Glossary
Stationary Engineer Terms & Vocabulary
15 essential stationary engineer terms with plain-English definitions: the vocabulary you’ll hear in training and on day one.
Key stationary engineer vocabulary
These 15 terms come up constantly in stationary engineer training, on the job and in interviews. Knowing them helps you follow instructions, document accurately and sound prepared.
- Air handler
- Moves conditioned air.
- BAS
- Building automation system.
- Blowdown
- Removing boiler water to control solids.
- Boiler
- Produces hot water or steam.
- Chiller
- Produces chilled water for cooling.
- CMMS
- Maintenance management software.
- Condensate
- Water from condensed steam.
- Cooling tower
- Rejects heat from chillers.
- Low-water cutoff
- Shuts a boiler down if water is low.
- Preventive maintenance
- Scheduled maintenance.
- Refrigerant
- Fluid that carries heat.
- Safety valve
- Releases excess boiler pressure.
- Setpoint
- A target value.
- VFD
- Variable frequency drive.
- Water treatment
- Chemicals that protect boilers.
Practice these terms
Test yourself with the free Stationary Engineer practice test: it includes vocabulary questions built from this list. For a complete course, see Stationary Engineer training.
Browse terms from every career in our career glossary.