Technical buildings come in a wide array of types and can be utilized to house and protect essential equipment and keep your facility up and running. From electrical buildings to control rooms to instrumentation houses, they offer the ability to protect people and equipment from the harsh conditions of the environment where they are typically deployed.

If you’re unsure exactly what a technical building is, you can learn more about them and the different types on the Armoda blog.

Armoda has deployed technical buildings in many places around the globe. Because of their many uses, these buildings have been used across a wide range of industries. This article will go over the primary sectors that technical buildings can be found and how they support each industry.

Technical Buildings in Refineries

Oil refineries are industrial plants where crude oil is processed and refined into various products. These products include liquid petroleum gas (LPG), gasoline, diesel, jet fuel, and others. These refineries take up large amounts of space, with some larger refineries spanning hundreds of acres.

Spread across these facilities are large pieces of industrial equipment which have a high demand for electricity.Technical buildings provide housing and protection to the electrical distribution equipment necessary to provide power across these massive facilities and the monitoring and control instruments needed to keep them up and running.

Types of Technical Buildings Found in Refineries:

• Power Control Center (PCC)
• Electrical Houses (E House)
• Control Rooms

Technical Buildings in Offshore Production

In offshore production, oil is drilled from wells at the ocean floor and brought to the surface where a host facility collects crude oil. These facilities range in type, depending on the location of the wells.

In shallower water, fixed platforms and tension leg platforms (TLP) are used. As the water depth increases, semi-submersibles, spar platforms, and other types of facilities are used. All of these production facilities run their own utilities and are completely self-contained.

To accomplish this self-containment in both a marine and drilling environment means that all the electrical equipment, instruments, controls, motors, and the like are housed in technical buildings that meet the required offshore certifications such as Zone I / II, Division 1 / 2, SOLAS, ABS, USCG, and others.

Types of Technical Buildings Found in Offshore Production:

• Control Rooms
• MCC Buildings (Motor Control Center)
• Electrical Rooms

Technical Buildings in Petrochemical Plants

Petrochemical plants are like oil refineries, in that they use crude oil as a building block to produce a wide range of products. They differ in the products that they produce, as petrochemical plants create ethylene, propylene, butadiene, aromatics, and others. These products are then used to make many of the items we all use every day, including plastics, soaps, medicine, clothing, and much more.

These plants are also expansive in size and utilize equipment that draws large amounts of electricity to run. Technical buildings are deployed across the plant to provide and protect electrical distribution equipment, monitoring equipment, and control rooms.

Technical Buildings Found in the Petrochemical Industry:

• Local Instrument Enclosure
• Remote Instrument Enclosure
• Integrated Power Room

Technical Buildings in Pipelines

Pipelines are used to safely transport crude oil to refineries and petrochemical plants. They are then used again to transport the refined material such as gasoline, diesel, and heating oil to their next destination, such as terminals.

Pipelines can span hundreds of miles across multiple countries, moving 100,000+ barrels per day. Technical buildings are constructed along the pipeline to provide the power and equipment necessary to keep the materials moving.

Technical Buildings Found in the Pipeline Industry:

• Transformer and Distribution Center
• MCC Building (Motor Control Center)

Technical Buildings in the Renewables Sector

Solar and wind farms are often located in remote areas, on land and at sea. As they collect the electrical power, they require a transmission substation to convert the energy to higher voltages for transmission from these remote locations to the power grid.

At the receiving end, another station converts the power to lower voltages and is then sent along to the distribution grid that connects the power to the end consumer. Wind turbines are also beginning to incorporate batteries, enabling them to maintain a more consistent power output than a traditional turbine. Technical buildings provide housing and protection for the substations and batteries at these remote facilities.

Technical Buildings Found in Renewable Industry:

• Renewable Energy Enclosure
• Solar Battery Enclosure
• Transformer and Distribution Center

Technical Buildings in Utilities

Once power is generated either by nuclear, hydro, or coal, it needs to be converted for transmission out of the plants to distribution points where it is converted and supplied to end-users. Technical buildings are used at both ends of this process.

Beginning at the power production facility, they house and protect equipment, such as transformers and switches, and convert the power for transmission. At the receiving end, they reverse the process to enable power to be more easily distributed.

Technical Buildings Found in Utilities Industry:

• Substation Modules
• Remote Instrument Enclosures
• E-House

Technical Buildings Are Used In Information Technology (IT)

In the information technology sector, the need for server and equipment buildings is continually growing. Technical buildings are utilized to provide data storage for critical information, housing of equipment for render farms or bitcoin mining, and protecting servers in remote locations and secondary location backups.

Technical Buildings Found in the IT Industry:

• Data Centers
• Power Control Center

These are some of the primary industries which use technical buildings today. These buildings provide housing and protection to the equipment necessary to keep these industries running. If you need a technical building, Armoda has the design and engineering experience to provide fully customized buildings that fit your exact industry and needs. Contact us here with any questions you may have about how a technical building could fit into your industry.