HKUST Strategic Plan 2021-2028

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1hg STRATEGIC PLAN 2021-2028 OVERVIEW Established in 1991, HKUST is now a globally respected university and contributes both locally and internationally to talent development, new knowledge and societal interests.

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A CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK VIEW DETAILS

FIVE STRATEGIC OBJECTIVES VIEW OBJECTIVES

1 STRATEGIC PLAN 2021-2028

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OVERVIEW Established in 1991, HKUST is now a globally respected university and contributes both locally and internationally to talent development, new knowledge and societal interests. Being international is an intrinsic element of the HKUST spirit. The University was founded on the principle that education, original scholarship, and the development of society are integrally linked and best pursued together. We believe that humanity’s advancement is generated through the fostering of an international community and the nurturing of individuals through holistic education, original research, and knowledge transfer into the wider society.

Continuing Commitments: We are in a time of great challenges, in Hong Kong as well as around the globe. A campus supporting openness, diversity and mutual respect is our highest priority. We must join hands in upholding our core principles and values, by exercising individual and institutional integrity, promoting our international standard, and improving our gender distributions as well as enhancing cultural diversity. Facing all these issues and needs, there is an additional demand on resources, both human and financial. Given the current and future challenges, some members have been encountering elevated financial and mental stresses. The University will continue to place a high priority to provide financial relief for those in need as well as to support mental-wellness via peer sharing and professional counseling. We will also continue the substantial partnership established with our external supporters in these areas.

Embracing New Era: Impacted by the pandemic, we have adapted and sought to optimize teaching arrangements, based on the valuable input from our faculty, students and staff through technological backing and multiple innovative arrangements. Such efforts will continue as we not only are under unprecedented challenges in teaching and learning but also should continue to innovate and improve with the hard-learned lessons in recent past. On the research front, in addition to substantial government support, we now see that a growing number of private enterprises are seeking close collaboration with HKUST in different areas, motivated by mutual interest in advancing frontiers of science and technology. Such partnership will help propel Hong Kong and the region to innovate and to transform its societal and economic landscape.

Signature Themes of the Future: Sustainable conduct, both locally and globally, is a paramount topic of forever impact. At HKUST, in addition to commitments of cutting down energy, water and waste, there is a self-expectation that we should make strong contributions to address the issues based on science and technology, as well as policy, human behavior and psychology. The Sustainable Smart Campus “as a Living Lab” initiative, with substantial commitments of the University’s resources has been gaining momentum, and will be encouraged to further scale up for comprehensive experimentation. Members of HKUST have created impressive marks in intelligent industrialization including robotics, big data, renewable energy and new materials. There are highly recognized enterprises related to personal drones, autonomous water vehicles and cars, FinTech, electronics and biomedical technologies which were founded by our alumni and faculty. Riding on these achievements, we will also develop energetic frameworks to support these endeavors with a goal of advancing and supporting human capital from birth to the end. Under these three themes, our Strategic Plan is aimed at addressing the future of living, the future of work, and the future of people.

Resetting Our Academic Framework: HKUST is well-positioned and will continue to enthusiastically support members to pursue curiosity-driven investigations in any disciplines within our established academic scope. Such activities may be fundamental with no immediate prospect for practical adoption. In parallel, the University is motivated to facilitate mission-encouraged research and learning in response to numerous challenges and opportunities of great societal implications. We recognize that the success of such pursuits requires expertise across disciplines along with necessary institution-wide structures and resources. It is impressive that with the COVID-19 pandemic sweeping across the world, members of HKUST have stepped up and made numerous highly recognized contributions to help address the needs. Such societal missions can provide long lasting satisfaction and substantial encouragement to our research and teaching scope. A primary focus of this Strategic Plan is the conceptualization and implementation of the dual support of both curiosity-driven and mission-encouraged pursuits, in systematic manners, through reimagined academic programs and structures. Clearly, increased resources and new physical infrastructure are necessary to encourage cross-disciplinary collaboration and to promote world leading ambition to our entire HKUST community. A system-wide framework is needed to address new frontiers and world-wide challenges beyond merely adjusting the existing framework.

