts in a wire story.

“As sustainability and ‘green’ meetings become increasingly important in the hospitality industry, we are challenged to find innovative ways to leverage partnerships with our local and state governments, as well as private industry, to satisfy the ever increasing expectations of our clientele,” she said. “The new Chilled Water Plant 1 is in step with helping us reach our sustainability goals for cleaner, greener meetings.”

“By providing technical, legal, and financial guidance, the Maryland Stadium Authority is pleased to be part of the team that worked tirelessly to ensure that the Baltimore Convention Center provides an excellent customer experience that benefits the local economy and environment,” added Michael Frenz, executive director of the Maryland Stadium Authority.

Sheffield Arena in the United Kingdom has a new naming rights agreement in hand to become the FlyDSA Arena. The exact deal details were not revealed although it is known to be a six-figure naming rights agreement with Doncaster Sheffield Airport (DSA).

The early phase of the three-year deal will heavily involve promoting the Doncaster Sheffield Airport as well as the arena and the greater Sheffield area.

The arena was built to host the World Student Games and was officially opened by Her Majesty The Queen on May 30, 1991. The venue can accommodate audiences from a theatre style 3,500 up to a 13,600-capacity, making it the region’s biggest capacity indoor arena. The Sheffield Steelers ice hockey team serve as the primary tenant with 25-30 home games a year.

In the summer of 2013 the venue underwent a multi-million pound investment and now has a new roof, doors, seats, lighting, catering and restroom facilities.

As part of the transition to FlyDSA Arena, the venue will go through massive rebranding to include tickets, venue branding, posters, promotional materials, signing inside and outside the arena and all advertising.

Interestingly, the venue opened as Sheffield Arena but from 2002-07 was known as the Hallam FM arena before returning to its original name. In a different five-year period it was known as Motorpoint Arena Sheffield.

In other news at the facility, general manager Rob O’Shea departed to give full attention and focus to his event promotions firm, Manifesto Events. O’Shea was succeeded in the GM position by his former deputy, Joe Waldron.

The Texas Rangers have unveiled renderings of their new $1.1 billion ballpark – Globe Life Field – which is set to open in 2020.

Impressive? To say the least. Necessary? Just ask the fans who swelter in the open-air heat of the current venue.

The team announced that the new approximate 41,000-capacity retractable roof venue will indeed open before the first pitch is thrown in the 2020 season. During a press conference that showed off all the considerable charm of Globe Life Field, it was emphasized that this will be the first “next-generation” ballpark.

In terms of similarities, Globe Life Field will most closely align with two venues that house NFL teams in Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis and U.S. Bank Stadium in Minneapolis.

There will still be some good old-fashioned Texas sunshine as the retractable roof will feature a skylight. Even when the roof is closed, natural light will be able to indirectly filter into the stadium with affecting players’ or fans’ vision. The roof will retract to the west, so in the event that rains comes in a torrential downpour, the infield will be the first thing to get covered instead of the outfield.

Another nod in the new park is the creation of an intimate environment with a three-tier roof. The park will house the first known 360-degree, uninterrupted upper concourse, so as to eliminate obstructions between it and the field.

Rob Matwick, the team’s executive vice president for baseball operations, called the new venue “amazing,” a term not loosely thrown around.

“A lot of hours went into this in short amount of time,” he said. “A building like this gives us opportunities that just don’t exist today at Globe Life Park.

One possible new feature is that safety netting can be extended around the entire lower bowl seating, a change from the current configuration where netting extends to the end of both dugouts.

Groundbreaking is scheduled to begin on September 28.

By Shibani Mahtani

Reprinted from The Wall Street Journal

Dean Gladden breathed a sigh of relief two years ago when a $46.5 million renovation of the Alley Theatre, the first major improvement in the Tony Award-winning theater’s five-decade history, was finally completed.

Standing in the theater’s flood-damaged, putrid-smelling basement almost two weeks after Hurricane Harvey dumped trillions of gallons of rain on the nation’s fourth largest city, Mr. Gladden was almost breathless.

“I thought I was done, that the renovation was the last big project of my career,” Mr. Gladden said as he walked through the pitch-dark theater. “And now, here we are.”

Harvey’s record-setting floods hit Houston’s downtown theater district, just feet from a bayou, particularly hard.

Cultural buildings including the Wortham Center, home to the Houston Grand Opera and the Houston Ballet, and Jones Hall for the Performing Arts, where the Houston Symphony performs, suffered major water damage. But the Alley Theatre, inundated with over 10 feet of water, faces some of the most severe losses.

The Alley Theatre basement houses not just the complex’s electrical system but also a smaller, 310-seat stage, the Neuhaus Theatre; rehearsal rooms; changing rooms; and thousands of props and costumes. These were all but destroyed when black water—a combination of sewage, chemicals and rainwater—submerged the space.

As waters receded, new threats emerged. The seats in the Neuhaus Theater are covered in a thick layer of mold and will have to be completely ripped out. Mold has also started growing on a large number of props.

