Sustainability in beauty an innovative proposing learning model to inspire renewable energy education

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Sustainability in Beauty: An Innovative ProposingLearning Model toInspire Renewable Energy EducationPosted By Ting Tan On January 17, 2015 @ 9:31 pm In Departments,EducationSetting,Geography,Higher Education,North America,Scholarly Feature | No Comments

Abstract

Renewable energy has become an important priority to the development of human society. Theauthors proposed an innovative “ProposingLearning” model to improve the renewable energyeducation at the university level, in which the student community was extensively involved in theselection, development and assessment of a capstone project. In this project, a hybrid energyharvesting system prototype comprised of a bamboo wind turbine and solar panels was developed atthe University of Vermont. The project idea was initially proposed through an online collectiveintelligence voting system, and then discussed in a committee comprised of students, faculty, staffand alumni members. A group of undergraduate students, representing different engineeringdisciplines, worked with the faculty advisors to create the prototype successfully. Good assessmentwas received from the students and local community for the project. Finally, the authors discussedthe future effort to improve this education model and the potential applications of the hybridrenewable energy system.

Keywords: Sustainability, Renewable Energy, Education, Bamboo, Hybrid Energy System, WindTurbine

Introduction

The utilization of renewable energy has become an important priority to the development of humansociety because it generates less greenhouse gas emissions than traditional energy sources(Jenning, 2009; Turner, 1999). The primary types of renewable energy include wind, solar, biofuels,geothermal and hydro power (Rosentrater and AlKalaani, 2006). It is reported that the installedcapacities of renewable energy sources contribute 16.3% of U.S. total energy consumption by 2014(Office of Energy Projects, 2014). Meanwhile, midterm goals have been established for individualrenewable energy sources. For example, the U.S. Department of Energy aims at supplying at least20% of the nation’s electricity from wind power by 2030 (US DOE, 2008).

Technical features of the wind and solar energy infrastructure often enable them incorporated intothe curriculums at schools to enhance the handson experience in renewable energy education, suchas capstone design projects (Pecen and Nayir, 2010; Belu, 2011; Anderson et al., 2011). Despitethese efforts, limited work exists to address two important aspects in renewable energy education.First, thoughts from students within the broader student community, not only the project members,could be better considered during the selection, development and assessment stages of the projectsto extend the project’s societal relevance. Currently, the faculty members propose the projects, andthe students join the project as team members to accomplish the tasks. Students outside theproject team have little impact on the design goals of the proposed projects. Second, the interrelationships between the energy infrastructure and the natural environment could be strengthenedby developing more environmentally adaptable energy systems. For example, concerns are alwaysexpressed to wind turbine systems due to their intrusiveness to surrounding environment, such astheir impacts on the landscape and the animals. Inclusion of natural materials in the design couldalso improve sustainable engineering to the natural world.

The objective of this paper is to implement an innovative “ProposingLearning” model to improve the



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Fig. 1 (a)

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Fig. 1 (a) A Moso bamboo stalk in the field; (b) An opticalimage of functionally graded bamboo cross section. Thedark areas are the fibers; while the light areas are theparenchyma matrices (Adapted from Tan et al., 2011)

renewable energy education at the university level by addressing these concerns. In this work, ahybrid renewable energy system was developed using a bamboo wind turbine and solar panels atthe University of Vermont. The paper is organized around the background of natural bamboo, theselection, development and assessment of the project.

Bamboo

Bamboo, comprised of hierarchical fiber and parenchyma structures, is a natural fiberreinforcedcomposite that evolves to resist wind loads (Fig. 1a). It is a group of perennial grasses in the grassfamily Poaceae, subfamily Bambusoideae, tribe Bambuseae (Liese, 1998). It grows in many tropicaland temperature regions. The global bamboo forest is approximately 65,520 square kilometres(Lobovikov et al. 2007), 65% of which is in Asia. Bamboo is among the fastestgrowing plants in theworld (Farrelly, 1996), whose growth is based on the vegetative reproduction (Janssen, 2000;Banik, 1995). During this process, new rhizomes grow out of the ground to produce a secondaryculm until the culm reaches a stable size (Chapman, 1996). Some large bamboo can reach theheight of 15 to 30 m in about 2 to 4 months. An estimation classified bamboo into 75 genera andapproximately 1500 species (Liese, 1998). Moso (Phyllostachys heterocycla pubescens) is the mostwidely distributed bamboo in the world (Liese, 1998).

