Angela
Carver
Angela's project interests:
Water Conservation
My favorite thing to do with my family is travelling. Throughout my life, the classic American road trip has been a staple of my life since my family drove from Ohio to Montana when I was three in 1999. A Midwestern girl seeing the wonders of the wild west reads like a coming of age novel. In between long stints in the car, I experienced environments completely unlike anything I could experience in my cornfield-laced home state of Ohio. The high desert of Utah, the baking sun of Nevada, and the tumbleweeds of southern California offered a stark change from the 72% average humidity of Cincinnati.
Angela in Utah, December 2015
The summer heat of the American West impressed upon me the necessity of water conservation in those areas, but the Yarbrough Elementary School project made me consider the necessity of water conservation in the lush forests of the eastern United States. While fresh water seems like an abundant commodity in must of the area east of the Mississippi, it simply is not. The research I did through this project, including research on water usage estimation, on rain harvesting systems, and on gray water reclamation systems, caused me to rethink the impact of water conservation even in areas where water is relatively abundant
Tap water must be treated before it arrives at the home, or in the case of our project, the school. All the wastewater that leaves the school must be treated again before it can be released back into streams. This is a sizable expense for the school, which I estimated the cost at nearly $1,000 per year for indoor water consumption costs, not including sewer or landscape irrigation costs. Small changes can make a large difference over time. Adding a rainwater harvesting system to existing gutters reduces tap water usage for water gardens, reducing costs for the school and reducing the load on water purification infrastructure. Also the team found that the simple change of attaching small, inexpensive aerator rings to the faucets at the school could reduce indoor water usage by about 32% annually.
The things I learned through this project made me re-examine the importance of water conservation. I realize now that I cannot take this resource for granted despite having easy access to it in my community. I realize that small changes in my personal water usage, such as shorter showers and fixing leaking faucets can make a big difference in the long run.
A panorama of Arches National Park taken by Angela
Angela's
Career Goals & the YES Project
I am a double major in Ecological Engineering and Organismal Biology; I have another year of biology classes before I will graduate from Auburn. I have loved science and biology since I started dissecting all the dandelions in my yard as a 4-year-old, but deciding which specific field to go into has proved difficult due to my broad interests. Until this school year, if asked, I would not have hesitated to say I wanted to go to graduate school and do research in biofuels. I did some research in ethanol production from lignocellulosic biomass, and I loved it.
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At first glance, it may not seem that the project at Yarbrough Elementary School has anything to do with biofuel production. Directly, it doesn't. But indirectly, it is a variation on the same theme of sustainability and efficiency. The energy and water usage consultation at Yarbrough Elementary School is an exercise in reduction of waste using existing technologies and practices. We were able to create a design which reduces water usage by over 10%, energy usage by over 10%, and increases storm water infiltration by 5%. All of these solutions were practical and fit with the school's budget.
I learned through this project about simple changes in a design having the potential to make a large impact in efficiency. None of our solutions were particularly high-tech or complicated. Some were as simple as turning off lights! But together they made a big change in the school's efficiency.
Poster from Angela's research
So, this project has shifted my thinking about energy conservation. Development of new technologies for biofuels and other sustainable energies is only a part of the equation. The other part is the implementation of existing technologies. The simple things in this project made the largest differences. The faucet aerators that you can pick up inexpensively at a local hardware store cut indoor water usage by nearly 32% per year. The swales we designed are essentially engineered ditches, but they will solve the school's runoff issues. This realization has made me rethink my career goals in some ways. I still want to do work that promotes sustainable technologies, but I realize now that it doesn't have to be high-tech and scientific to be sustainable. Graduate school and research is an option rather than a requirement for this field. Plus, I learned that designing things in AutoCAD is fun; you don't get to do that in biofuels research!
Project Contribution
For this project, I performed a wide variety of tasks. Initially, we all collaborated to brainstorm ideas for improving Yarbrough Elementary’s water and energy usage efficiency as well as reduce their runoff issues and incorporate STEM learning opportunities. While on a site visit, I came up with the idea to use two gravel-lined channels along the sidewalk the playground to remediate runoff issues and decrease erosion. I took this idea as far as design sketches, sizing calculations, and an economic estimate before we changed our design to include swales rather than channels. When the design was changed to swales, I did the design calculations for sizing the swales. I also researched the creation of berms to go with the swales we created.
In addition to this, I also performed the water consumption estimates for Yarbrough Elementary based on Ross Hall on Auburn’s campus. I also spearheaded the rain collection and cistern design efforts as well as making the SketchUp drawing for the rain garden.
I also did all the team components for the creation of the eportfolio. I also proofread many of our written documents because of my affinity for writing.
What I Learned
Channel design sketches
This project taught me a lot about engineering design projects as a whole. Throughout my undergraduate career, I learned the technical knowledge necessary to complete engineering designs. One thing I had not learned was how to create an engineering design project from scratch. I found there is a difference between solving problems on a homework assignment and solving problems presented by a client. We not only had to do research and find a solution to the problems Mr. Forrester told us about, but we also had to find engineering data on which to base our design. For example, we weren’t given any electricity or water usage data from the school, so we had to estimate those based on similar buildings. Unlike a homework assignment, nothing was given.
Also, once we had the engineering data and a semblance of a solution to all the problems, we had to create a unified plan which would be appealing not only to other engineers but also to clients with no engineering background. As a part of this, we had to produce both technical engineering drawings and non-technical illustrations. Walking the line between technical accuracy and understandability was a new experience for all of us; it is not a feature of any homework assignment.
Lastly, I learned that team dynamics greatly affect the outcome of a project. Our team had particularly good synergy. Often, I find group projects frustrating in that I typically end up doing a larger portion of the work or my group-mates wait to do their work at the last possible moment. Not so with our group. While, like any project, we hit a few snags during the design process, we still got our work done efficiently and in a pleasant way. It was truly a blessing to not have to constantly worry about whether my group-mates would complete their work or not. While some of the other senior design groups had issues getting along with each other, I feel our group has become closer over the course of the project. I found that these aspects made a huge difference in our stress levels and in the quality of our work. I learned that being able to work well as a team is a big part of being a successful engineer.
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