Congratulations to our final year students Cheung Wan Ki, Chow Sze Wah, Sum Ho Yin, Yung Ho Lam who have just won the first place in the HVAC Design Calculations Category of the ASHRAE Design Competition 2022. This is the fourth year that HKU participated in the competition. Since receiving the Rising Star Award in 2019, student teams were able to reach the podium for three consecutive years in 2020, 21 & 22. Other than a monetary award, one representative from the team will be invited to attend the ASHRAE 2023 Winter Conference in Atlanta in February 2023, where the award will be presented.
The ASHRAE Design Competition is an international competition in air conditioning and refrigeration in which design teams are required to conduct a comprehensive design of a real project assigned by the organizer. There are four categories in the competition: HVAC Design Calculations, HVAC System Selection, Integrated Sustainable Building Design (ISBD) and Applied Engineering Challenge. Student teams are invited to participate in one or more of the categories. In this year, a new 23,300 sq.m., two-story performing arts building on a higher education campus in Sydney was chosen. The building consists of offices, classrooms, studios, performance halls, auditorium, offices, food services, and parking area. New HVAC systems were designed for the building including load calculations, system selection, ductwork and pipework layout, optimization of design, and integration with the architectural design and building envelope, etc. The design has to check against its compliance with international standards on thermal comfort, ventilation and energy use as well.
The competition was opened to all universities and submissions had to successfully go through selection boards at local, regional and international levels. Out of the 63 design teams and 17 teams in the HVAC Design Calculations category, the HKU Team is able to win the first place in its category.
Computer Model of Project Building
Use of Building Information Model in HVAC Design
Ventilation Modeling using advanced computer simulation
Thermal Comfort Prediction Model
System Schematic
System Layout