Unified HKUST - Complementary Campuses: The establishment of HKUST(Guangzhou) creates an exceptional opportunity for new resources, organizational structure and physical settings needed for the systematic development of cross-disciplinary programs in concert with the disciplinary-oriented efforts on our Clear Water Bay campus. We envision a unified university system that capitalizes on the aforementioned duality while promoting two complementary campuses without duplicating academic programs, which are of separate legal entities of independent finances with no cross-subsidization.

Under the Unified HKUST-Complementary Campuses umbrella, academic structures and degree programs are differentiated, the overall infrastructures substantially enlarged and updated, and courses and central research facilities open to students and researchers both ways. Even though the two campuses are of separate legal entities and financial frameworks, faculty are encouraged and supported to collaborate and co-supervise students, and students will have opportunities to pursue degrees offered by both campuses. This way, members of both campuses will freely choose their research topics and related studies with University’s overall enlarged scope, with more flexibility and better support. Accordingly, HKUST will continue to advance its role as a globally leading institution, and our faculty and students will find an encouraging atmosphere for their passions and interests to better develop their potential.

Upholding Core Principles: Ever since our founding days, HKUST’s position in teaching, learning, research and academic pursuits has remained the same. These fundamentals are repeatedly validated by our regular conduct as well as through internationally-benchmarked objective measures. We remain steadfast in our support for academic freedom, (see examples below) and scholarly endeavors:

https://www.freedomforuminstitute.org/about/faq/what-is-academic-freedom https://www.britannica.com/topic/academic-freedom https://www.insidehighered.com/views/2010/12/21/defining-academic-freedom We are determined to contribute our utmost efforts to the future of Hong Kong and beyond.

Strategic Objectives: With the above reasoning, the University deems it critical to reflect, assess and reinvent our approaches in achieving our objectives while responding to the new circumstances. As such, HKUST will move forward as and by:

A University of talents An international leader in education and research Incorporating innovation and entrepreneurship in our spirit An exemplar of best-in-class standards, practices, and operations A champion of diversity In the new University Strategic Plan, our underlying aspirations not only set out to sustain and advance HKUST as a trendsetter in both education and research landscapes for the long term, but also address the evolving needs and challenges facing society.

A CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK Assessing Where We Are

Established in 1991, HKUST is an internationally-minded research University founded on the principle that education, original scholarship, and societal development are intimately linked and best pursued together. Fundamental to this principle is our global and humanity-oriented approach: advancement of humanity through the development of an international community and the nurturing of individuals alongside original research and knowledge transfer. These ideals support each other and are reflected in all endeavors of the University: advances in the arts and sciences, engineering, and business are strongly connected to societal issues such as sustainability and climate change; wealth disparity; social justice; geopolitical conflicts; and notably the pandemic that has transformed our world over in the past few months.

As a prominent international University, HKUST has a profound commitment to furthering the mission of the academy: providing an open, inclusive, and free campus to support education and research of the highest quality. As an important Hong Kong institution, HKUST has a deep obligation to help address the social, political, and economic challenges that our city faces.

HKUST supports in-depth studies in selected disciplines, structured under four Schools: Science; Engineering; Business and Management; and Humanities and Social Science. Each School offers degree programs, recruits faculty, admits and educates students, and engages staff based on its scope and ambition. Our faculty independently choose and pursue their research activities, while Departments and Divisions within Schools offer home bases under an umbrella that ensures disciplines as a whole flourish. In addition to Schools, the Interdisciplinary Programs Office (IPO) encourages, facilitates, and promotes academic endeavors that do not fit neatly within a single School’s intellectual scope.

This unrestricted blue-sky framework, designed to stimulate creativity and enable discovery, is a trademark of a modern university. An important feature of HKUST's integrated approach is the support provided for the further development of the ideas and inventions generated by our University community. Going beyond initial inspiration and invention, the University assists and encourages the application of basic research through practical usage and entrepreneurship, along with other societal contributions. These knowledge transfer activities are a core component of our approach to fulfilling our primary objectives.

