Students: Chris Boccarossa, Chelsea Johnson, Jeremiah Murila, Nathan Parke, and Erin Picard
In this project, we analyzed the heat losses from Dr. Pingen’s house and sought to make improvements to the energy efficiency of the home. By using a thermal imaging camera that shows temperature differences, we identified problem areas in the home and calculated the amount of heat lost through these places per year. Then, we determined the amount of money that could be saved by investing in a few home improvements and calculated the return on investment.
After identifying the largest problem areas in the home, we chose four to quantitatively analyze. We used the convective heat transfer equation to perform our analysis. Our results showed us that Dr. Pingen was losing approximately $35.35 yearly through these four problem spots. The return on investment for this estimation is 6 months.
This is an example picture taken by the FLIR thermal imaging camera. The purple spot is a place in the ceiling that is missing insulation. You can see the large temperature difference between that spot and the well-insulated ceiling. A PDF version of a poster we presented at the Union University Scholarship Symposium can be found here.