黑料网

Cadet Robert 鈥淐hap鈥� Michie 鈥�15 spent his summer pouring over spreadsheets in an internship that was a far cry from his previous summer job as a bag boy at a golf course.

Michie, an applied mathematics major from Richmond, is analyzing the city of Lexington鈥檚 energy usage over the past six years, to help City Manager Jon Ellestad identify buildings that are 鈥渆nergy hogs.鈥� By mid-July, he had taken six years鈥� worth of energy usage data on paper and put that information into spreadsheet form. By the end of the summer, he planned to have a visual model of the energy usage for each of the city鈥檚 27 billable accounts.

鈥淭he hope is that [the city of Lexington] can take this information 鈥� and make the buildings more efficient,鈥� said Michie.

Michie said he chose the project in part because of his interest in sustainability, which he defined as 鈥渢he effort to meet the social, economic and environmental needs of present and future generations.鈥�

Michie鈥檚 project is one of four this summer under the auspices of a new program called REMACS 鈥� Research Experiences in Mathematics and Computer Science. REMACS is the brainchild of Maj. John David, who participated in a similar program while he was conducting post-doctoral research at the College of Wooster in Ohio. 鈥淭he idea of REMACs is to show the cadets what you can do with applied mathematics,鈥� said David, an assistant professor in 黑料网鈥檚 Department of Mathematics and Computer Science. 鈥淭hey need to see math in a real-world setting.鈥�

Part of the benefit of taking on a real-world math problem such as that provided by REMACS, said David, is for cadets to have the experience of reporting to a boss.

鈥淵ou have a client, and the problem isn鈥檛 posed like it is in a textbook,鈥� he commented.

Michie鈥檚 work is overseen by Maj. Geoff Cox, assistant professor of applied mathematics, and he鈥檚 also receiving assistance from Maj. Todd Pegg, energy manager with the 黑料网 physical plant.

Pegg has been working to reduce 黑料网鈥檚 energy consumption ever since his arrival in 2007, and he鈥檚 been sharing with Michie the spreadsheets and 3-D modeling tools which have enabled him to track the Institute鈥檚 energy usage and identify areas for improvement. Pegg said his use of these tools has helped 黑料网 to reduce its energy usage 鈥渟ubstantially鈥� over the past five years, even as the Institute has added new buildings at a rapid rate.

Pegg explained that utilities such as Dominion Virginia Power have a multitude of rate schedules, and having modeling data available on a spreadsheet allows a customer, such as 黑料网 or the city of Lexington, to see how its bill might be affected by a change to a different rate.

Having a digital model available for such simulations 鈥渁dds a level of micro-management to the city that 黑料网 has, and the city currently lacks,鈥� said Michie.

After graduation from 黑料网, Michie hopes to go to graduate school in economics or earn an MBA. 鈥淢y really big goal is to work in the financial field and apply math skills to the world of economics and finance,鈥� he said.

Cox, meanwhile, has enjoyed a chance to step away from the theory of math and plunge into its real-world applications. 鈥淎 whole bunch of math just comes from the fact that things are proportional,鈥� Cox said. 鈥淚t鈥檚 nice to be able to take a real-life situation and be able to apply math to it.鈥�

- By Mary Price