Overcoming Existing Boundaries

The breadth of contemporary scholarship and the ever more complex problems facing society are challenging our traditional academic division into Schools and Disciplines. As new research directions take shape and as new expertise among faculty and students develops, the traditional disciplinary boundaries can seem restrictive. For example, the newly emerging area of Data Science requires core competencies and encompasses research directions that do not fit within any existing academic department. Similarly, the pandemic has shown the urgent need for a University structure that joins together the wide expertise (including biology, medicine, public health, advanced materials, autonomous systems and sensor technologies, integrated data analytics, economics, public policy, and ethics) required to provide mission-encouraged, system-wide solutions.

Our Schools and IPO structures have served the University well, and we expect them to continue to do so for many years to come. Yet in order to effectively realize our broader goals, we must identify ways to not only be more hospitable to endeavors that cross disciplinary boundaries, but also to encourage systematic efforts unbounded by disciplinary definitions. While such interdisciplinary efforts are reflected and supported in HKUST's current activities, a system-wide framework, fundamentally outside our current discipline-focused structures, is needed in order to encourage and develop new and emerging frontiers. A fundamental change of this sort is not possible by merely overlaying or adjusting the existing disciplinary format. It must be done without compromising our support for established disciplinary pursuits whose intrinsic merits remain undiminished.

Resetting Our Academic Framework

Leading universities promote cross-disciplinary research directions in part because of their implications on addressing major societal challenges with possible implications on humanity. As both scope and integration of our research and educational endeavors evolve, we naturally expect a broadened range of activities that include not only the blue sky, curiosity-driven efforts that have formed the core of our program, but also more mission-encouraged research spurred by the grand challenges facing humanity.

HKUST is well-positioned to fulfill our institutional ambition by leading efforts to both: (1) pursue curiosity-driven investigations on topics in any discipline, whose ultimate impact may not be initially apparent (e.g., discovery of black holes, the double helix, fractals and strange attractors, the invention of the transistor), as well as (2) mount mission-encouraged, multi-faceted responses in systematic ways to identified challenges of great magnitude (e.g., space exploration, human/machine coexistence, pandemic and public health, inequality and inequity, and global sustainability), whose success requires expertise from various disciplines.

To cover the entire spectrum spanning pure scholarship, implementable solutions, practical adoption, and entrepreneurship and transfer of knowledge beyond the University, both disciplinary and cross-disciplinary activities are needed. Nurturing both curiosity-driven and mission-encouraged endeavors is critical for the future of the University and the development of academia as a whole. However, these two distinct approaches lead naturally to different degree programs and underlying academic structures.

A primary focus of our Strategic Plan is the conceptualization and implementation of this dual support through enlarged resources and new physical infrastructures. The development and addition of resources and infrastructure that are supportive of both, encouraging cooperation without creating unhealthy competition, is a key component.

Unified HKUST

To preserve and further develop a diverse and encouraging atmosphere to meet the above goals, new resources, organizational structures, and physical settings are required. The development of our new campus HKUST (Guangzhou) creates an exceptional opportunity for the systematic development of cross-disciplinary programs in concert with the disciplinary-oriented efforts on our Clear Water Bay campus.

Under the Unified HKUST-Complementary Campuses umbrella, the current Strategic Plan strengthens our vision and strategic priorities, with an emphasis on our expansion both physically and conceptually. We envision a Unified System that capitalizes on the duality outlined above, promoting complementary University campuses while avoiding duplicating programs. The complementary academic structure allows establishment of new intellectual domains to fit the University’s diverse goals, and promotes collaboration and integration between campuses, including facilities and services, policies and mechanisms, and professional standards.

The scope and complexity of the problems we face call for new approaches with large-scale change and significant experimentation. Complementary academic structures and non-overlapping degree programs will offer and promote a healthy mix of curiosity-driven and mission-encouraged academic and related activities. Under this framework, members of the HKUST system can observe, learn from, and collaborate with each other. Such opportunities will integrate and enhance activities on both campuses, providing a bridge between disciplinary and cross-disciplinary endeavors. Most importantly, the unique individual campuses will enable faculty and students to find the best atmosphere in which to follow their passions and fully develop their interests.

