The University of Virginia is constructing a cutting-edge heat plant at its campus to reduce carbon emissions and waste. The plant will utilize a geo-exchange system to capture and store heat underground, providing thermal energy to buildings. UVA aims to be carbon neutral by 2030 and fossil fuel-free by 2050, showcasing forward-thinking and sustainable energy practices. Graduates and students involved in the project are gaining valuable engineering and construction experience.
Illustration by Ayers Saint Gross/Courtesy of University of Virginia
The proposed heat plant won’t burn fossil fuels to create heat, but will be a geoexchange system that captures heated water, stores it underground and retrieves it when it’s needed.
The University of Virginia (UVA) is currently building a ground-breaking energy plant at the Charlottesville campus designed to gather wasted heat and store it in subterranean wells until it is needed again.
Some news sources have placed the cost of the project at around $70 million, although the university has not confirmed that figure.
UVA Today, an online news site produced by the school's communications office, reported Aug. 7 that the plant under construction in the Fontaine Research Park will supply thermal energy to the new Paul and Diane Manning Institute of Biotechnology.
Because 90 percent of UVA's fossil fuel consumption is used for heat, employing new and efficient technologies will help the venerable university reach its goal of being carbon neutral by 2030 and fossil fuel-free by 2050, the campus news outlet noted.
The Fontaine plant will not burn fossil fuels to create heat, said Paul Zmick, UVA's director of energy and utilities. Rather, it will employ a geo-exchange system that, in simple terms, captures heated water, stores it underground, and retrieves it when needed to provide heating or cooling to a campus building. Initially, the plant will utilize about 100 underground storage wells. The geo-exchange system acts as a very large thermal battery.
The plant is part of a multi-pronged goal to curb the university's energy use. That effort includes dialing down the temperature of hot water from 200 degrees to 165 or lower and boosting the energy efficiency of new buildings and additions.
The geo-exchange system is highly efficient because it takes heat that would otherwise be vented or wasted and recycles it, according to UVA Today.
"It's a passive system — a thermal transfer between one substance to another, rather than being generated with carbon or a different energy source," explained Ashley Morris, a UVA graduate and project engineer with DPR Construction, a worldwide general contractor with offices in Richmond and Reston, on the heat plant project. "As that water is being passed through the loops in the circuits, that thermal transfer is happening. And that is what is providing heat and thermal energy, or lack of it, to the plant. There will still be power needed to operate that equipment, but the source of heating and cooling itself is fossil-fuel-free."
UVA Engineering Graduates Working at Heat Plant Site
Morris, a Loudoun County, Va., native, is a 2019 mechanical engineering graduate. A DPR employee since leaving UVA, Morris does a variety of jobs on the site, including quality control, site logistics and schedule management.
Working with Morris at the heat plant site over the summer was Mary Cotter, a rising third-year mechanical engineering student at UVA. Cotter served as a summer intern with the university's energy and utilities department in the Division of Facilities Management.
She told UVA Today that the internship has altered her view of the school.
"As a student, I did not realize how much goes into the functioning of this university," Cotter said. "Just heating and cooling the university is such an undertaking and that has been really interesting for me to learn about. When I'm going to class and walking around [UVA's] Grounds, I'm going to have much more of an appreciation for every piece of our energy systems.
Working at the heat plant site also has given Cotter practical experience.
"It's a great learning opportunity," she elaborated. "What I learn in the classroom — such as physics — is really important and plays into this. But being able to intern during my summer gives me an idea of what being an engineer is actually like. To be able to do it at my own university, where we're doing pretty cool stuff, is extra special."
Morris acknowledged she went into the construction field for similar reasons.
"I quickly realized I didn't want to necessarily sit behind a desk or be a traditional engineer," she said. "I wanted to physically see the fruits of my labor every day and get my hands dirty a little bit. That's what the construction industry was for me.
"I also became fascinated with building techniques and watching the folks who have done this for years and who are skilled and what they have learned about their own trade. They're the subject matter experts."
Morris, who stayed in Charlottesville after graduation, was able to apply the teamwork she learned as a goalie on UVA's women's lacrosse team to her job. A project like the UVA energy plant demands teamwork from a lot of different individuals, she added.
"No one could ever do this or any other construction project by themselves," Morris said, noting that it requires her general contracting team, made up of the project manager, regional safety and quality personnel, experienced subcontractors and a talented group of designers, to "make things happen."
Both Morris and Cotter are impressed with how far forward UVA officials are planning in their development of the campus.
"This plant was designed with 30-plus years down the line in mind. The level of planning and forethought that goes into these projects is monumental," Cotter explained. "With an abundance of forward-thinking technologies being utilized, I am excited for the future of UVA."
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