The Philosophy of Engineering for the Burj Khalifa- The world’s tallest structure

I attended a special lecture by Lawrence C. Novak which is organized by the civil engineering department of the University of Texas Arlington. In the lecture, the guest speaker, Novak, spoke about the world's tallest building, " Burj Khalifa", which is built in Dubai.

Burj Khalifa

The faculty member of civil engineering introduced the speaker, Lawrence C. Novak, to the audience as the Director of Engineering Buildings of the Portland Cement Association. He has served as the lead structural engineer for the Burj Khalifa, the world’s tallest building while he was an Associate Partner with Skidmore, Owings & Merrill. Moreover, the faculty member introduced Novak as an impressive interactive demonstrator. Novak introduced himself and then continued the talk towards the world’s tallest buildings. Then he directed the conversation towards the Burj. He emphasized the structure, and wind engineering.

Novak used a chart to show where Burj stands when he lists the tallest buildings. It is a building which has a height of 2716.5 feet which is considered as the tallest building and the freestanding structure in the world. It is a multipurpose building consisting of residencies, cooperate suits, hotels, and recreation facilities with an observation deck on the level of 124.  The structure itself has an attractive floor design which a shape of “Y” has based on the flower hymenocallis. He said that it is a popular design in Islamic architecture.  This building is composed arranging three elements around the central core. The stability of the building depends on the three elements around the center.

Burj is a tall structure. Therefore, Novak said that the wind was a major problem to them because it swings when there is a wind. In addition to wind issue, there were more problems they had to overcome. One of them is pressure and temperature changes with the height and its effects of the building with the weather conditions in Dubai.