Teaching Design For Energy Sustainability

“Increasingly, investors are diversifying their portfolios by investing in companies that set industrywide best practices with regard to sustainability”1. Sustainability has become yet another universal trend, besides total quality management, six sigma and total customer satisfaction, that businesses and industries must adapt to remain competitive in the global market. Industries are adapting to Corporate Sustainability and, as a result, engineers must be trained to help their employers to stay in compliance with, and excel in, this investor-driven economic atmosphere. Sustainability has everything to do with a harmonious co-existence of the economy, society and the environment 3, 4. It is proposed that we view energy as the common thread that holds these three sectors together in an optimized fashion. A vision is cast in which the application of the principle of energy sustainability is incorporated into all engineering designs. Discussion is made on why sustainability should be considered as part of the design criteria much like that of economic feasibility of any acceptable engineering design projects10. Sustainability means different things to different groups,4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 16 in the context of this paper, energy sustainability is defined as the ability to fuel the world’s economic engine in support of its economic growth by minimizing the use of fossil fuels to the extent that there is no associated environmental impact. A design for energy sustainability, therefore, is a design of inherent energy saving systems. This could take in the form of specifying renewable resources or taking into account measures to slow down the depletion of non-renewable resources or a combination thereof. This could mean design for energy effectiveness via fuel choice, conversion efficiency, operational controllability via either automatic or self-learning process, etc. A course designed to teach energy sustainability is proposed. It embraces the philosophy that true energy sustainability must be a combined effort of end-of-pipe behavior and that at the command and control. A list of examples is made to cite lack of energy saving sensitivity in the real world both at the point of use as well as in the design process. Discussion is made concerning how they could have been designed differently had the principle of sustainability been invoked or practiced17, 18. It is concluded that true sustainability can only be achieved if energy sustainability can first be achieved. Page 8.060.1 Proceedings of the 2003 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright 2003, American Society for Engineering Education Introduction Businesses and industries are under intense pressure to embrace policy of sustainability or face economic reprisal by the investment community1. At the core, sustainability makes a lot of sense. It is the ability to sustain ourselves with respect to the utilization of natural resources, the ecology and the environment. It is meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs2. Sustainability has everything to do with a harmonious co-existence of the economy, society and the environment3, 4. The economic engine requires energy to run. The society depends on economic growth and a healthy and sustainable environment to thrive and the environment requires responsible energy harvesting and utilization to be inhabitable. In light of this interdependence, it is proposed that we view energy as the common thread that holds these three sectors together in an optimized fashion. Many, if not most, publications5, 6, 7, 8, 9 on the subject of sustainability, and its subset of engineering for sustainability, have been focused on the management aspects of the issue. Nothing is wrong with this approach except that it is philosophical and policy-oriented. Since sustainability is such a worldwide and urgent issue, a more concrete approach is needed—one that advocates practical actions. This paper is aiming at achieving this goal along the finite domain approach__solving a large and complicated problem one domain or element at a time. And the problem at hand is energy sustainability. Since sustainability means different things to different groups,4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 16 in the context of this paper, energy sustainability is defined as the ability to fuel the world’s economic engine in support of its economic growth by minimizing the use of fossil fuels to the extent that there is no associated environmental impact. If energy sustainability means engineering ability to design to the compliance of corporate sustainability policy, then future engineers (engineering students) must be trained and equipped with the know-how and creativity of engineering to explore new venues, to develop new methods and to enhance the existing efficiency. But all those could not be accomplished if the engineers being educated today are not aware of the immense responsibility expected of them concerning future generations. Practicing energy sustainability, however, does not mean that today’s generation must sacrifice its life style so that the generations to come can live (it does not have to be that dramatic or traumatic although it would be noble if the situation so demands). Practicing energy sustainability, however, does mean significantly slowing down the rate of borrowing energy from tomorrow. This can be accomplished by enhancing current energy efficiency and transformability from fossil fuel resources as well as making options for renewable fuel resources more cost effective. How to impart the urgency of this sustainability message to today’s generation of engineers is the topic that we will explore in this paper. The role of higher education was well highlighted, and rightly so, in connection with the subject of sustainability: “Higher education prepares most of the professionals who develop, lead, manage, teach, work in and influence society's institutions. It plays a critical role in creating and disseminating the knowledge, skills and values for society”10 P ge 8.060.2 Proceedings of the 2003 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright 2003, American Society for Engineering Education An Engineering Vision Who would have thought, even a decade ago, that oceanic oil tankers with double hull design could have become second nature to design engineers today? It may have required many oil spill catastrophes, culminating with the Exxon Valdez, to make design of double hull a second nature. But it has become second nature nonetheless. Who can today imagine any engineering designs or solutions done without economic analysis? It, too, has become second nature to engineers of this generation. Engineering solutions cannot stay aloof and be judged solely on their technological basis. Economic justification will set them apart. On the same bases of the above two examples, the author is casting a vision that engineers working on energy systems will, as a matter of second nature, take into accounts the strategies for energy sustainability in all facets of engineering design, purchase, installation and operation decision making. First, the Energy Picture On the front of global energy utilization, we, the people, are conducting ourselves in the most illogical manner that can be imagined. Not only are we using the most of what we have the least as shown in figure 1 and 2, we are subjecting the least available resources to the most accelerated depletion rate as shown in figure 3 and 412. The only plausible explanation to this irrationality is expediency. A quick solution, albeit a solution, may ultimately be undesirable. Figure 1—World Fuel Reserve. Figure 2—World Fuel Consumption Coal is most abundantly available. Coal is the least used fuel resource. (EIA Annual 2000) (EIA Annual 2000) World Fuel Reserves (2000)