Grand Energy Challenges Develop Energy Education Modules
Interested in Developing Energy Education Modules for The Undergraduate Chemical Engineering Curriculum?
Apply for an AIChE Grand Energy Challenges Energy Education Module Grant
Submit your application by April 5, 2010 to energymodules@aiche.org
Why Should you be Interested in Developing Energy Education Modules for The Undergraduate Chemical Engineering Curriculum?
Both Individual and team submissions are encouraged.
Energy Modules for Chemical Engineering
The need for affordable, clean, and sustainable energy is one of the largest challenges facing today's society. Based upon their training, chemical engineers are well suited to address this problem. At the same time, there is a strong need to bring relevant teaching and learning material into the curriculum. This project addresses both of these goals.
Through support of the AIChE Energy Grand Challenges project and its Foundation and industrial sponsors, two awards will be made in 2010 for the development of Energy Education modules to fit into the chemical engineering curriculum.
A sample project is described below.
The winning applications will receive the follow awards and recognition.
- $2500 stipend
- An AIChE Energy Efficiency Award Certificate
- Peer review and feedback to be provided by members of Energy Advisory Board
- Recognition and publication in CEP
- Dissemination on the AIChE Energy Initiatives web site and the CACHE organization education website
Application should consist of:
- 2 page outline of problem to be solved including:
- approach to be taken in the solution
- impact on the education of undergraduate chemical engineering students
- description of plans to use the module in the classroom
- assessment plan
Sample Project for the AIChE Grand Energy Challenges Energy Education Module Grant.
Through partial support of the US Department of Energy and the CACHE Corporation (www.cache.org) a fuel cell task force has assembled nearly two dozen modules to bring fuel cell and hydrogen technology into the chemical engineering curriculum. It is noted that the modules are available online at: http://www.chem.mtu.edu/~jmkeith/fuel_cell_curriculum/
To date an introductory module has been developed to provide an overview to hydrogen and fuel cells. Additional modules have been developed for these chemical engineering courses: Material and Energy Balances, Thermodynamics, Fluid Mechanics, Heat and Mass Transfer, Kinetics and Reaction Engineering, and Separations.
Each module stands alone and can be assigned to students as an in-class problem, a homework assignment, or a project. The modules use the fundamental concepts taught within the core course and apply them to hydrogen generation, distribution, storage, or use within a fuel cell. Thus, students are able to see the applications of the fundamentals from their courses. By using the modules, students are indirectly encouraged to pursue life-long learning.
Beyond fuel cells there is a need to develop similar modules for chemical engineers in all aspects of energy systems. For each energy system course-specific modules will be developed to fit within the core chemical engineering curriculum. In addition, a design based module will also be developed that integrates fundamentals from the core chemical engineering courses. The areas on energy that will be investigated include traditional sources such as natural gas and coal, and alternative, renewable sources such as wind, solar, water, biomass, and geothermal energy.
We are interested in module proposals that apply new energy technology such as in the following example areas:
- Material and Energy Balances
- Fluid Mechanics
- Kinetics and Reaction Engineering
- Process Control
- Heat Transfer
- Thermodynamics