RIfI client award prize to 2nd year students
Planet Matters, a client of the Research Institute for Industry (RIfI), has awarded cash prizes to three second year undergraduate project teams for their work to design a simple system that can provide electricity in emergency situations.
RIfI has carried out consultancy work focused on the performance of a compressed-air system for Planet Matters, which is based in London. The company are involved in a number of alternative energy projects in China, India and more recently, in Africa. Following a major earthquake at one of the company's sites - Sichuan in China, the company realised that there was a need to develop a stand-alone electrical power generator that can provide electricity in emergency situations.
The company considered whether solar energy could be stored as compressed air which could be used to generate electricity as and when required. In agreement with the company's director, Kent Walwin, the consultancy work with Dr Torbati and three academics from SES ( Dr Sharkh , Prof. Markvart and Dr McDonald ) through the RIfI was turned into a group project as part of the design module (SESG2005), lead by Prof. Scanlan , for second year undergraduate students.
The students were given an overview of the subject, objectives and deliverables in a one hour lecture given by Mr Walwin who kindly offered to give "Planet Matters Awards" to the top three team projects. On completion of the project each team made a presentation to a judging panel of academics and a company representative who selected the top three teams. The winning project teams were presented with a certificate and a cash prize by Mr Walwin at the ceremony held in December. Mr Walwin was very impressed by the quality of reports and his company will be seriously considering the proposed designs.
He awarded a cheque for £600 to 1st prize winners: T. Addison-Lydon, T. Cook, J. R. Farthing, D. J. Hickey, A. Kostadinov, D. Newland, C. W. Pitcher, J. Smith, I. G. Todd and U. Walach for their design. Two further cash prizes of £300 and £100 were awarded to the 2nd and 3rd prize winners respectively.
Associate Dean for Enterprise, Professor Simon Cox , stressed the importance of enterprise activities supporting research and teaching activities in his opening speech at the ceremony. He added that the project was an excellent example of an engineering module being enriched by a real industrial example.