FIVE STRATEGIC OBJECTIVES We have sharpened and updated our strategic directions in substantial ways. The refreshed strategic objectives represent the desired emphasis for our next phase of development. Our underlying aspirations not only set out to sustain and advance HKUST as a trendsetter in both education and research landscapes for the long term, but also address the evolving needs and challenges facing society.

1 A University of TALENTS

Under the Unified HKUST-Complementary Campuses umbrella, we are prepared to extend our global reservoir of minds and abilities by looking beyond conventional academic disciplines and being open to the recruitment and nurturing of more diverse areas of strength among students, faculty and staff.

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1 An International LEADER in Education and Research

By balancing disciplinary and cross-disciplinary activities, and on-going development of our educational thinking, our two complementary campuses will serve as dual knowledge hubs, creating a distinct synergy and model for the future.

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1 Incorporating INNOVATION AND ENTREPRENEURSHIP in Our Spirit

Our fast-changing world requires ever-faster implementation of new concepts and technologies, and a mindset equipped to solve real-world challenges through the transfer of knowledge into positive, sustainable change. We will strive for such a spirit to become a recognized core component, internally and externally, of our knowledge transfer endeavors and social impact.

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1 An Exemplar of

BEST-IN-CLASS Standards, Practices, and Operations

With sustainable development as the key to present and future, our goal is to deliver the best possible campus environment, and business processes and systems to support our world-class education, research, and diverse University community for the long term.

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1 A Champion of DIVERSITY

Our goal is to embrace and value differences, to learn to learn from each other, and to foster a mindset of diversity that promotes inclusiveness, collegiality, and respect.

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A UNIVERSITY OF TALENTS A Champion of Diversity An International Leader in Education and Research HKUST has been successful in drawing top minds from around the world. Our new Guangzhou campus, i.e. HKUST (Guangzhou), sets to provide exciting new reach and opportunities for education, research, and knowledge transfer. We are prepared to extend our global reservoir of minds and abilities by looking beyond conventional academic disciplines and being open to the recruitment and nurturing of more diverse areas of strength among students, faculty and staff.

Recruiting the best talents effectively and competitively

We are looking for and developing students for pure academic and broad-based talents. This will be achieved by flexible/targeted admissions, scholarship schemes, and incentives that can attract quality students with diverse talents and backgrounds. We aim at rolling out a comprehensive outreach campaign, emphasizing the HKUST experience and using a mix of engagement means applicable to suit the constantly changing environment or the “new normal”. Such engagement will involve connecting with prospective students, parents, teachers and schools by combining physical channels with technologies and online communication platforms.

Given the key role our faculty members play in both our education and research endeavors, we will be proactive and open in identifying and reaching out to leading and promising candidates from around the world, targeting to attract scholars in fields within and beyond HKUST’s traditional areas of strength or disciplinary areas to drive forward evolving opportunities at both our Clear Water Bay and Guangzhou campuses and our cross-disciplinary activities.

We also fully recognize the essential role of our staff in the efficient and effective day-to-day administration, operations, including health and safety, and campus management, and the need to recruit and retain top staff for the myriad posts this encompasses. HKUST will position itself as the “employer of choice”, ensuring an all-around supportive and high performance culture with corresponding reward and recognition

Nurturing talents to achieve full potential

Recruitment is only the start of a life-changing journey. For students to fully benefit from their HKUST experience, we will foster and develop academic capacity, social skills, entrepreneurial spirit, community service, and personal development opportunities so that each can find their own space, unlock their own interests and potential, and make their relationship with the University truly transformational and lifelong.

We will regularly assess and enhance our students’ breadth of intellectual development so as to build understanding of different fields and perspectives alongside their major program, and widen their interests. Beyond the curriculum, strengthening and expansion of all-round student support, including mental health and overall well-being, competency-based learning, and stronger connections with alumni will build up capacity, confidence, and networks. The HKUST experience for students and the University community as a whole will be further enriched by new provision of more on-campus housing, including for all first-year undergraduates, deepening peer friendships and multicultural integration.

