Journal of Fundamentals of Renewable Energy and Applications
Open Access
ISSN: 2090-4541
ISSN: 2090-4541
Bhaskar Kura
University of New Orleans, USA
Posters & Accepted Abstracts: J Fundam Renewable Energy Appl
Municipalities have started paying attention to the energy efficiency opportunities and associated carbon savings from their energy intensive processes. Energy consumed for a variety of operations by municipalities include water treatment/supply, storm water pumping, wastewater collection, treatment/disposal. Energy demand from wastewater collection is a function of the terrain with flat terrains typically requiring higher energy because of increased pumping at lift stations. The University of New Orleans (UNO) is collaborating with the local municipalities and their public works departments to develop strategies for reducing energy consumption and associated carbon footprint from their wastewater collection systems. One such case study involves 500+ lift stations that have about 1000+ pumps. The scope mainly includes creating an online knowledge base for the municipality��?s wastewater collection system��?s assets/infrastructure, energy data, and associated logic to develop strategies for energy saving decisions. The knowledge-based system (KBS) developed, includes features to track historic energy consumption trends, compute and rank the pumps/lift stations based on their energy consumption, and others. KBS data was used to identify a lift station for performing pilot study to evaluate the energy saving potential from the use of variable frequency drive. This project is scalable to any municipality or any city and the system can assist in making strategic decisions for obtaining energy efficiency while reducing their carbon footprint. Efforts are being made to apply this model in the future to other major cities in the United States, India, Brazil, and others. This project involves interdisciplinary experts (mechanical engineers, civil engineers, environmental engineers, information technology specialist, computer engineers, and more) under the direction of the principal investigator.
Email: bkura@uno.edu