The functionally graded bamboo structure has excellent mechanical properties, such as stiffness,strength and fracture resistance (Schulgasser, 1992; Tan et al., 2011). The bamboo culm includesapproximately 40% cellulose fibers, 52% parenchyma tissue and 8% conduction tissue (Liese,1998). Sclerenchyma fibers comprise the principal supporting tissues within the vascular bundles,whose primary chemical contents are cellulose, hemicellulose and lignin (Abdul Khalil, 2010).Surrounding the vascular bundles, there are parenchyma cells (Fig. 1b). In the cross section, theratio of vascular bundles to parenchyma matrices decreases from the outside to the inside surface(Amada et al., 1997; Ghavami et al., 2003; Ray et al., 2004) (Fig. 1b). In the longitudinal direction,the narrowing of the bamboo results in a reduction of the parenchyma toward the culm head (Liese,1998). Prior studies (Amada et al., 1997; Li, 2004; Ma et al., 2008; Nogata and Takahashi, 1995)showed that the elastic moduli and tensile strengths decrease from the outside to the inside surface,while the fracture resistance increases in the same direction (Tan et al., 2011). This is because lessenergy is invested to propagate cracks by splitting the fiber fences closer to the outside thanbreaking the lignin web closer to the inside surface, in which different bridging types and intensitieswere observed (Tan et al., 2011; Tan et al., 2014).

Bamboo has beenused by humanbeings over a longtime for manyapplications. Thereare more than 1000documented uses ofbamboo (Bansal,2002). In ancientChina, bamboobooks were craftedfrom culm stripsstrung on sting torecord history(Loewe andShaughnessy,1999). Bambooculms have alsobeen successfullyused to constructlarge scalestructures,

including buildings and bridges (Fig. 2). For example, Simon Velez built a bamboo church in

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Fig. 2 (a)

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Fig. 2 (b)

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Fig. 2 (c)

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Fig. 2 (a) The bamboo church built bySimon Velez in Columbia (Adapted fromInspiration green, 2013); (b) The bamboobridge in the crosswaters town atGuangdong, China (Adapted from EDSA,2013); (c) A bamboo bicycle (Adapted fromBoobicycles, 2013); and (d) The plybambooroof at MadridBarajas airport (Adaptedfrom Lafage, 2013).

Manizales, Columbia; a structure combining grace and sustainability (Fig. 2a). Bamboo is also apromising solution to build earthquake shelters in disasters (Richard, 2013; van der Lugt, 2008). Atest bamboo house survived loads of 7.8 Kobe earthquake on a shake table (Vengala et al., 2008).The real proof occurred in 1991; approximately 20 bamboo houses survived near the epiccenter of7.5 Richter scale earthquake in Costa Rica (Janssen 2000). Beside the utilization of bamboo culms,bamboo fibers could also be blended with polymeric matrices to produce high performance fiberreinforced composites for many applications. As the evergrowing need for sustainable materials,bamboo fiber reinforced polymeric composites are widely used to manufacture various industrialproducts, such as racing bicycles (Fig. 2c), sport products and electric device packages (Tan, 2014).For example, more than 200,000 m2 plybamboo were used to build the roof at the MadridBarajasairport (Fig. 2d) (Lafarge, 2013). This award winning design project successfully synergized thesustainable materials and the daylight utilization aesthetically.

Despite these studies, limited work exists to develop wind resistant bamboo structures even thoughbamboo is born to resist wind loads. Given its intrinsic to resist winds, bamboo could be a goodmaterial to produce high performance wind turbine blades (Brøndsted et al., 2005). Driven by thisbioinspired idea, a project was proposed to create a hybrid renewable energy system comprised ofa bamboo wind turbine and solar panels, which are detailed in the following sections.

