Archive of Frequently Asked Questions:

Some frequently asked questions:

1.  What is the Future Energy Challenge?

It is the first, in what promises to be a new series, of broad-based student engineering competitions.  The purposes will be to further the technical issues of energy use, efficiency, alternatives, management, control, production, and conservation.

2.  What is the topic of the 2001 Challenge?

The electric supply system of the future is likely to be highly distributed.   There will be a large number of small, local suppliers connected to the grid.   Fuel cell systems, small turbines, and even photovoltaic units have promise as the energy source in this distributed energy system.  Today, the interface between the supply system and the grid is an area of concern, and the 2001 Challenge attempts to address this issue, at least in part.

3.  What technical issues are to be addressed?

An inverter is needed to convert fuel cell (or photovoltaic) power to the ac form used in a home, factory, or on the grid.  Today's inverters are not a good match for the application.  Large ones are too expensive, and small ones do not meet many performance requirements needed for alternative energy sources.  The specific challenge is to design low-cost inverters suitable for fuel cells or similar sources.

4.  Is this suitable for students?

Yes.  The technology is well understood, but the system interface issue remains a challenge.  The cost issues could use some solid innovative thinking in terms of packaging, electrical design, thermal design, and the entire range of issues.  The sponsors believe that a well-managed student team will not find this easy, but will find it to be a rich source of practical problems that could make a big difference in future energy systems.

5.  Is it international?

This is the first offering of the Future Energy Challenge.  While we are trying to add an international component, the timing does not appear to allow this for 2001.   The primary funding agencies are from the U.S. government, but we will continue to seek cooperation from Canada and others in the region. The IEEE is discussing a follow-up 2002 Future Energy Challenge which will be entirely international.

6.  What do we do?

First, plan out your participation.  Will you use this as a topic for a team design course?  Will the student group be an IEEE Branch or similar existing group?   Will the topic be used as the basis for a Senior Design offering, or what might you attempt?  The strongest proposals will be those with a cross-discipline team and clear curriculum connections.

Next, if possible assemble student leaders for the project, and help them formulate a project plan and proposal.  The sponsoring organizations are working to help set up company interactions and school team sponsors.

The first specific task is to prepare a Letter of Intent.  This must be on school letterhead, signed by someone authorized to commit the school to participate.  A draft letter is included in the Request for Proposal document.

If your proposal is accepted, its time to do the design and build a prototype.

7.  What are we supposed to design?

The design is to address a 10 kW inverter system.  By "system," we mean that it must provide high-quality output power and meet requirements for protection and safety.  It must be efficient, inexpensive, properly packaged, and ready for use by an untrained customer.  It is not enough just to convert dc power to ac.  IEEE Standard 929 has been suggested as a reference for many of the filtering and performance issues.  More complete specifications are provided in the Request for Proposals.

10 kW was selected because it is a realistic power target for domestic applications.  Since an objective of the competition is to develop designs for practical systems, it is important to use an appropriate target level.

Although the design is for a 10 kW system, for more convenient testing, the organizers have established a target of 1.5 kW continuous for hardware prototypes.  We believe this will facilitate student engineering work without special equipment, and will be large enough to allow the judges to assess the complete 10 kW system design.

8.  Why are the system design and prototype design levels different?  Can we just submit a 1.5 kW design?

The 1.5 kW hardware prototype will be an excellent demonstration of each team's capabilities, implementation skills, control concepts, and aspects of engineering achievement.  However, a 1.5 kW inverter can supply only a single domestic electric circuit.  A higher power level (10 kW) will be needed to advance the application of alternative energy sources.  On the other hand, some schools have reported that they will have difficulties building and testing full 10 kW systems because of limitations on laboratory equipment and other factors.

9.  The specifications talk about a 48 V input.  Can we use a 300 V input instead?  The design would be simpler.

Each specification in the list was chosen after considerable discussion by the Organizing Committee.  The 48 V input specification is a good example to tell you how the process worked.  In many alternative energy systems, including fuel cell, photovoltaic, battery, and others, a high-voltage rail means that a large number of units are connected in series.  This causes possible power balance problems, and means that system performance is limited by the weakest unit in the series string. In general, a high voltage rail makes the power electronics simple and cheap, but moves costs and performance limits into the energy source. Some authors have advocated much lower dc levels (such as 3 V) to provide a high-quality interface for the energy source. At present, 48 V appears to provide the best cost/performance tradeoff between the energy supply system and the output power processing.  This is the level most likely to result in a truly practical system. It has the crucial additional advantages that safety considerations are well understood at 48 V, that both the telecommunications industry and the automotive industry are converging near a 48 V standard rail level, and that a wide range of components is available at this level. The specification was chosen on the basis of all these considerations.

Questions about competition details:

1.  Cost is a major issue in the competition, but it will depend on quantities, suppliers, and many other things.  How will cost be compared?

We are working with industry experts to prepare an objective cost evaluation scoring system.  Both published high-volume pricing and real industry experience are being used to develop the system.  In essence, each component is scored at a specific cost value, and the value is consistent among the teams.  Thus if two teams came up with the same hardware, the cost scores would be identical.  The cost score is based on a Bill of Materials to be submitted with the Final Report.  The advantage of this approach is that teams get the benefit of realistic high-volume prices without having to document them, and without subjective opinions on the relative merits of components.  Each team will have a Cost Spreadsheet to use for this evaluation.

