ASHRAE announced the winners of its 2018 ASHRAE Student Design Competition and Setty Family Foundation Applied Engineering Challenge. The competitions recognize outstanding student design projects and encourage students to become involved in the design of energy-efficient HVAC systems. A total of 63 teams participated and 35 teams were judged at society level.

The guidelines of the Student Design Competition provided background information enabling teams to participate in up to three categories: HVAC design calculations, HVAC system selection, and integrated sustainable building design (ISBD).

This year’s competition focused on a new 70,000-square-foot, four-story mixed use complex north of Istanbul, Turkey, near Arnavutkoy which is just south of the new international airport. The facility featured retail and office spaces, a restaurant, and a hotel in support of the upcoming rapid growth in the area when the airport is completed in 2019.

First place in the HVAC design calculations category was awarded to Jack Buckley, Madeline Sampsel, Austin Seagren, and Christopher Wozney of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Faculty advisors are Joe Hazel, Dan Karnes, and David Yuill.

The team selected a heat recovery chiller in conjunction with a geothermal loop field as the primary system for the building. The geothermal loop is a sustainable approach for cooling and heating that can easily be hidden from occupant view under a parking lot. The geothermal heat recovery chiller provides efficient, flexible means of producing heating or chilled due to three operating modes available through the virtual endcap.

Placing first in the HVAC system selection category were Kevin Clark, Madison Hopfinger, Evan Reese, Whitney Luck, and Andres Saldivar from Kansas State University. Faculty advisors are Julia Keen and Fred Hasler.

The team selected water-to-air heat pumps, water-to-water heat pumps, active chilled beams, and a hybrid ground loop/cooling tower. The system proposal allows for the integration of sustainable solutions that encompass energy efficiency, human comfort and productivity, indoor environmental quality, and architectural aesthetic.

Receiving first place in the integrated sustainable building design category was an international collaborative team from The Pennsylvania State University (PSU) and Technical University of Denmark (DTU).

The PSU team members are William McCann, Salvador Ordorica, Ashutosh Ojha, Marie Rottschaefer, Siddharth Swaminathan, and Gbadebo Tobi. Their faculty advisor is William P. Bahnfleth.

The DTU team members are Vasileios Filis, Myrto Ananida, and Alexandre Hugo Matthieu. Their faculty advisor is Eleftherios Bourdakis.

The collaborative team provided insight into the environmental crisis of the decreasing water supply Istanbul faces due to an expanding population. The team focused on integrating the building into the natural slope of the landscape to decrease the excavation footprint and blend the facility into the natural landscape.

In the 2018 Setty Family Foundation Applied Engineering Challenge, Iik Wahyu Anggara, Katon Vembriarto Widayaswara, Yoga Hutomo Putra, Mohammad Ilham Akbar, and Fahmi Rizaldi from Bandung Institute of Technology received first place. Their faulty advisors are Pandji Prawisudha and Adrian Rizqi Irhamna.

The team was required to design a temporary shelter for use by governments, municipalities, and humanitarian agencies that will provide housing and essential domestic systems for displaced families. Bandung Institute of Technology placed second for the previous three years before this year’s first place finish.

The projects will be shared during the 2019 ASHRAE Winter Conference, Jan. 12-16 in Atlanta. The Winter Conference is held in conjunction with the ASHRAE co-sponsored AHR Expo, which will be Jan. 14-16 at the Georgia World Congress Center.

For a full list of Student Design Competition winners, visit the Design Competition Winners page on ashrae.org.