My new shop at the River House has a single lally column located in the middle. Initially, I thought this would be highly undesirable. When I laid out my shop equipment, however, it became apparent that this would be the perfect means for dropping power to the machines which will be centrally located. Today, I built a square column around the round one and installed four 120V outlets and four 240V outlets upon it which will be used to power my table saw, bandsaw, jointer/planar, and router table with several spares. The base of the column and floor molding through the basement is built out of a rice hull-based product that is impervious to water. Should the basement ever flood, we can sustain 5-1/2″ of water before the drywall or plywood becomes exposed.