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Methods

We implemented a “ProposingLearning” model to improve renewable energy education for thestudents at the University of Vermont (UVM). The “ProposingLearning” model denotes acollaborative effort among the student community, the faculty and the administrative staff in theselection, development and assessment stages of the proposed project.

The “ProposingLearning” model synergizes the features of the “projectbased” learning model andthe “learnercentered education” model. Meanwhile, the uniqueness of the “ProposingLearning”model is based on the active involvement of the students and instructors in the selection,development and assessment stages of the projects and creating substantial impact to a widerlearner community.

1. Project selection

In the beginning, a capstone project idea entitled “A hybrid energy harvesting system comprised ofa bamboo wind turbine and solar panels” was submitted by a team consisting of faculty membersand undergraduate students to the UVM Clean Energy Fund (CEF) committee. The CEF was createdin response to students’ vision of UVM running efficiently on a fraction of its current energy needs,powered by clean, locally produced renewable energy that fulfills both the university’s needs andsupports the local economy. Approved by UVM’s Board of Trustees in 2008, a $10 per semesterstudent fee supports the fund, generating about $225,000 annually. A randomized survey of 419students showed that 68 percent would pay $10 per semester for the development of clean energyon the UVM campus.

The CEF committee is comprised of student, faculty, administrative staff and alumni members atUVM. Each year, project ideas related to clean energy are collected over the campus, which areposted online via a crowdsourcing portal to receive votes from the UVM community to rank theideas. After collecting the initial voting, the CEF committee members are fully involved in the review,discussion and selection of the proposed ideas.

In conventional capstone projects, communication only exists between two of the three sides in theprojects, i.e., the faculty, students and administrators (Fig. 3). Information could not be sharedamong the three sides simultaneously. For example, the faculty and the administrators could comeup with certain projects that may not be interesting enough to a wider student community. Or, thestudents may propose some projects to the administrators that are not be proper due to thetechnical or resource constraints. However, by forming the CEF committee, an extra dimensionenables a synergized and direct communication among all of them. The ‘ProposingLearning’ modelsubstantially stimulates the interest and involvement of the student community and strengthenstheir learning motivations.

II. Project development

We proposed a hybrid renewable energy harvesting system comprised of a bamboo wind turbine andsolar panels. The project included the design of the structural and the electrical modules. Theproject team consisted of two faculty members and four undergraduate students in the School ofEngineering at UVM. Two students in mechanical engineering focused on the structural design; whilethe other two students in electrical engineering focused on the electrical system design. Thedevelopment of the project is detailed in the following sections.

(1) General concept



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Fig. 3. A schematic of the “ProposingLearning” modelrepresented by the UVM Clean Energy Fund mechanism.The solid lines represent the twoway communicationbetween two of the three sides, i.e., the faculty, thestudents and administrators. The dash lines represent thecommunication in the committee synergizing all three sides.

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Fig. 4. A schematic of the hybridrenewable energy harvesting systemconsisting of a bamboo wind turbine andsolar panels

The hybrid renewable energy systemwas comprised of a bamboo windturbine and an array of solar panels.In the system, the energy harvestedfrom the wind turbine and the solarpanels were stored in the batterythrough an integrated control system(Fig. 4). The stored energy was thenused to power LED lights installed onthe center poles and the wind turbineblades. Beside ordinary illumination,we expected to see an aestheticallypleasing display of lights when theblades rotated. Moreover, the hybridsystem was isolated from currentpower grids. To prove the concept, aprototype of the hybrid energy systemwas developed at the University ofVermont.

(2) Structural Design

A vertical axis wind turbine (VAWT)was selected to harness the wind energy due to its goodadaptability to building roofs in urban areas (Eriksson etal., 2008; Mertens, 2003). Initially, a literature reviewwas performed to determine the design parameters ofthe VAWT systems (Johanson et al., 2014). The finalselection was a Gorlov type wind turbine (Johanson etal., 2014) with helical blades. The design parameters arelisted in Table 1, and the assembled wind turbinestructure is shown in Fig. 5c.

