May Chapter Meeting: Distinguished Lecturer - "Smart Grid and Smart Buildings" & Chapter Awards

Title: The Coming of Age of Smart Grid and Smart Buildings

Speaker: Thomas Lawrence, PhD

Presentation

GBCI Approved | 1 CE Hour | 0920014297

AIA Approved | 1 LU/HSW | LAWRENCE01

The smart grid is coming and in that future era buildings will be interacting even more with the electric utilities.  The communication will be in both directions, with the utility working to balance the grid supply and demand through methods such as signaling requests for demand response measures, real-time price adjustments, etc.  This is a new and evolving field and, while there are some differences in the need for and how a smart grid might function in the various regions of the world, there are some common factors as well.  This seminar provides an overview of the smart grid particularly as it relates to buildings and their systems.

Speaker Bio

Dr. Lawrence is the Mechanical Engineering program lead with the University of Georgia, and has 35 years of professional experience. He spent the first 18 years in industry and after going back for his PhD at Purdue he has been at UGA since January 2004. He is the past chair of ASHRAE Technical Committee 2.8 and is a member of the committee that wrote and maintains ASHRAE Standard 189.1 for High Performance Green Buildings. As an ASHRAE Distinguished Lecturer, he gives seminars on green building design at venues around the world. Dr. Lawrence was named an ASHRAE Fellow in 2016 and is a Director-at-Large on the Board of Directors for ASHRAE.

Dr. Lawrence has a B.S. with Highest Distinction in Environmental Science from Purdue University (1978), a M.S. degree in Mechanical Engineering from Oregon State University (1982) and a second M.S. degree in Engineering Management from Washington University in 1989. He received a Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from Purdue University in the spring of 2004

Distinguished Lecturer Program

The purpose of the ASHRAE Distinguished Lecturers (DL) Program is to provide ASHRAE Chapters with lecturers equipped to speak on relevant subjects of interest to ASHRAE members and guests without incurring huge costs by covering travel expenses to and from the host city. Distinguished Lecturers are nominated by ASHRAE members and presentations are evaluated. The Distinguished Lecturer Program is supervised by the Chapter Technology Transfer Committee. For the 2018-19 Society Year, 195 visits are allocated to the 15 ASHRAE Regions. The CTTC Regional Vice Chair for each Region allocates visits to the Chapters.