\u201cWe\u2019re trying to look at energy data in order to identify problems in the system, such as being able to tell that your heating and cooling controls aren\u2019t working right or your refrigeration system is not working as efficiently as it used to, and why that is,\u201d mechanical engineering professor Brent Nelson<\/strong> said. \u201cLots of times with these faults we\u2019re just throwing energy away\u2014wasting it because something\u2019s not working right, a heating valve is stuck open, or something.”<\/p>\n \u201cThat helps NAU, because if they can know where those faults are they can fix them, and we can reduce our energy consumption.\u201d<\/p>\n The project started with Ben Ruddell<\/strong>, an associate professor in the School of Informatics, Computing, and Cyber Security<\/a>, and Karin Wadsack<\/strong>, a project director in the School of Earth and Sustainability<\/a>. Wadsack was co-chair of the campus\u2019s energy action team for the environmental caucus with Jon Heitzinger<\/strong>, associate director of utility services, and they, along with then-sustainability manager Ellen Vaughan<\/strong>, discussed the sheer amount of data NAU collected on electricity, natural gas and water usage.<\/p>\n From there, a marriage of convenience materialized. The university has all of this data, but no one has time to analyze it. Professors had students who needed research and analysis experience who wanted to take on problems similar to what they\u2019ll experience in their careers later. SES professor Erik Nielsen<\/strong>, who along with Wadsack teaches in the Climate Science & Solutions master\u2019s program<\/a>, mechanical engineering lecturer Jennifer Wade <\/strong>and Nelson joined Ruddell and Wadsack on the academic side, recruiting graduate and undergraduate students to analyze data, write reports and reach conclusions that in some cases could be put to use.<\/p>\n \u201cWe figured out a way to bring together our student projects, including both research projects and student coursework, with what campus facilities is doing on energy systems,\u201d Ruddell said. \u201cThe goal there is to give students real-world experience and also to provide applied value to campus.\u201d<\/p>\n We all know colleges and universities have labs and do research. In a living laboratory, the entire campus and community is an innovative, user-driven laboratory. NAU is building on this concept with its diverse array of student research projects focused on energy efficiency.<\/p>\n Student power is one of the major natural resources of the university, one Nelson was quick to employ. He contacted undergraduate students who were eager to get research experience before applying to graduate school or looking for work. The skills required for this type of work, including data collection and analysis, creating and troubleshooting potential solutions and communication, all are skills engineers need in any type of work they\u2019ll go into.<\/p>\n It\u2019s not just engineers, either. The same is true in most fields where working with data is part of the job description, Wadsack said.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s really important, if the students are going to be data scientists in the real world, whether in informatics, engineering or environmental sciences, that they actually get practice in learning how to deal with those situations,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n Climate science and solutions master\u2019s student Kyle England<\/strong> said this project provided experience using Excel to collect and analyze data, professional writing and presentations, and this project is on his resume. And that\u2019s not all.<\/p>\n \u201cIt is important to the overall goal of sustainability at NAU, as the results from these projects can help inform decisions made to improve the university,\u201d he said. \u201cThese projects are time-consuming, and those in charge of higher level sustainability and energy decisions simply don\u2019t have enough time to get to every little project.\u201d<\/p>\n Projects became internships, capstone courses and graduate-level research, with students looking at campuswide energy use, potential improvements to campus buildings as well as water use and solar panel use throughout the city of Flagstaff. For Taylor Asher<\/strong>, also a grad student in Wadsack\u2019s class, knowing this was real work that could be used to benefit the university made it that much more important.<\/p>\n \u201cDoing the energy analysis was probably the reason that I got my summer internship with Chugach Electric Association, the largest electric provider in Anchorage,\u201d she said. \u201cI see a huge opportunity for many more similar projects. It would even be worth employing students to work on similar projects of the university. It\u2019s a win-win.\u201d<\/p>\n Ruddell created a nationwide program that tracks communities\u2019 supply chains using millions of data points. Without information, he says, people cannot make informed decisions. Knowledge in this case literally is power.