2.  But we have manufacturing and controller ideas that will reduce product costs.  The advantages might not show up in a rigid cost scoring system.

This is where judging comes in.  The judging teams will be asked to evaluate each design and prototype in detail, and assign a "bonus factor" to the cost score.  A team that creates a competent design within a conventional methodology would gain a bonus for it.  Innovative assembly concepts, more effective thermal management, control approaches that enhance reliability or simplify the system, and similar improvements are all examples of efforts that will lead to a higher bonus.  Complicated assemblies, extra parts, awkward clearances, precision tolerance requirements, and similar complexities will lead to a lower bonus.   A substantial percentage of the final cost score is based on the bonus.

3.  We see school XYZ on the list, and we found out that their Faculty Advisor is on the Organizing Committee.  This gives them a big advantage doesn't it?

No, we believe it does not, and we will work hard to make sure no unfair advantages or disadvantages arise.  The Organizing Committee is charged with administration of the competition.  The goals and objectives were set up by the Department of Energy even before the Organizing Committee began its work.  The committee makes decisions as a whole, and no individual member can gain a special advantage.  All participating teams should plan to be involved in drafting of final rules, discussion of final scoring details, and other aspects.  Leaders in the judging processes will not be associated with the teams.  In fact, it is likely that all participating Faculty Advisors will be asked to serve on the Organizing Committee.  A team should be judged on its results, not on the extent to which its faculty advisor has helped with competition administration.  Of course, team results should reflect the efforts of students.

Prior questions about proposals:

1.  What about specific rules and test procedures?

Schools with approved proposals will be involved in the final preparations of the rules and test procedures.  The Organizing Committee intends to ensure that all teams understand and appreciate all aspects of the rules and tests, and that their inputs and questions are given full consideration.  The Springboard Meeting in November will be a time of major activity in this area.

2.  What is our school administration expected to do?

As represented by the Letter of Intent, the school must authorize formation of a team and agree that a proposal will be submitted.  In our experience, support of the institution is an important requirement for success.  When the proposal is submitted, it will be necessary for school officials to submit a more formal Letter of Support.   The Letter of Support is needed to confirm that the school will support undergraduate study related to the project, that basic support in the form of facilities and equipment will be available to the team, and that contributions from outside sponsors will be augmented by cash and in-kind matching.  There will be limitations on matching requirements to be sure costs are manageable.  More information will be added as the Request for Proposal becomes more complete.

3.    How are proposals judged?

The reasons for requiring a proposal are to make sure a team has been fully organized and that a solid, viable plan is in place.  The judges reviewing proposals will be asked to evaluate a number of points.  Some of the most important ones are:

• Is the commitment of the school and the team clear and complete?
• Is there an effective multidisciplinary base reflected in the team and the plans?
• Is there a good plan in place?
• Is the school likely succeed in this competition, based on the plan?
• Is it clear that the activity will have significant impact on the undergraduate engineering curriculum?

4.  How can we make these clear?  Any further suggestions?

-        Commitment:  Is an organizational structure in place, has student leadership been identified, and is the team ready?  Is it clear that the team has been preparing and intends to pursue the project vigorously?  Be sure to include a Letter of Support from the school.  It should be clear that the school is willing to provide facilities, faculty time, and an appropriate level of support.  Team plans for fundraising should be clear as well.

-       Multidisciplinary base and curriculum impact:  Does the project involve courses, student group projects, team members from multiple departments, interdisciplinary topic emphasis, and strong undergraduate involvement?  The project should not represent a full-time engineer's or researcher’s development work.

-        The plan:  Does the proposal have sufficient technical content to display expertise and a plan likely to lead to a low-cost inverter design?  Detailed circuit diagrams can be included if available, although this is not expected, but block diagram overviews combined with sufficient description to illustrate the design considerations for cost reduction are necessary.

5.   Should the proposal include any credentials or resumes?

Qualifications and level of interest of team members and advisors is of interest (auxiliary participants such as post doctoral researchers, visiting scholars, or lab technicians should not be included).  Short biographical sketches about the faculty advisor and some of the students are encouraged, provided they remain within the proposal length guidelines.  In the case of students, it is important to reflect student efforts to prepare for the competition.

6.    Are there limits on student participation?

Not really.  A faculty advisor must be identified for each team.  Also, proposals are judged in part for the impact on undergraduate engineering.  For schools with graduate programs, it is acceptable to have graduate student involvement, but the bulk of the activity should be at the undergraduate level to demonstrate curriculum impact.  Involvement of students both inside and outside of engineering disciplines is encouraged.

7.    What about sponsorship?

Our plan is to fund two team members for travel and participation in the Springboard Meeting in November.  Finalist teams will have several members funded to participate in final testing.  The Organizing Committee is working to secure additional seed money, and more information should be available in November.  Each school is encouraged to seek their own sponsorship.  There are no special restrictions on sources of funding.  It is the intention of the Organizing Committee to set up the competition requirements in such a manner that winning results can be attained with modest project budgets.

8.    Our school has a faculty member on the Organizing Committee.  Does this mean we can't be involved?

To avoid conflicts of interest, any Organizing Committee members with connections to specific schools will not participate in any direct decisions or judging activities that involve those schools.  The judging panels understand and appreciate the need for strict impartiality.  We strongly support the IEEE Code of Ethics.  Your school is welcome to participate.