“It is just a huge mess,” said Mr. Gladden.

A layer of mold has started growing on the chairs at the Neuhaus Theatre, and must be ripped out and replaced. Mr. Gladden expects repairs to be in the millions, only a fraction of which will be covered by insurance.
A layer of mold has started growing on the chairs at the Neuhaus Theatre, and must be ripped out and replaced. Mr. Gladden expects repairs to be in the millions, only a fraction of which will be covered by insurance. Photo: Shibani Mahtani/The Wall Street Journal
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On a recent visit, theater staff donning particulate masks and jumpsuits sifted through typewriters, dolls, skeletons and oversize Oriental rugs, while crews zipped around pulling out soaked equipment and pumping hot air into the area.

Alley Theater prop master Karin Rabe Vance, who has chronic lung problems, wore a ventilator as she worked 14-hour shifts in the basement.

“There’s just so much heartache—not physical and not because of my lungs, but emotionally, because of what has been lost,” Ms. Vance said, choking back tears. Of the times she has cried over the past week, the moment she said she remembers most vividly was when she spied a smiley-face mug on the floor, filled with flood water. She had made the cup for a cheerful stage manager.

When Harvey hit, a new play by Rajiv Joseph, “Describe the Night,” had been in rehearsals and was set to premiere at the Neuhaus Theatre on Sept. 15.

Mr. Gladden thought he might have to scrap the run entirely, but was able to move the production to the University of Houston’s 185-seat theater instead. Alley Theater’s office of 70 people, computer servers and other equipment also relocated to the university campus.

Tropical Storm Harvey’s impact on Texas has been catastrophic, but the city of Houston is faring worse than some others. Here’s the science of why Harvey has been especially devastating for the area. Photo: NASA
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To stick to the original schedule, set designers had to redesign the play’s set for the new stage in just a week. “It was a race to get this done,” Mr. Gladden said. “Describe the Night” opened Friday to a full house, he said.

The Alley Theater will have to raise about $11 million in funding to restore the building, Mr. Gladden said, as its insurance policy only covers about $3 million in building repairs and another $4 million for equipment.

The two-year-old renovation took 14 months to finish and 70% of the $46.5 million cost came from private donors. But raising even $4 million in the current climate, given the competing needs of the city and the slump in the oil-and-gas industry, is an intimidating task.

Mr. Gladden has assigned a member of his staff to apply for available grants to help fund the renovation, including the National Endowment for the Humanities’ emergency grants for cultural institutions hit by Hurricanes Harvey and Irma. Applications for the federal grant opened last Thursday, allowing institutions to apply for up to $30,000 to preserve documents, artworks or structures damaged by the hurricane. The NEH gave out about $2 million in similar funding after Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

“The idea is to get the money to these institutions who need it as fast as possible,” said Paula Wasley, a spokeswoman for the NEH.

Mr. Gladden expects to reopen the main theater by November, in time for “A for Christmas Carol,” but the Neuhaus Theatre will take longer.

Still, staff—many of whom are also contending with personal losses of homes and more—are keeping it all in perspective. “The important thing is that we are all standing here, safe,” said Ms. Vance. “The rest of it—all this stuff—we can rebuild. It is just stuff.”

Not every school is a Power 5 NCAA school, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t doing what it takes to make game-day experiences more enjoyable for their guests.

The South Dakota School of Mines and Technology (SD Mines) in Rapid City, South Dakota, is welcoming a new LED video display at O’Harra Stadium as well as a new marquee display manufactured and installed by Daktronics. The new displays were installed before the start of the 2017 football season.

“Partnerships and branding with Daktronics elevates our game time experience for our fans and scholar-athletes,” said SD Mines Athletics Director Joel Lueken. “We couldn’t be happier with our scoreboard.”

The new display measures 20.5 feet high by 35 feet wide and features a 15HD pixel layout for excellent image clarity and contrast. It is capable of variable content zoning allowing it to show one large image or to show multiple zones of live video, instant replays, statistics, graphics and sponsorship messages.

Capable of full-color imagery and graphics, the school’s new marquee display measures 5.5 feet high by 12 feet wide with 15-millimeter line spacing to welcome fans and promote upcoming events and sponsors.

“Daktronics appreciates the opportunity to once again partner with SD Mines for these display upgrades at O’Harra Stadium,” said Matt Warnke, Daktronics sales representative. “This technology will help in taking the game-day environment to the next level. We look forward to the football season and the 2018 track season to see the impact of these displays.”

Additionally, a game clock/running clock will be installed for the football and track seasons measuring 4 feet high by 14 feet wide. Two play clocks will cap off the stadium’s upgrades to keep fans immersed in the action throughout each event.

Founded in 1885, the South Dakota School of Mines & Technology is a science and engineering research university located in Rapid City, offering bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral degrees. The university enrolls 2,859 students with a student-to-faculty ratio of 15:1. The SD School of Mines placement rate is 96 percent, with an average starting salary of $62,929.