Updated on: Tuesday, December 20, 2011
VIT University was the first institution under the School of mechanical and building sciences offering a unique 4-year undergraduate programme leading to a B.Tech degree in Mechanical (specialized in Energy Engineering).
This course is designed to develop Energy engineers and specialists capable of meeting the challenges of future industrial expansion and to meet current industrial requirements, with an emphasis on industrial interaction and applied engineering, university chancellor Dr G. Viswanathan said.
The course is being offered in co-operation with Aachen University of Applied Sciences, Julich, Germany, Technical University, Eindhoven, Netherlands, and Indian Institute of Technology, Chennai.
VIT also offers courses in M.Tech energy and environment. Students also study subjects on advanced courses in solar energy, wind energy, bio energy, fuels and combustion, energy economics, renewable energy project preparation etc apart from the courses on heat transfer, mass transfer, and conventional energy systems instrumentation, energy conservation systems and auditing.
It also has initiated number of research programmes leading to Doctoral degree and Innovative long term research for conservation of energy, promoting large scale projects for conventional power generation plants.
We have taken steps after doing regular energy auditing to install power plants using biomass, solar PV, solar water heating and dish Stirling engine systems at our university, Dr Viswanathan said, adding that already the university had installed 2 water heaters capable of heating 15,000 litres of water every day and installed a solar PV cum aero generator for street lights in Chennai campus and planning to install a number of solar water heater units. As a long term measure VIT is also planning to install wind power generators for Solar PV plants on wheeling basis.