Introducing NYU Room: NYU’s Next Step to NYU 2040
By: Shaurya Srivastava, Alicia Pairman, Sanjay Chunduru, David Green, Gracie Palumbo-Alkire, and James Yang
Overview
NYU Room is a simple solution to a long-standing problem, not turning off the lights. Using a very mechanical approach, the NYU Room device simply attaches to your wall right beside your light switch and manually turns the light on or off depending on the sound level in the room. If the sound level falls below a certain threshold for a prolonged period of time (about 30 minutes) and the light is on, NYU Room will switch the light off, saving electricity, money, and the environment. Similarly, it helps users by turning on the light switch when the sound is above a certain level. A simple clap should do it. Our design worked using an arm, a servo motor to move the arm, a microbit to measure the sound levels and to tell the arm when to move, wires, and alligator clips to connect the device to power. In our presentation, we powered the device from our laptop but in practice, a battery would be used.
Our Original Thoughts and our Data
Our original proposal was to create a mechanical switch that was connected to a servo motor (which was then connected to the microbit). We believed that if the microbit read a sound level below a certain threshold, it would automatically turn the switch off, which would thus reduce wasted energy from the lights being inadvertently left on.
There was a wide range of data that supported this idea. We initially turned to our potential users to gather some qualitative data regarding this topic. Each of us interviewed our roommates and other dorm residents about this idea, asking them questions about how often they leave the light on, how often they are actually aware of that mistake, and how badly they care to get up and turn it off. Most of our responses fell into three categories: our interviewees said that they didn’t care to turn off the lights because they weren’t the ones paying for utilities in their dorm. Others said that they were simply too lazy, and the third group said that they simply had no idea. We realized that this had the potential for a big issue as most dorm residents supported our assumptions that they didn’t care about when they left the lights on in their rooms, resulting in lots of energy being wasted. We then looked towards supporting this idea from a quantitative means, looking at some data that NYU had published, Professor Grewell had given to us, and anything useful that we could find on the internet.
Looking at NYU’s Climate Action Plan, we saw a fact that discussed how 99.4 percent of their energy consumption was building related, of which 27% was for electricity purposes and 65% of it was for Natural Gas. Since our current, LED based, dorm lights use a combination of both natural gas and electricity, it was fair to make a conclusion that a significant amount of NYU’s energy consumption was being affected by students inadvertently leaving their lights on.
We then investigated NYU’s energy building data from 2018 to 2022, looking to see if we could find any patterns between dorms. We set Lipton as a baseline, or control, as we were aware of the fact that they already had motion sensors. We were essentially using that dataset to determine whether there was slight proof that a different version of our proposed idea was actually working. We noticed that Lipton Hall’s energy usage went from 800,000 kWh in 2018 to 140,000 kwH in 2022. Meanwhile, other dorms which didn’t have an energy prevention system like Lipton’s such as Brittany Hall’s energy usage went from 1.3 million kWh to only 1.2 million kWh. University Hall‘s energy usage stagnated at around 2.2 million kWh, while Washington Square Village’s energy consumption stagnated at around 5.3 million kWh.
Finally, we looked for more evidence and scoured the web, coming upon a study done on california college students and their energy demand throughout the day. The graph showed that at the peak of the day, the highest source of energy demand came from exterior and interior lighting, with interior lighting’s demand being higher than exterior lighting’s demand.
We were really convinced at this point that there was clear potential of this being a big problem for NYU. We were confident in our proposal to create NYU Room, as it was attacking a problem with the potential of great impact for NYU.
Trials and Tribulations
The NYU Room device underwent numerous iterations before we arrived at the prototype that we proudly showcased. Initially, we considered focusing on single pole switches and incorporating two customized arms with a 90-degree angle between them, which would rotate up and down to switch the lights on and off. However, after consulting with our mentor, we made the wise decision to concentrate on rocker switches and incorporate the same customizable arms. While building the switch, one of our product specialists (thank you Noel) suggested outfitting the servo motor with just one arm instead of two. We experimented with using a moldable plastic to create the arm, but quickly discovered that it lacked the necessary force to operate the light switch. To address this issue, we initially tried using a plastic knife, and eventually resorted to a combination of the knife and the moldable plastic. However, we soon realized that the problem lay in the direction of the servo motor’s rotation. We made a 90-degree rotation to the servo motor, fashioned a stable arm out of a pen with a drilled hole, and conducted rigorous testing. Finally, we achieved success, enough pressure was applied to both sides of the light switch for it to operate seamlessly, and we had successfully overcome the challenge.