As the development of HKUST (Guangzhou) progresses, faculty will benefit from the expanded research scope that this will bring, offering more diversity, interdisciplinary possibilities and knowledge transfer openings, and enabling our academics to follow their passions and develop their interests. Joint proposals, joint grant applications, and large-scale research group projects between faculty from both campuses will be encouraged and facilitated. In addition to such research career development opportunities, faculty leadership capabilities will be enhanced through management development programs, and a systematic junior faculty mentoring mechanism.

For staff, a performance culture will be cultivated. Succession planning, opportunities for job rotations, leadership and management training for middle and senior management will be among the areas we actively explore.

AN INTERNATIONAL LEADER IN EDUCATION AND RESEARCH A University of Talents Incorporating Innovation and Entrepreneurship in Our Spirit HKUST’s new Guangzhou campus provides an unparalleled opportunity for us to elevate our position as a trendsetter in frontier knowledge and breakthrough research, while contributing to solving the complex challenges facing the world. By balancing disciplinary and cross-disciplinary activities, and on-going development of our educational thinking, our two complementary campuses will serve as dual knowledge hubs, creating a distinct synergy and model for the future.

Delivering an education to enable original scholarship and endeavors

A founding principle of HKUST is that education, original research, and the development of society are integrally linked and best pursued together. In developing this “three-pronged” approach to meet the needs of our changing world, the degree programs we offer and the way we deliver our education must be able to flexibly respond to emerging trends resulting from social changes, including the COVID-19 global pandemic.

To spark and develop the creative thinking and endeavors that will mobilize the full capabilities of our students and on graduation enable them to serve the global community, we will focus on two complementary strategies. We will continue to advance the disciplinary activities of our Schools’ traditional core areas of science, engineering, business and management, and humanities and social science, and those intellectual endeavors that do not neatly fit within a single School’s scope through our Interdisciplinary Programs Office. However, we will also go beyond the University’s existing horizons and conventional academic disciplines to embrace the potential of cross-disciplinary pursuits to generate new vision and human resources that can, among others, contribute to solutions to pressing and complex global challenges impacting the future of our living, work and people.

At the Clear Water Bay campus, we are constantly upgrading our undergraduate curriculum. Cross-disciplinary elements in the form of Extended Majors (Major + X) will be introduced to broaden undergraduates’ perspectives from other disciplines. In addition, we will build on our signature “Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program” (UROP), which offers early hands-on research opportunities on faculty projects, by introducing two more programs, namely an “Undergraduate Teaching Opportunities Program” (UTOP) and “Undergraduate Practice Opportunities Program” (UPOP) for workplace immersion and to boost specific career development in students’ areas of interest.

Additional scope and flexibility will be provided by the different degree programs offered at HKUST (Guangzhou), where the setting-up of the new campus creates an exceptional opportunity for the systematic development of cross-disciplinary programs in a complementary way to the disciplinary-oriented efforts on our Clear Water Bay campus, with no duplication of existing programs and academic structures.

On-going improvement of the way we deliver our education is a further priority. This will involve the provision of a stimulating, participatory learning experience, enabled by technology in order to cater to the learning needs of students anywhere. Through a more student-centric pedagogy, interactive exchanges, discussions, and project-based learning, students will learn to think creatively, integrate ideas boldly, solve problems innovatively, and work collaboratively.

Spearheading a dual approach to research excellence

This dual approach will be further reflected in our approach to research excellence. In an era when technology combined with human passion, intelligence, and ingenuity promise to unlock unprecedented understanding of ourselves and the world, HKUST’s new model will contribute to the development of academia as well as address major societal challenges and their implications for humanity, both critical contributions for a global university of the future.

We will promote and support curiosity-driven and open/blue sky pursuits in which the impact may not be initially apparent (for example, discovery of black holes, the double helix) in any discipline, including emerging fields and new areas of expertise. We will also encourage mission-driven, multifaceted efforts that look beyond existing academic boundaries to explore and develop novel cross-disciplinary solutions to practically impact the major challenges facing the world, such as global sustainability, public health, and inequality, as well as contribute to developments of great magnitude, for example, space exploration and human/machine coexistence.

Our dual endeavor will be carried out through increased resources, new physical infrastructure, and the exceptional opportunity offered by the development of HKUST (Guangzhou) to enable the systematic development of cross-disciplinary programs in concert with the disciplinary-oriented efforts at our Clear Water Bay campus.