Fabrication of the bamboo helical blades was essential tothe project, which also directly affected the quality ofwind turbine systems. We used a threestep strategy tomanufacture the high quality helical bamboo windturbine blades. Initially, 3D printing techniques (Lipsonand Kurman, 2013) were implemented to produce innerblade skeletons using ABS polymers (Stratasys, Edina,MN). Accurate 3D geometrical models allowed precisecontrol of the airfoils, the helical curves and thethickness. To reduce weight, arrays of circular cutoutswere removed from the blade skeleton surfaces, and fivestruts were preserved to maintain the blade shape (Fig.

5a). Then, bamboo laminates were wrapped around the polymeric skeletons to form the bladesurfaces. Oneinch bamboo strips were attached to the skeletons from bottom to top using the PVAglue (Lineco Inc., Holyoke, MA). Prior layer surfaces were sand polished before the next layer wasattached (Fig. 5b). Finally, the vacuum infusion method (Tan et al., 2013) was used to achieve theblade finish by placing the covered blade skeletons and EcoPoxy (Ecopoxy Inc., Canada) in vacuumfor the final curing. Furthermore, 3D printed connectors were also created to link the blades and thevertical rotating shaft to horizontal bamboo frames. Beside wind turbine blades, structures were alsodesigned for the electricity transfer module and the turbinepole connection. To transfer electricityfrom the battery to the lights on rotating blades, a slipring system was developed using conductingbrushes and metallic contacts. In addition, aluminum structural components were manufactured forboth the center pole and the turbinepole connection (Fig. 5c).

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Fig. 5 (a) [10]

Fig. 5 (b)

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Fig. 5. Development ofthe bamboo windturbine structure (a) a3D printed polymericskeleton for the helicalwind turbine blades;(b) a fabricatedbamboo laminatedcovered wind turbineblade skeleton; and(c) the assembledwind turbine structureon the roof.

Table 1. Design parameters forthe vertical axis wind turbinesystem

Type Height(m)

Diameter(m)

AspectRatio(H/D)

PitchAngle(degrees)

TwistAngle(degrees)

Airfoil

VAWT 0.53 0.44 1.2 60 80 NACA 0018*

* Timmer, 2001

(3) Electrical System Design

The control system (Xia et al., 2003, Franco et al., 2004) was implemented using a microcontrollerto perform multiple functions, which included regulating the battery charge and voltage supply,monitoring the motor and solar panels and controlling the LED light patterns. Meanwhile, it alsocontrolled a driver circuit to provide a startup driving force to start the motor rotation byovercoming the initial large torque of motor device.

For the electrical aspect, the system must be able to effectively harvest energy so as to generatesufficient voltage from the sunlight and the wind for the battery charging, which is responsible topower on a set of LED lights. For safety consideration, it is important to protect the battery fromovercharging or over draining, and to control and switch power source for the battery chargingbetween the solar panel and the wind turbine. The proposed control circuit design (Xia et al., 2007,






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Fig. 6 (a) Printed circuit board layout

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Fig. 6 (b) A picture of the fabricatedcontrol circuit board.

2008) is shown in Fig. 6a. The output voltages generated from the motor and the solar panel weretreated as analog input signals to the microcontroller. The microcontroller was programmed toconnect either wind turbine motor or solar panel output signal to the battery for power chargingwhile leaves the other one open. The battery terminal voltage level was sampled and monitored byan analog to digital converter (ADC) circuit inside the microcontroller, which protects the batteryfrom being overcharged or over drained. Once the voltage level is monitored beyond or below thepreset threshold values, control circuit will act to disconnect the battery from the power source orthe LED lights. The proposed circuit had been designed and tested. Fig. 6a shows the layout of theprinted circuit board (PCB), and Fig. 6b illustrates the fabricated circuit board with circuitcomponents populated. The PCB was a two sided, high performance board, including plated throughholes, a top layer silkscreen, and a solder mask to prevent trace oxidation. Banana connectorswere placed on each power node to prevent shorts between sources and ground so as to achievehigh reliability. LED lights were connected via standard receptacle connectors through single rowheader pins and controlled by the microcontroller, which switch the lights on or off states betweennighttime and the daytime.

