For a small place, Dal鈥檚 Agricultural Campus houses a lot of infrastructure. That makes it an ideal choice for students in the engineering department鈥檚 Integrated Environmental Management (IEM) and Engineering programs, says Kenny Corscadden.
The facilities aren鈥檛 the only strength. As the department's farm energy conservation industry research chair, Dr. Corscadden works closely with the local energy industry and takes his students to farms in the area to put theory into practice.
鈥淲e have a number of projects on farmers鈥� sites,鈥� he says. 鈥淲e鈥檝e got six wind towers up at the moment on different farms. We have an ultrasonic wind sensor that鈥檚 on a trailer鈥hat gets deployed to measure wind speed.鈥�
Students also have access to trucks, tractors and heavy machinery at the Bio-Environmental Engineering Centre on campus 鈥� one of Canada鈥檚 leading research and development facilities.
鈥淲e鈥檝e got large conveyors there with real operating systems that can move two or three tonnes of material,鈥� Dr. Corscadden says. 鈥淏eing able to visualize things helps (students) grasp the concepts.鈥�
Strong connections with energy industry
Although he鈥檚 been a professor for the past three years, Dr. Corscadden says his industry background in pulp and paper and heavy instrumentation gives him a strong connection to the energy industry, where a lot of important research is generated.
However, he says he always considered a career in academia. He enjoys teaching and helping students understand how they鈥檒l use basic engineering principles in their future careers.
鈥淭he energy side of my work has a primary focus on鈥nderstanding how energy is used in agriculture, how we can perform research that will help industry, communicating that information to industry and ensuring that we can implement things,鈥� he explains.
His teaching and research also focuses on ways to produce renewable energy and integrate those methods onto farms. Understanding sustainability and renewable energy will be important for future IEM and Engineering graduates, he adds.
鈥淚 think in the next five years, there will be very few jobs that won鈥檛 consider sustainability. I think there are great opportunities for students. Most of my courses are electives鈥nd I鈥檓 seeing more and more people taking an interest in those courses.鈥�
Building a TREEhouse
Outside the classroom, Dr. Corscadden and his students are involved in a project called , which stands for Technology for the Responsible use of Energy and the Environment. The project was born from a small residential home the campus acquired two years ago.
鈥淲e basically gutted the house and rebuilt it using renewable and recycled materials and it鈥檚 now become an office space,鈥� he says.
The TREEhouse has a recycled roof made from tires formed into shingles, large south facing windows to take advantage of passive solar heating and different types of insulation, some of which is made from recycled pop bottles.
鈥淭here are different zones for different lighting types. It鈥檚 all instrumented, so we can measure how much energy is used, how much light is in each zone, what the temperature is and what the humidity is,鈥� says Dr. Corscadden.
The project is currently in its second phase, which involves building a green roof and a water management system to control rainwater run-off. Students from the Environmental Horticulture Landscape program will eventually populate the roof with plants.
鈥淭his was a real opportunity for them to knock a wall down, build a new structure, help put windows in and see how a house is insulated and wired and things like that,鈥� says Dr. Corscadden.
Time outside the classroom allows him to engage students and identify their strengths and weaknesses, he adds.