To assist such activities, the University will strengthen the leadership role of our current cross-disciplinary research institutes to serve as a conduit for engaging faculty and connecting academic units across our two campuses. We will also plan the renewal of our research facilities and devise new policies to achieve self-sustainability of our Central Research Facilities, to ensure that our research environment continues to be attractive to new and existing faculty, to emphasize differentiation and minimize duplication between our two campuses, and to effectively support world-class research.

INCORPORATING INNOVATION AND ENTREPRENEURSHIP IN OUR SPIRIT An International Leader in Education and Research An Exemplar of Best-in-class Standards, Practices, and Operations Our fast-changing world requires ever-faster responses and solutions to emerging needs. This in turn accelerates the need for the implementation of new concepts and technologies, and a mindset equipped to solve real-world challenges through the transfer of knowledge into positive, sustainable change. We will strive for such a spirit to become a recognized core component, internally and externally, of our knowledge transfer endeavors and social impact.

From ideas to actions

Members of HKUST will be given an environment to embrace the boldness to think beyond traditional perspectives, and the willingness to implement novel ideas, considered in concert with people’s needs and sustainability locally, regionally, and globally.

Our campuses will continue to serve as “living labs” for our members to experiment by putting their ideas into actions, and to meaningfully learn and grow from these experiences. We will extend our signature “Sustainable Smart Campus as a Living Lab” initiative and collaboration on both campuses. The scheme, an innovation in itself, creates the opportunity for HKUST students, faculty, and staff to tackle real-life problems, large and smaller in scope, through trying out their smart and sustainable ideas on our campus. For example, a smart mini-grid showcasing 100% renewable energy, and a resource-efficient aquaponics farm that serves as a student and faculty lab and green business platform, among many other projects already underway.

Connecting with industry and society

At the same time, we will foster our engagement and collaboration with government, industry and other areas of society to enhance the relevance of our research endeavors overall, and maximize resources and knowledge transfer opportunities regionally and internationally. To optimize such openings, the University will better coordinate internal support systems on both campuses for entrepreneurial pursuits.

AN EXEMPLAR OF BEST­-IN­-CLASS STANDARDS, PRACTICES, AND OPERATIONS Incorporating Innovation and Entrepreneurship in Our Spirit A Champion of Diversity With sustainable development as the key to present and future, our goal is to deliver the best possible campus environment, and business processes and systems to support our world-class education, research, and diverse University community for the long term.

Over the previous Strategic Plan, we made good progress in expanding our Clear Water Bay facilities through major capital projects such as on-campus residences that can enhance student life, and upgrades to our research and innovation activities. Our intention now is to steer HKUST to the next level as a holistic sustainability leader.

Sustainability in action

Building on the goal to move the University toward zero-carbon, zero-waste, and net-positive environmental campus operations, we are refreshing the HKUST Sustainability Challenge with new targets in areas such as energy and greenhouse gases, waste-to-landfill management, landscape and biodiversity, and community well-being. We will also develop our management structures and provide more on-campus opportunities for student initiatives and research projects accordingly.

Financially, the University will seek to maintain a sound position to sustain existing operations and support new areas, in view of the uncertain macro environment, including the pandemic and its aftermath. In exercising prudence and looking to diversify our revenue streams, the University will continue to advance and extend our academic strengths and excellence.

Digital-empowered work culture

A key element in achieving such goals will be our implementation of next-generation business processes, information technologies, and systems. This will improve the effectiveness of our administrative framework as a whole and make it more empowering, efficient, and productive.

Initiatives will include digital transformation, streamlined management, and a user-centric focus. A more user-friendly resource platform will also be set up for easier visibility and accessibility to organizational processes, structures, and key personnel. An IT-enabled and supervisor-driven safety management system will add to efficiency related to health and safety through upgrading or establishing relevant databases, along with more effective safety performance monitoring.

A CHAMPION OF DIVERSITY An Exemplar of Best­-in­-class Standards, Practices, and Operations A University of Talents As both an international university and Hong Kong institution, HKUST seeks to advance knowledge, understanding and awareness of self and others through the development of an international community and nurturing of individuals.