III. Projectassessment

The projectteam wasassessedthroughout atwo semestercapstonedesign coursewithdeliverables,designreports anddesign

presentations. A demonstration of the prototype and the results of device testing were also required.A poster and video were authored and presented at the Design Night, an event that the localresidents in Burlington areas could attend. Lastly, three exams were used to determine the learningof each student team member related to the project performance. Exams, deliverables and designreports were graded by the course instructors and design presentation evaluated by peers, industrymembers and faculty.

Results

1. Project selection

The selection of the hybrid project included both the online review and the committee paneldiscussions, during which the UVM students were extensively involved in. In the online review, ideason renewable energy were collected and shared within the UVM community. Each person with a UVMemail address could log into the Clean Energy Fund system and vote for the favorable ideas. Thevoting numbers were collected on both the numbers of thumbs up (“like”) and thumbs down(“dislike”). The net votes were calculated by subtracting the “dislike” from the “like” numbers. If the“dislike” numbers exceed the “like” numbers, a negative number appears for the net votes. In realtime, UVM campus members could see posted ideas elevating up or down based on net votes.

A quantitative analysis was performed to evaluate the results in the online review stage. There were





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Fig. 7. Distributions of (a) the total votes

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Fig. 7. Distributions of (b) the supporting rate

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Fig. 7. Distributions of (c) the average net cost for all theproposals.

38 ideas submitted to the UVM Clean Energy Fund committee in 201213. The indices were definedas follows. Total votes were the numbers consisting of all the “like” and “dislike” votes. Supportingrates were the ratios between the “like” and the total votes. The average net cost was the ratiobetween the proposed budget dollars and the net votes, representing the costeffectiveness of theproposal. Because some proposals did not include a budget number, a zero value was assigned tothe average net cost. The hybrid energy system was the NO. 5 proposed idea in the array. In Figs.7a and 7b, the data showed that the NO.5 proposal won substantial popularity (total votes) and thesupporting rates. In Fig.7c, it showed that average net cost of the hybrid project was close to thelow end in the proposed ideas.

Before the panel discussion, the hybrid team was invited to present the proposed idea to thecommittee for potential questions. After that, several committee meetings were organized to discussthe proposed ideas based on the innovation, the budget plan, the project team, and the resultscollected from online review stage. Finally, the award decision was notified to the hybrid team.Students, not only the project members, but also the committee members and the voters, activelyparticipated in the entire selection process. Both vote results and the final decision exhibited thatthis ”ProposingLearning” mechanism was effective in selecting projects synergizing the interests ofthe student community, the idea innovation and budget plans.

II. Project development

A prototype of the hybrid energysystem was developed at theUniversity of Vermont during theschool year of 20132014. In thisperiod, group meetings werescheduled every other week to discussthe project progress, attended by thetwo faculty members, the four teamstudents and an administrator staff. Technical details were revisited anddiscussed between the faculty advisorsand the student members. Effectivecommunication was establishedbetween the structural and theelectrical groups to coordinate theneeds from both sides. The nextsteptasks were also elucidated for eachgroup member for the followingmeeting. The administrative staff fromthe Clean Energy Fund committeeprovided essential help on thelogistics, such the roof accessauthorization for the systeminstallation.

After the group meetings, the progresswas periodically briefed to thecommittee members, during whichfeedback and suggestions werecollected and transferred back to thehybrid team. The student teammembers were also required to

present the project status to broader audience based on the senior capstone project schedules,including the literature review, the system development, the laboratory tests and the field






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Fig. 8 (a)

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Fig. 8 (b)

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Fig. 8 (c)

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Fig. 8 (d)

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Fig. 8 (e)

demonstration.

