Martin Fischer, Civil and Environmental Engineering

Combined cooling, heating and power (CCHP) systems theoretically use 90 percent of the primary energy going into them, but in reality their efficiency is usually just a little better than large, coal-fired power plants. In the spring, electricity demand hums along, but the waste heat from a CCHP generator is mostly not needed for air conditioning or heating. This project will find out how much the efficiency of large CCHP plants, (greater than 10 megawatts), can be increased by planning new campuses, neighborhoods, industrial zones, etc., with CCHP in mind, rather than bolting on CCHP after the planning is done.