Mizzou Dashboard to expand
The program will expand from three residence halls to nine.
Published March 9, 2010
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Mizzou Dashboard is expanding to nine residence halls, including Dogwood and Galena, from the three it was involved in last year. Mizzou Dashboard measures energy outputs in residence halls.
Mizzou Dashboard will receive support from the Residence Halls Association in publicizing its annual energy conservation competition.
The competition will take place April 4 to May 2 in the three residence halls monitored by the program: Schurz, Hatch and College Avenue.
Funding from an anonymous donor will allow the program to expand from three residence halls to nine.
Student Sustainability Coordinator Pat Margherio said Lathrop, Laws, Jones, Galena, Hawthorn and Dogwood residence halls are on track to receive access to the Mizzou Dashboard machine.
RHA Sustainability Chairwoman Chasidy Kretzer said RHA would work to include events and offer prizes for the residence hall able to most greatly reduce its energy usage.
Kretzer said she would work to include events, such as a flash rave and movie nights, within the targeted residence halls. RHA is considering other events, such as game nights, Frisbee or flashlight tag.
Kretzer will present a $590 funding request to RHA next Monday that intends to use money to purchase organic cotton T-shirts advertising the event.
The competition last year in the spring 2009, which was the first ever competition, produced an average 2.4 percent savings among the three residence halls involved in the program.
Margherio said though the 2.4 percent savings didn't necessarily make up for the environmental impact of installing the equipment, the potential for savings hadn't yet been reached.
Kretzer said RHA owns two Kil A Wat electric usage monitors. The machines are able to instantaneously inform the user of how much power each appliance draws.
Although RHA is able to use these machines to test individual products, it will publicize knowledge on how much power standard appliances use.
"That's what we're trying to do, to connect the education with the tool so that people can adopt it for the future," Margherio said.
At the moment, Mizzou Dashboard will focus on informing residents of the three halls of the benefits.
"We'll have all nine buildings up and running next year, and that's really when we can do a much bigger targeted event across campus," Margherio said.
Lucid Design, the company that designed the dashboard site, was extremely innovative in terms of new features, Margherio said.
Over the summer, the dashboard site will undergo a renovation, which will allow more information to be tracked using the dashboard site.
Mizzou Dashboard is working with CDS to educate students on food waste, and the site might include a section as early as this May in which students could easily view dining hall food waste, Margherio said.
The group is also looking into tracking information from a weather module at Sanborn Field and a wind turbine on top the Engineering Building, Margherio said.
Other schools also received funds from donors through the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education program.
"One of the other schools in the program was Yale, and they were also purchasing and setting up a program from Lucid Design," Margherio said. "I believe they hooked up two buildings on campus. We'll be able to compete with them next semester through dashboard to see how much energy is saved."