<\/p>\n \u201cWe need data to do this,\u201d Ruddell said. \u201cWe can\u2019t spot problems and inefficiencies in campus energy use or in sustainability unless we collect data. It\u2019s extremely important that universities that care about sustainability invest in data collection and in tracking things like energy use. There\u2019s nothing we can do unless someone\u2019s collecting the raw numbers.\u201d<\/p>\n While he\u2019d like more and better data, the information that is available gives researchers insight into what is happening related to energy and water usage throughout campus. One project, which master\u2019s student Amin <\/strong>Sepehri<\/span><\/strong>\u00a0did for his informatics class with Ruddell, studied the HVAC system, finding the strategies in use to control HVAC systems weren\u2019t running properly. He wrote a computer program that looked at operational data and identified some faults, which Facility Services employees then could fix. He also analyzed the feasibility of a new thermal energy storage system for the university.<\/p>\n \u201cWe know the need for a sustainable energy supply is becoming more important with declining fossil resources, environmental pollution and climate change,\u201d he said. \u201cAs a conscientious engineer, I want to be a part of the solutions that can prevent environmental calamities.\u201d<\/p>\n While he worked with Nelson on those projects, Nelson also oversaw undergrads Kylie Dykstra<\/strong>, Daisy Liguori<\/strong> and Blake Hallauer<\/strong> who looked at NAU\u2019s energy consumption data to see where he could detect and diagnose faults\u2014areas that use more energy than they should be because of an error. Sometimes, that is simple\u2014a building shouldn\u2019t be running the heater and the air conditioner at the same time. Other times, such as with buildings where a variety of different types of research are happening, it\u2019s not that simple.<\/p>\n Again, they analyzed the data, looking for numbers that didn\u2019t seem to fit and could indicate faults that cost the university money.<\/p>\n \u201cMy undergrad team found a few problems early on, and we let Jon know right away that these are things that are hemorrhaging energy,\u201d Nelson said. \u201cIf you\u2019re wasting energy, you\u2019re wasting emissions too. He\u2019s gotten them resolved quickly.\u201d<\/p>\n Graduate students in another of Nelson\u2019s classes looked at what caused the energy peaks. North and south campus are metered separately, and north campus has a single peak time, but south campus had two. With more residence halls on the south, student researchers determined the evening peak was caused by students getting home, and it was correlated with sunrise and sunset, meaning light was probably the biggest factor in that peak. An easy solution? Energy efficient light bulbs.<\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s most of what you can do,\u201d Nelson said. \u201cIf you look at energy demand profiles throughout different parts of the country throughout the year, you can see in terms of occupant behavior what\u2019s causing them. This is when people are coming home from work or waking up and plugging in coffee pots. You can actually see those peaks in load profiles.\u201d<\/p>\n The Climate Science and Solutions class that Wadsack and Nielsen taught in the spring was divided into three groups, each tasked with analyzing a specific question the energy action team asked.<\/p>\n \u201cThey were supposed to really think about all aspects of the problem,\u201d Wadsack said. \u201cThey\u2019re not actually doing that improvement in a vacuum. You have to take other things into account. There are ways you can do infrastructure projects in a building where you work around some issues, but you can\u2019t just pretend it\u2019s not there.\u201d<\/p>\n Kyle England was part of the first group, which asked about updated insulation in Gammage. A number of years ago, NAU installed a unique type of insulation in Blome, which changes from liquid to solid as it changes temperature, which helps to keep the ambient temperature in the building steady. This had been a problem in Blome, with employees complaining about being too cold in the winter and too hot in the summer, so they were uncomfortable in their offices. The new insulation fixed that problem. England and his partner used energy data and conducted interviews to determine if a similar intervention would help in Gammage. Short answer? Yes.<\/p>\n Long answer? Thanks to the new insulation, the university is saving money on heating and cooling Blome; the upfront expense would be quickly recouped. But the biggest benefits aren\u2019t financial.<\/p>\n \u201cMore importantly, the people who work in the building are more comfortable,\u201d Wadsack said. \u201cIf you have someone who goes to work and needs a space heater and a sweater to be warm, they may be less productive and don\u2019t really think of their work environment as a friendly habitat. If we fix that, they can be more focused on whether they\u2019re enjoying the job and doing it well.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThe students that worked on Geology said in their paper, \u2018We\u2019ve been uncomfortable in Geology,\u2019\u201d Wadsack said. \u201cIf they think their recommendations could make a difference, could help future students and faculty be more productive, if they could use their data analysis to help someone on campus make decisions about the future of buildings, to them it\u2019s really powerful.