HKUST is proud to be the home of talents from many different cultural and educational backgrounds, forming a solid foundation to work together as an integrated team not only to learn, explore, and understand the world better but ourselves and others. Our goal is to embrace and value differences, to learn to learn from each other, and to foster a mindset of diversity that promotes inclusiveness, collegiality, and respect.

Open minds

In advancing an open, cohesive, and collaborative environment across all levels, we will foster appreciation of diversity to bring the HKUST community together. This will be assisted by enhanced communication and promotion of inclusiveness.

We will bring down prejudices and biases, and ensure a level playing field, regardless of age, gender, sexual orientation, race, religion, socio-economic background, etc. For it is such openness and diversity that spur the inspiration and creativity to see from different angles, bringing an opportunity to spark fresh ideas and synthesize new ways of teaching, learning, researching, and transferring our original ideas into technologies and approaches with practical application. This includes genuine academic diversity unlimited by traditional boundaries and welcoming of outliers.

HKUSTHKUST SUSTAINABLE SMART CAMPUS AS A LIVING LAB ABOUTPROJECTSGET INVOLVED CONTACT TRANSFORMING OUR CAMPUS The HKUST Sustainable Smart Campus as a Living Lab (SSC) is an effort to transform our campus into one where the campus itself is a platform for learning, experimenting, and showcasing new ideas and approaches. By combining sustainability principles with smart and innovative approaches to solving problems – and by using our campus as the platform to see and experience the results – the SSC will demonstrate HKUST’s leadership in constructing a sustainable and smart pathway into the future.

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Commitment of the University The SSC is not a short-term effort – this is a minimum three-year commitment, with all academic departments and administrative offices participating. University funded research, along with student competitions and creative ventures, will be evaluated according to how well the efforts embrace these main SSC principles.

To demonstrate this commitment, HKUST is allocating $50 million to be awarded over the next three years to HKUST students, faculty, staff, alumni, and strategic partners who develop and implement projects on campus as showcases of sustainable and smart thinking.

Why is sustainable and smart combined in this effort? Sustainable and smart are two side of the same coin. Both emphasize efficient utilization of our limited resources, and both highlight the need to make good long-term decisions that will make our communities better off in the future.

Role of Experimentation Innovation is a building process – even the best ideas do not work as expected the first time, but first attempts provide insights for revisions and improvements. Therefore, the SSC will celebrate innovative efforts – even if they fail – recognizing that a true “Living Lab” will learn and grow from these experiences. This means not just innovation in technology, but experimentation in arts, humanities, and behavioral experiences. While all innovative ideas and solutions will be welcomed, the Initiative will prioritize HKUST home-grown research, scholarship, and student input.

Campuses are microcosms of global cities, which recognize the urgency of developing smart, sustainable policies and technologies to guide their transition into the future. It is hoped that SSC projects will become a source of inspiration to our Hong Kong Community in ways that communicate a positive vision for a sustainable world. HKUST’s GREAT Smart Cities Institute is a bridge from our community of ideas and innovation to the broader Hong Kong community, and beyond.

Home Projects Phase 1 Phase 2 Phase 3 PROJECTS - PHASE 1

Blockcerts for ARO and DSTO

Project lead: Samuel KWAN & James PRINCE

Blockchain will be applied to student transcripts, underpinning the development of tools for students to create CVs

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Facial Recognition for Library Services Project leaders: Samuel KWAN, KT LAM, & Edward SPODICK

Facial recognition software to be implemented for Library access and book checkout

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Pulse of HKUST Project leader: Huamin QU

Data-driven online platform for communicating campus stories and data, and enhancing social cohesion within the HKUST community

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Smart Mini-grid of 100% Renewable Energy

Project leaders: Tianshou ZHAO

Demonstrate a 100% renewable energy power system on campus with a mini-grid composed of solar panels and an innovative e-fuel energy storage system.

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Smart Mobility: Indoor Navigation and Bus Queue Analytics

Project leaders: Gary CHAN

Employ WiFi sensing and machine learning analytics technology to understand the current waiting time and level of people at our bus stops and create Path Advisor 2.0 to discover one's current location in real time on campus.

