In an attempt to encourage eco-friendly living in Qatar, a group of college students have put their heart and soul into a pilot project that has the potential of standing as a model for building eco-friendly living and work spaces in the future. The “Green Home” project proposes “Common Sense Automation” to reduce the electricity and water usage. The five students from the College of the North Atlantic Qatar (CNA-Q) are looking toward smart home automation materials, fixtures, gadgets and systems to achieve energy and water savings significantly. They will also investigate alternative energy sources like solar and recycling of gray water.
For this revolutionary project, the CNA-Q team is using an existing villa in Doha as their test center, where they will collect data on the electricity and water usage. They have finished calculating the lighting, heating, ventilation and air-conditioning (HAVC) and water loads of the existing system, and is currently comparing the Old Current System with the New Proposed System, which is a theoretical model, incorporating new energy technologies. The comparisons done so far have showed significant energy savings with 70% less energy consumption for lighting and 40% less energy for HVAC.
Now the team will collect data for a one-year period and compared to the initial theoretical calculation. This data will then be compared to data without automation of the same villa and is expected to show significant improvement in energy savings. The Green Home project will present inexpensive alternative to the current construction practices. Many international companies like GE lighting, Leviton and local companies such as, National have been quite impressed with the project and have offered to sponsor some of the hardware.
Via: Global Arab Network