\u201d<\/p>\n The third group had a different task: to predict energy usage of buildings. They analyzed all available utility data, including electricity, natural gas and water, to attempt to create a statistical regression model designed to predict what usage would look like in a new building. They couldn\u2019t do it, Wadsack said\u2014not because the data didn\u2019t exist, but because there was simply too much of it and it wasn\u2019t specific enough. For instance, the Babbitt Administrative Center was in the same classification as the Health and Learning Center\u2014two buildings with very different purposes and setups. More time and more detailed data could potentially achieve this.<\/p>\n At the end of the spring semester, the groups presented their findings to the class and to Vaughan and Heitzinger, who then offered feedback. The groups incorporated that feedback into the final report and turned it into Nielsen and Wadsack to be graded and Vaughan and Heitzinger to be used in future planning projects.<\/p>\n England, who studied Gammage\u2019s insulation, isn\u2019t done. This semester, he plans to study the data for the summer and fall (for his class project, he only had time to study winter) and use that information to offer a more complete picture of the potential savings of the new insulation.<\/p>\n \u201cThe ultimate goal is to get a Green Fund proposal going to have this phase change material installed in the Gammage Building,\u201d he said. \u201cWhat I am able to do with this project during the fall semester will depend a lot on data availability and how much extra time I have for a side project.\u201d<\/p>\n Wadsack is hoping future students will be interested in a different kind of project. She\u2019d like someone to take on management of the data\u2014cleaning it up so students can analyze it, finding holes, putting it all into one easy-to-access place so future classes can look at this data plus all the projects and analysis classes are doing now. Without good data, good solutions are almost impossible.<\/p>\n \u201cIs it useful? Is it measuring things correctly? There are certain meters that just roll over every now and then, so if you\u2019re not paying attention, you can end up with screwy measurements or data, or you think you\u2019re measuring something and it turns out you\u2019re not,\u201d Wadsack said. \u201cTeaching students how to deal with messy data or incomplete data or data that needs different kinds of manipulations or transformations is actually something we already do here.\u201d<\/p>\n She also is collaborating with the other educators whose students are working on these projects to create a repository for all of the data, analyses, presentations and reports that have been done. This way, future classes will know what has and hasn\u2019t been done, what data are missing and what questions needed additional work than a semester-long project allowed, and they can build on the research instead of doing it over again.<\/p>\n Heidi Toth |\u00a0NAU CommunicationsLiving laboratories<\/strong><\/h3>\n
![\"Kyle](\"http:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wordpresst\/uploads\/sites\/153\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/Kyle-England-241x300.jpg\")
<\/a>![\"Taylor](\"http:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wordpresst\/uploads\/sites\/153\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/Taylor-300x221.png\")
<\/a>Data-led solutions<\/strong><\/h3>\n
![\"Amin](\"http:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wordpresst\/uploads\/sites\/153\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/Amin-225x300.jpeg\")
<\/a>Energy consulting<\/strong><\/h3>\n
![\"Gammage](\"http:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wordpresst\/uploads\/sites\/153\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/nau-osfa-gammage-1-300x200.jpg\")
<\/a>![\"Liberal](\"http:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wordpresst\/uploads\/sites\/153\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/Liberal_Arts_dsc7822_28123177386_o-200x300.jpg\")
<\/a>The second group did a feasibility study on a LEED retrofit on the Geology building. Using the Liberal Arts building as a comparison, students analyzed the benefits of retrofitting the Geology building to get LEED certification. Their conclusion? It\u2019s complicated. The LEED certification offers points for things like using electricity and encouraging non-car commuting, so adding bike racks and a shower, recycling and using low-impact materials on construction materials all could help. However, the buildings were difficult to compare because they were structurally different, so the students couldn\u2019t conclude a similar retrofit would be as efficient.<\/p>\nNext steps<\/strong><\/h3>\n
\n![\"NAU](\"http:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wordpresst\/uploads\/sites\/153\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/NAU_primary-281_3514-1-300x213.png\")
<\/a><\/p>\n
\n(928) 523-8737 | heidi.toth@nau.edu<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"