The hybrid energy system was tested on the Votey building roof at UVM. Two groups of snapshotsare shown to illustrate the field performance of the hybrid energy system at both day and nighttimes (Figs. 8a8f). The background was the Ira Allen Chapel at UVM. When the hybrid system wasinstalled in the day time (Figs. 8a8c), we noticed that a good compatibility existed between thebamboo wind turbine and the surrounding environment. Due to the inherent connections betweenbamboo plants and the earth, the wind turbine could be treated more like a giant plant than anartificial structure. During the night, the stationary lights on the center pole provided enoughillumination for the adjacent area, while the rotating lights on the blades displayed aestheticallypleasing patterns.

In the end, the hybrid energy system was demonstrated in the ‘Design Night’ event organized bythe College of Engineering and Mathematical Sciences of UVM (Fig. 9). Local residents, ranging fromkids to seniors in the Burlington area, were invited to attend the event and share their excitement ofthe innovative capstone projects. In the event, the hybrid energy system was warmly embraced bythe UVM community, attracting a lot of attention and interests from the event attendees.Suggestions were collected from students, parents and local industries for the future development ofthe project. The hybrid team also received many invitations from the local schools in Burlingtonareas to demonstrate the project to more K12 students in the future.

III.

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Snapshots of hybrid energysystem in (ac) the day time,(df) the night time; thebackground is the Ira AllenChapel at the University ofVermont. (Fig. 8 (f))

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Fig. 9. A picture of the demonstration of the hybridenergy system in the Design Night event at UVM in2014.

Project

assessment

The evaluation of the final presentation was a good indication of the students’ performance in theproposed project. They showed the input of student peers, faculty and industry members who wereall present at the presentations. The student team was assessed on Understanding, Preparedness,Enthusiasm, Comprehension and Content using a four point scale (Table. 2). For Understanding, theteam was found to show a full and thorough understanding of all aspects of the project. Similarly,their Comprehension score showed the ability to accurately answer all of the audience questionsposed related to the design, analyses and testing. The Content score indicated the completion of theproject to their client’s satisfaction. Lastly, Preparedness and Enthusiasm ratings indicated that theywere well prepared for their presentation and generated strong interest in their work with theirpresentation style. Overall, their final presentation grade was in the top five percent as were all theiroral presentation work. A difference can be found between the hybrid system project and othercapstone projects proposed in conventional ways.

As with most teams, there are strengths and weaknesses. This team was not as strong in writtendesign reports as they were in oral presentation. There is a need to provide more instruction, peerand practitionerreview of written presentations for engineering students in the overall course.

The project has also attracted attention from different public medias, such as UVM communications(Brown, 2014), www.designnews.com (Montalbano, 2014), www.greenenergytimes.net,www.energymatters.com.au [24], www.energyharvestingjournal.com [25], www.openideo.com [26],www.lifewithbamboo.com/ etc. A video named “UVM Hybrid Energy Harvester” is uploaded towww.youtube.com to illustrate the working condition of the system.

Discussion

A prototype of the hybrid renewable energy system, consisting of a bamboo wind turbine and solarpanels, was developed by a team comprised of faculty members and undergraduate students atUVM. In this project, an innovative “ProposingLearning” model was implemented to enhance theinvolvement of students to every stage of the project, including the selection, development and theassessment stages. In the selection stage, the online review forum effectively promoted theinterests from the student community in renewable energy topics. In the development stage, a


http://www.energymatters.com.au/

http://www.openideo.com/

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http://www.energyharvestingjournal.com/



group of undergraduate students worked closely with the faculty advisors to develop an innovativerenewable energy system comprised of a bamboo wind turbine and solar panels. In the assessmentstage, peerreviewed feedbacks exhibited the effectiveness of this model mechanism in enhancingthe renewable energy education. By using this model, we could promote the renewable energyeducation by making an impact to the student community before, during and after the project. Inthe future, we will improve this “ProposingLearning” model by strengthening the postprojectassessment. We plan to collect online comments and ratings for the completed projects from thestudent community. We will also organize seminars oncampus to share the experience with thestudents by creating direct communication within the UVM community. Through these activities, weexpect to collect suggestions and new ideas for the future development of these projects and thiseducation model.

