ASHRAE Journal - February 2024 - 48

TECHNICAL FEATURE
ASHRAE's 2023 Energy
Genius Award Winner
BY WADE CONLAN, P.E., BCXP, MEMBER ASHRAE; IMANE EL GHAZOUANI; MAT COALSON, ASSOCIATE MEMBER ASHRAE; JOHN CONSTANTINIDE, P.E., MEMBER ASHRAE
Founded in 1963 as a public polytechnic university to help sustain the United States
space program's workforce, the University of Central Florida (UCF) has grown as one
of the nation's largest public universities.1 Having such a large footprint of buildings,
the university (Photo 1) seized the opportunity to use Level 1 Energy Audits from
ASHRAE Standard 211-2018, Standard for Commercial Building Energy Audits, as part of
its sustainability initiative to reduce energy consumption and cost. The result was a
commissioning and design engineering firm conducting an audit of nine buildings
and identifying 204 energy efficiency measures (EEMs), of which 82 had no capital
cost (i.e., were maintenance tasks) and 88 had an estimated payback period of less
than one year.
Beyond the Level 1 Energy Audits, the owner requested
that the commissioning and design engineering firm
develop a procedure for engineering students to
perform future audits, with Building Energy Quotient
(Building EQ), for college credit. The commissioning
and design engineering firm's team, including an intern
who was working toward her mechanical engineering
degree (Photo 2), created the standard operating
procedure (SOP) for future Level 1 Energy Audits at the
university. This experiential learning would provide
hands-on experience for college students, many of
whom are ASHRAE Student Members, which can lead to
gaining experience for future careers. This SOP became
a model and inspiration for energy audit checklists
developed by the ASHRAE Building EQ Committee for
use by ASHRAE Chapter volunteer engineers and energy
auditors with ASHRAE Student Branch members at
colleges and universities.*
The project's broad impact, with its EEMs identified by
the consulting engineers, direct experiential learning
component for UCF students and inspiration for
experiential learning at other colleges and universities
led to its being awarded the 2023 Energy Genius Award.
Project Details
The initial phase of UCF's energy audit program
intentionally audited classroom, administrative and
laboratory facilities that conducted work, research and
*These checklists for use by ASHRAE Chapter volunteers are
available upon request by e-mailing BuildingEQ@ashrae.org.
Wade Conlan, P.E., BCXP, is assistant vice president and commissioning and energy discipline manager, Mat Coalson is a commissioning and energy specialist and Imane El
Ghazouani is an associate project manager for Hanson Professional Services, Inc. John Constantinide is a Florida-licensed mechanical engineer and past chair of the Building Energy
Quotient Committee.
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