Our Hackathon Process
We started off with our idea of using the motor and creating an arm to turn off the switch. Alicia made two arms and we chose to focus on the straight one as opposed to a two prong arm.
David grabbed two light switches and we decided to work with the rocker switch as opposed to a flip switch. Our cardboard arm was moving well so we briefly considered 3D making an arm that would perfectly fit the motor, however we ultimately decided against it. Noel Joyce provided us with a sketch of how he thought our light switch, motor, and microbit should be situated.
Next, we used the moldable plastic to create an arm, but it did not work well. The microbit, motor, and light were fixed into a piece of cardboard. Noel helped us make an arm out of a spoon and suggested we create a moon shaped cover for the microbit and motor.
Alicia and Gracie created the moon shaped covering but we ultimately ditched it. We grew frustrated as we could not get our product to work and turn on and off the switch. Noel suggested we use a pen, change the orientation of the arm in relation to the switch, and lift the motor up. Finally it worked. We got our hands on the orange tape and the rest is history. We also created a little dorm with an LED light to model how the switch would work as a result of sound levels. We plan on implementing the moon shaped covering later on as we advance the prototype.
The Final Presentation
In our final presentation, we propose our solution: NYU Room. For introducing context, we briefly summarize our interviews on the next slide. We were able to identify a common pattern where 1. Dorm dwellers did not care about conserving electricity since they are not responsible for the bills and 2. People forget or are too lazy to turn off the lights which waste energy. We then present our data comparing the energy consumption of Lipton Hall, Brittany Hall, University Hall, and Washington Square Village. Lipton Hall, which used motion-sensor lighting, experienced a tremendous decrease in energy use after installing this system while University Hall and Washington Square Village stagnated. Brittany Hall saw a minor decrease in energy consumption. The next slide displays that interior and exterior lighting account for a significant portion of the energy use, highlighting the scope of the problem. Therefore, our solution aims to solve a relevant issue. We then present our prototype describing its notable features: sound sensor, mechanical lever, adjustable threshold, and 30-minute rotational cycle. We proceed to justify why our solution is effective by stating that NYU Room can save 15.1 million watts and reduce costs by $60,000. We also emphasize on the cheap cost of our product, which is around $30 and is mass produced. Moving forward, we can add an app for better convenience and customizability. We can use higher quality materials to build our product in conjunction with grants, more testing, and experiments.
Here is the link to our presentation: Link
Next Steps
The immediate next step is to test the efficacy of the product in terms of how much electricity it has saved by running a pilot test on rooms from all dorm halls, to get an baseline understanding of the amount of electricity saved by the product. To do so, we will measure the electricity consumption when using it over the period of 1 month, and see if there are significant changes when compared to the bill in the other months. If the dollar savings are great enough to warrant potential adoption of the product, we will go through with iterative prototyping by conducting interviews with dorming students. Furthermore, the current model only works with a certain type of light switch, so some thought must go into adapting it to different light switches as well — this may even warrant designing a different operating mechanism.
We will also test whether this product will be viable for use in regular homes as well as classrooms, so as to gain an understanding of the potential market segments we could target.
With the 5,000 dollar budget, we would look to really improve our prototype. After the prototype has evolved to a level that is seen as optimal by all stakeholders involved, we will be experimenting with removing the microbit and replacing it with an inexpensive microcontroller like the Raspberry Pi. Once that stage is completed, We will work on prototyping and developing the app for the product. Finally once all the pieces are in place, we can put in a bulk order of the device and implement it.
We currently have been making efforts to improve the prototype to give it a more sleek appearance. That can be viewed here: Link
We also designed a quick prototype for our app. That can be viewed here: Link
