Salas O’Brien Team: Lu Brownstein, Hannah Kreutzer, Leah Marville, Rosemary Termini
2023-2024: In collaboration with Salas O’Brien, this student team designed an innovative solution for decarbonizing the campus of a small university in New England. The focus of the team’s effort was on new and innovative technologies that are feasible for use on a campus-scale grid, but which have not yet been widely adopted.
After reviewing the heating and cooling requirements of the campus, the team identified a range of potential decarbonization options, including infrastructure upgrades, policy changes, and energy generation and storage technologies. The team evaluated these options against the key project requirements and selected a small micronuclear reactor as the most innovative yet feasible solution for the campus. The team conducted both energy and spatial analyses for the micronuclear design, and compared these analyses to those for a combined geothermal heat pump and solar panel design, which is the current state-of-the-industry for campus decarbonization. The team provided their energy modeling, site plans, and design documentation to their liaisons along with recommendations for pursuing micronuclear in the future.