Engineering student's design takes top prize

UNSW engineering student David Snowdon is the NSW winner of the 2002/2003 Siemens Prize for Innovation, one of the country's richest awards offered within the tertiary engineering sector.

The Siemens Prize for Innovation is awarded for the most outstanding final year student project in the fields of electronic, electrical, communication or computer engineering.

As a state winner, David will be awarded $5000 and will represent NSW in the Trans-Tasman finals in Melbourne this June for a chance to win an additional $20,000.

David is a contender for the big prize as a result of his work on Sunswift II, the UNSW entrant in the World Solar Challenge. David's project involved the design and implementation of a telemetry and control system for the solar car. The main goal of the system is to vary the car's speed to take into account hills, wind, solar radiation, and any other data that can be successfully used to model the car's power consumption. By doing so, the energy required for the solar car to travel from point-to-point through management of the car's speed can be reduced, in a kind of intelligent cruise control.

While the implementation could not be directly transferred to a normal commuter car, it would be possible to use the technology in a more conventional vehicle, reducing fuel consumption and greenhouse emissions for highway journeys.

The Siemens Prize for Innovation showcases leading-edge Australian engineering projects from the country's top students and universities. Now in its fifth year, the $20,000 prize is awarded to the most outstanding final year engineering project with innovative business solutions for industry sectors including IT, health, energy and telecommunications.

Item provided courtesy of UNSW