Sustainable Energy Choices – Technologies and Economics
Integrates quantitative methods of engineering analysis and life-cycle/technoeconomic assessment to make informed energy choices in a contemporary sustainability context. Fundamental principles of thermodynamics, transport, and reaction kinetics applied to representative energy supply and end-use technologies. Topics include resource assessment, energy extraction/capture, conversion, distribution, storage, consumption, and end use, environmental, social, and economic consequences, local to global scales. This course will prepare students to employ engineering and economic tools and techniques to analyze large and small energy projects and make effective recommendations for selecting energy technology options. The course will also cover energy systems, markets, innovation, and policy, with a focus on the aspects required to support comprehensive, quantitative energy project analysis.
Topics
- Analyze current energy supplies and demands. Learn and appreciate the importance of geopolitical/social context in sustainability analysis.
- Demonstrate advanced skills for engineering analysis, including process thermodynamics, 2nd-law/availability-exergy analysis, transient heat conduction, and economics of energy systems.
- Demonstrate techniques for incorporating engineering principles into economic analyses to model project performance and inform decision-making, including economic principles, such as the time value of money, interest rates, and cash flow analyses.
- Complete a design/analysis project, working in teams of typically two students each, that involves both oral and written communication of results.
Official roster learning outcomes
Sources
- Course catalogue ↗2026-2027