The studies were part of a pilot project the students designed through an educational partnership agreement signed between IU and NSA Crane in October. The partnership aims to help NSA Crane replicate the successes of IU-Bloomington’s experience in the IU Energy Challenge, which has saved IU 4.8 million kilowatt-hours of electricity, 16 million gallons of water and more than $1.2 million in energy costs, according to an IU press release.
Energy efficiency is a key initiative for the Navy, according to the release, which has engaged in several strategies to curb energy use following a 2009 executive order signed by President Obama to set sustainability goals for federal agencies.
In their recent studies, graduate students saw reductions in energy ranging from 4.5 to nearly 26 percent.
Three teams of students, supervised by IU’s Director of Sustainability William Brown, spent three weeks in early October obtaining baseline data for energy from different buildings, including a 31,233-square-foot administrative support facility built in 1944, a 68,000-square-foot structure built in 2006 that holds 202 Army and Navy personnel, and the Navy Gateway Inn and Suites, a 28,300-square-foot building built in 1999, according to the release.
From Oct. 9 to Nov. 5, the teams used behavioral tools like social norms, commitment and prompts to focus on energy reduction in their respective buildings. These efforts included prompts places to light fixtures, appliances and electronics to urge energy consumption, themed emails including energy-saving tips and reminders, pocket-sized checklists for staff to follow energy-conservation steps and more.
The administrative support building saw a 20.4-percent drop in consumption throughout the three-week period. According to the release, the decrease in energy consumption was estimated to save $660 during the three-week pilot period, amounting to potential savings of $11,440 a year.
The Army and Navy personnel structure saw a 4.5-percent reduction in energy equating to more than $6,000 in annual savings. The hotel savings amounted to $40 per day, which could add up to about $14,600 annually, after a 25.8-percent reduction was observed during the project.
Brown said in the release that the key of the project was to get people to change how they think about energy consumption.
“I think the cumulative results of this project support our objective going in, which was to show that applying behavioral science to influence energy conservation is cost-effective and scalable,” Brown said in the release. “Because the pilot period was short, other factors may have contributed as well — or the approaches we used might have proven more effective over time.”
Brown said in the release a longer study could provide more definitive results.
Cmdr. Tim Craddock, commanding officer at NSA Crane, said the students gained valuable experience interacting in a large work force where others might be apathetic about energy conservation.
“Some workers may be all for it,” Craddock said in the release. “Others may not care — that’s life. When it comes to human behavior, no one rule works all the time and no one idea applies all the time. A wide variety of things must come together to make things work. Hopefully this gives the students a better understanding of that dynamic so they are better prepared when they enter the real world.”
Carley Lanich
