Chars were produced from two coals (North Dakota lignite and Pittsburgh No. 8 hva bituminous coal) in a flat flame burner at atmospheric pressure. Intrinsic char reactivities to oxygen were then measured in a high-pressure thermogravimetric analyzer as a function of temperature, total pressure, and partial pressure of oxygen. Care was taken to avoid mass transfer effects. Reactivities were normalized by the available mass of char at any given time (g/(g avail ‚s)). Reactivity data were obtained over a wide range of char burnout and were found to be independent of burnout level between char burnouts of 20 and 60%. Data were obtained at pressures from 1 to 32 atm and at temperatures from 598 to 823 K and were analyzed using the nth order rate law and Arrhenius temperature dependence. The reaction order of each char was shown to be constant at 0.7 for total pressures ranging from 1 to 32 atm and for partial pressures of oxygen ranging from 0.03 to 12.8 atm, and was essentially the same for both chars. Activation energies determined for each char were also determined to be constant with total pressure and partial pressure of O 2 .

Sixty‐three professionals in the field of interior design were asked about the importance of competencies for interior design entry‐level positions and the importance of learning the competency at school or work. The forty competencies were chosen from areas that the Foundation of Interior Design Education and Research (FIDER) suggested for inclusion in a comprehensive interior design curriculum. Professionals in this study indicated that oral communication skills, furniture arrangement, space planning, and color theory were more important for entry‐level positions in interior design than the technical competencies of lettering and line drawing, elevation drawings, use of technical drafting equipment, and freehand sketching. The respondents also indicated that history of architecture, perspective drawing, color theory, and lettering and line drawing were competencies which should be learned at school rather than in work experience.

Summary Interior environments are directly affected by the transmission of heat energy through unprotected windows. At the point of transmission at the window plane, various methods of creating a barrier can be constructed to obstruct the energy transmission by modifying the air convection loops that pass in front of the window. Drapery is likely to be the most widely accepted and applied method of shielding the window. There are endless varieties of drapery fabric that are available for use for drapery construction. The drapery used in this research was “Meta‐lon” aluminized drapery because of the advertised energy‐saving quality. When tested in the Test Unit Controlled Environment (TUCE), the Metalon drapery provided a barrier for the transmission of heat to the interior air volume of the TUCE. The drapery displayed the ability to transmit less of the absorbed heat from the fabric than conventional drapery. As a result of lower heat transmission rates than ordinary drapery fabric, the air plane on the interior room side of the drapery absorbed less transmitted energy. Therefore, the natural convective loops that normally disperse the heat energy were cooler than those tested with the application of the conventional drapery. The use of the aluminum impregnated drapery can provide energy savings when combined with proper drapery management (opening and closing drapery at the proper time in the day according to needs).