World energy in engineering design

Abstract

As engineering students consider the economic, social, political and ethical aspects of design, they are often treated as compulsory aspects that must be checked off a list as they dive deeper into the technical aspects of design. Getting students to appreciate the real-world societal relevance as an integral part of design is often challenging. The World Energy Exercise, which integrates an interactive and state-of-the-art computer simulation with a role-playing exercise, opens a social and active learning pathway, which helps students connect their engineering designs with real-world societal relevance. The exercise enables students to control various energy related policy levers that impact global climate change. One lever in the exercise, the carbon pricing policy, also plays a major role in the students' regenerative steam power cycle design. Carbon pricing is a real-world consideration, with policies currently enacted and/or under consideration at state, regional, and national levels. Incorporating the World Energy Exercise (created by Climate Interactive and the UMass Lowell Climate Change Initiative) into the senior level thermal fluids systems design course provided many students with an increased understanding and motivation to address the complex social, political and economical issues related to their technical design. The exercise did not change the students' technical design parameters such as thermal efficiency, but it provided students with an increased appreciation of the societal relevance of this parameter. Student reflections reveal that the exercise deepened their understanding of the nontechnical issues both in the design and in life in general.