This page provides information and links to materials we have developed for recent research and teaching projects.
Virtual Inter-university Symposium on Infrastructure Management (VISIM)
Collaborators: Cal Skiles (current), and Adrian Hernandez (past and co-founder of VISIM)
Summary: We launched VISIM in 2022 as to establish regular and ongoing connections across universities. VISIM features monthly, student-led talks organized in hour-long sessions throughout the academic year. The link below provides additional information, including instructions to sign up to give talks!
Symposium Page: https://sites.northwestern.edu/visim1/about/
LOCOMOTIVES: LOwering CO2: Models to Optimize Train Infrastructure, Vehicles, and Energy Storage
Sponsor: USDoE Advanced Research Projects Agency–Energy (ARPA-E) Program
PIs: P.L. Durango-Cohen (NU), H. Mahmassani (NU), A. Elgowainy (ANL), and M. Wang (ANL), and Y. Zhou (ANL)
Other collaborators: A. Hernandez (NU), M. Ng (NU), C. Siddique
Summary: Researchers at Northwestern University and Argonne National Laboratory developed an analytical framework to inform Class I Railroads and other stakeholders in on the deployment of alternative locomotive energy technologies, including support infrastructure, across their networks to decarbonize their operations. To make the analysis accessible, a flexible industry-oriented tool has been created that caters to individual user needs and provides insights with respect to costs, emissions, and operational performance metrics for the evaluation of various decarbonization deployment strategies over varying time horizons.
Project Website: https://transportation.northwestern.edu/research/featured-reports/locomotives.html
- Includes links to a github repository with our data and code.
Interactive Dashboard: https://nufriend.transportation.northwestern.edu/
Computational tools and data for Economic Input-Output models for environmental and social lifecycle assessments
Sponsor: VentureWell
PI: K. Gray
Summary: We developed a course module for CivEnv 304: Civil and Environmental Engineering Systems Analysis focusing on applying input-output analysis for environmental and social design and lifecycle assessment. The analysis constitutes a contemporary and important engineering application. To support the analysis, we developed computational templates (in Matlab and in Excel), and in collaboration with Allie Holmgrem (BS CEE) and Jing Yu (PhD CEE), we recorded video tutorials on the methodology and use of the computational templates. These materials are available from a repository at https://civenv304.github.io/. Also, included are videos that the students from the Spring 2024 course offering produced instead of written reports. The module, the materials, and the assignment were well received by the students.