Lights Out!
Jeremiah Haggerty
Issue date: 2/3/10 Section: News
Castleton State College isn't running out of energy, but it sure is trying to do its part to conserve it. With the assistance
of real time or "Smart" electric meters, installed in six different residence halls, monitoring CSC's energy usage
will give us a better idea of where and how we can do more to use less.
Over the summer 2008 six of these electric meters were installed into residence halls and a Castleton student, Andrew
Hicks, began installations
and updates of the necessary
computer programming to process the data. Castleton Hall, Morrill Hall, Wheeler Hall, North and South House, Haskell, and Adams Hall are the buildings where these meters
were installed. At some point in the near future these meters will be used to judge a competition amongst the residence halls declaring the hall that uses the least, the winner.
The meters have already begun to show certain trends and patterns in our Campus' energy usage. These meters report the amount of kilowatts being used every hour. "You can really see the difference between a nice spring day when people are outside, and a rainy day when everyone is inside" said Hicks. A junior here at Castleton, Hicks is working on obtaining a math and computer science degree. "The trends we are seeing are phenomenal" he said.
During the proverbial "N-Period" the meters show a two hour long spike in kilowatt
usage. This is more energy
than a single residence hall burns up on a Saturday. "All the clubs meet during N period and anyone who isn't involved in one goes back to their dorm room and turns on computers, televisions, video-games and then takes a nap" said Hicks. This is just one of his theories about the massive spike in electricity usage.
Bill Allen, Dean of Admissions
agrees with Hicks. "It's remarkable what you can see when he puts the data together" said Allen. "I think it's easy to burn up electricity in the resident halls" he said. A single student alone in a dorm room can burn up just as much as if the entire suite were there, Allen explained, adding credibility to Hicks theory.
of real time or "Smart" electric meters, installed in six different residence halls, monitoring CSC's energy usage
will give us a better idea of where and how we can do more to use less.
Over the summer 2008 six of these electric meters were installed into residence halls and a Castleton student, Andrew
Hicks, began installations
and updates of the necessary
computer programming to process the data. Castleton Hall, Morrill Hall, Wheeler Hall, North and South House, Haskell, and Adams Hall are the buildings where these meters
were installed. At some point in the near future these meters will be used to judge a competition amongst the residence halls declaring the hall that uses the least, the winner.
The meters have already begun to show certain trends and patterns in our Campus' energy usage. These meters report the amount of kilowatts being used every hour. "You can really see the difference between a nice spring day when people are outside, and a rainy day when everyone is inside" said Hicks. A junior here at Castleton, Hicks is working on obtaining a math and computer science degree. "The trends we are seeing are phenomenal" he said.
During the proverbial "N-Period" the meters show a two hour long spike in kilowatt
usage. This is more energy
than a single residence hall burns up on a Saturday. "All the clubs meet during N period and anyone who isn't involved in one goes back to their dorm room and turns on computers, televisions, video-games and then takes a nap" said Hicks. This is just one of his theories about the massive spike in electricity usage.
Bill Allen, Dean of Admissions
agrees with Hicks. "It's remarkable what you can see when he puts the data together" said Allen. "I think it's easy to burn up electricity in the resident halls" he said. A single student alone in a dorm room can burn up just as much as if the entire suite were there, Allen explained, adding credibility to Hicks theory.
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