A Greener Campus

You might say that the ivy-covered NJIT campus buildings are turning a new shade of green this fall. Come August, NJIT students can opt to live in a residence hall that incorporates state-of-the-art technologies for efficient use of energy and sustainability.

The Oak Hall upgrade, a key part of many green initiatives on campus, has been made possible by $1.6 million in funding from the 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA). Scheduled for completion this year, the renewal of 25-year-old Oak Hall could reduce electrical energy use by as much as 50 percent and fossil energy consumption by as much as 40 percent. The project was approved by the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities and the U.S. Department of Energy as one of seven projects in the $20.6 million State Energy Program funded by ARRA.

Can Your Car Phone Talk To My Car Phone?

How did we ever get along without GPS technology – that coaxing voice and small screen that direct us to our destination while driving? What was once an exotic gadget is now a necessity, like the cell phone. And if the work of NJIT Associate Professor Cristian Borcea is an accurate social barometer, we’ve seen only the beginning of our interconnection with computers, wireless communications devices, and billions of sensors spanning locations from cars and the pavement to home appliances and even our bodies. Translated into one real-world driving scenario, Borcea says that “Integration of these technologies could automatically alert us to an accident miles ahead, sense congestion and tell us how much to slow down for safety, and place calls to people at work letting them know how late we’ll be for a meeting.”