About the Competition

POWERless is a seven-week energy competition among the residence halls to increase energy conservation awareness. Students compete to reduce the energy use in their building, based on baseline power consumption. The winner is the building with the largest percentage energy reduction over the course of the competition. An award is also given to the residential area with the overall largest percentage energy reduction.

Many of Elon’s residence halls are connected to a web-based system, called Building Dashboard, where students can monitor their energy usage in real-time. They can also compare their building’s energy usage to a rival building’s usage. The unit equivalent feature of the system allows comparisons in units such as pounds of coal and burgers.

POWERless took place for the first time in the spring of 2008. The building winner was Loy G, H & I with 23.8% reduction. The residential area winner was the Loy Center with 15.1% reduction. Overall, the competition resulted in a reduction of 111,762 kwh of electricity, compared to the baseline consumption. Environmentally this means the students prevented 45 tons of coal from being burned, 63 tons of carbon dioxide emissions, 291 pounds of nitrogen oxides emissions, and 726 pounds of sulfur dioxide emissions. Keep shedding those kilowatt hours Elon!