Meanwhile, we plan to develop more environmentally compatible energy infrastructure based on thedeveloped prototype of the hybrid energy system. First, due to the intrinsic to resist wind loads,bamboo laminates are excellent solutions to manufacture small and middle scale distributed windturbine blades. Second, in the field demonstration, bamboo wind turbines are less intrusive to thesurrounding environment because of their inherent connection to earth. The idea of “planting” windturbines will make the renewable energy utilization more appealing and environmentally adaptable.A more sustainable relationship will be established between the energy infrastructure and thelandscape of mountains, farms and ocean shorelines. Third, the proposed hybrid system is isolatedfrom current power grids, making it a proper option for remote areas. Due to the abundance ofbamboo plantation, the bamboo wind turbines could be developed and used in many parts of theworld, such as developing and underdeveloped regions. The renewable energy utilization in theseareas will make a significant impact on the sustainable development of the local communities.Finally, the light patterns on the rotating blades could be tailored to meet various needs, such as thewarning, emergency, advertising and entertainment. In the future, we will conduct a series ofexperiments to quantitatively characterize the longterm performance of the hybrid energy system.

Conclusions

We implemented a ”ProposingLearning” model to inspire renewable energy education at theUniversity of Vermont by developing a hybrid energy system comprised of a bamboo wind turbineand solar panels. Born to resist wind loads, bamboo is featured by the hierarchical structures offibers and parenchyma cells, making it remarkable in strength, stiffness and fracture resistance.Despite many applications in housing and industrial products, limited research exists to developbamboo wind turbines. By using the “ProposingLearning” model, we extensively involved thestudents in the selection, development and assessment stages of the hybrid energy project. Theresults showed that the model effectively improved the renewable energy education at theuniversity level. Meanwhile, an innovative renewable energy system synergizing sustainability andbeauty was developed during the project period. In the future, we will strengthen the postprojectassessment, and further develop the hybrid renewable energy system to meet various needs.

Acknowledgements

The authors greatly appreciate the funding from the UVM Clean Energy Fund to support the project.We are also grateful to the help from the Senior Experience in Engineering Design program at theSchool of Engineering, and the 3D printing support from the College of Engineering andMathematical Sciences at UVM. Meanwhile, we very much thank the Office of UndergraduateResearch at UVM for providing the summer support for students in this project.



Table 2. A summary of the peer review table for final project presentations.

CATEGORY Points: 4 3 2 1HybridTeamScore

OverallTeamAverages

Understanding

Presenters showa full andthoroughunderstandingof the topic.

Presenters showa goodunderstandingof the topic.

Presenters showa goodunderstanding ofcertain parts ofthe topic.

Presenters donot seem tounderstand thetopic very well.

4.00 3.60

Preparedness

Presenters arecompletelyprepared andhave obviouslypracticed.

Presenters seempretty preparedbut might haveneeded somemore practice.

Presenters aresomewhatprepared, but itis clear thatmore practicewas needed.

Presenters donot seem at allprepared orready topresent.

3.90 3.85

Enthusiasm

Facialexpressions andbody languagegenerate astrong interestand enthusiasmabout the topicin others.

Facialexpressions andbody languagesometimesgenerate astrong interestand enthusiasmabout the topicin others.

Facialexpressions andbody languageare used to tryto generateenthusiasm, butseem somewhatfaked.

Very little useof facialexpressions orbody language.Did notgenerate muchinterest in topicbeingpresented.

3.80 3.40

Comprehension

Presenters areable toaccuratelyanswer almostall questionsposed by theaudience aboutthe topic.

Presenters areable toaccuratelyanswer mostquestions posedby the audienceabout the topic.

Presenters areable toaccuratelyanswer a fewquestions posedby the audienceabout the topic.

Presenters areunable toaccuratelyanswerquestionsposed by theaudience aboutthe topic.

4.00 3.60

Content

Presentersprovide aProblemStatement,Description ofdesign beingbuilt, Testing tobe performedand Open issues

Presenters didnot provide one(1) of theprevious list ofseven (4).

Presenters didnot provide two(2) of theprevious list offour (4).

Presenters didnot providethree (3) ormore of theprevious list offour (4).

4.00 3.80

Total Scores 19.80 18.30

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