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SmART Steps

Project leaders: Kellee TSAI, King CHOW, & Anna KWONG

A broad “arts belt” comprising static and multimedia installations that extend throughout the campus to enhance productivity and promote wellbeing

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Upgrading the Pond Water Treatment System Project leaders: Yiu Wing HA, Allan LEUNG, & Vincent WANG

Revitalization of the Chinese garden (pond) with modern filtration systems to achieve a healthy pond ecosystem

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USThing Extension

Project leaders: Kar Yan TAM

The extension of USThing services will include electronic version of student card, chatbot and serve as a centralized platform for different IT services and tools.

PROJECTS - PHASE 2

Aquaponics in HKUST

Project leaders: LING Li, Miranda MAN

The aquaponic farm developed by many undergraduates and faculty members serves as an educational, living laboratory as well as a green business platform. The farm specifically yields fishes and vegetables with least consumption of resources.

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Solar Cell-Driven and WiFi-functioned Clocks

Project leaders: He YAN

Organic solar cell-powered and Wi-Fi functioned clocks, unlike the analogue clocks we use today, are much accurate and efficient in terms of maintenance. With organic photovoltaic materials, clocks will be self-powered without any battery source.

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Smart Campus Air Network (SCAN) for Community Environmental Awareness

Project leaders: Zhi NING, Jimmy FUNG, Alex LAU

With cutting-edge technology of Air Quality Health Index sensors as well as Indoor Air Quality sensors, campus community will gain an accurate information on the indoor air quality, thereby improving environmental awareness and gaining educational materials.

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Internet of Tree Things

Project leaders: WANG Yu-Hsing

Among the various kinds of wildlife, trees are an indispensable part for the sustainable development of the HKUST campus. Unfortunately, trees can be attacked by various kinds of diseases and in particular are vulnerable to natural disasters. Internet of Tree Things will provide for an efficient system to maintain and monitor trees.

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Digital Twin for HKUST Campus

Project leaders: Jack CP CHENG, Edward KL CHAN

Digital twins give us a glimpse into what is happening, and what can happen, with physical assets now and far into the future. Digital twin technology can be used to design, test, and build intelligent systems for everything in the physical world; monitor and maintain day-to-day operations; and build immersive location experiences.

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Smart Water Network @ HKUST

Project leaders: GHIDAOUI, MS

Monitoring pipeline leakage using a comprehensive time-reversal technique in visco-elastic pipes.

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GGT Smart Campus Project leaders: Derry FONG, Alan HUI

As the campus becomes smarter and new technologies flourish, so should the student halls. Making use of IoT sensors and data platforms to improve convenience for both residents and management.

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PROJECTS - PHASE 3

Self-cleaning Multipurpose Nano-coatings

Project leaders: Jinglei YANG

Maintaining clean buildings' appearance through in-house developed self-cleaning multipurpose nanocoating that is innovative and saves labor.

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Autonomous Greywater Treatment

Project leaders: Frank LEUNG, Desmond TSOI, Xijun HU

This project aims to develop a practical unit for water reclamation from the greywater effluents of the HKUST campus facilities, effectively removing the pollutants and disinfecting the reclaimed effluent in the greywater.

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Urban Spring Smart Dispenser Meter

Project leaders: Janice WONG, Katherine LAM, Meike SAUERWEIN, Hung LAU, Chi Sing WONG

Integration of Urban Spring Smart Meters to existing water dispensers across HKUST campus to enable more efficient drinking water facility management and demystify water quality to community

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You Will See a Hoopoe

Project leaders: Yu-Hsing WANG

Using AI cameras to identity various bird species and capture pictures of them in order to show the wonderful side of HKUST nature

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Skip to main content A A A Search HKUSTHKUST SUSTAINABLE SMART CAMPUS AS A LIVING LAB ABOUTPROJECTSGET INVOLVED CONTACT Breadcrumb Home Projects Blockcerts for ARO and DSTO Blockcerts for ARO and DSTO

What is the project? This project utilizes the blockchain technology for student confirmations, verification of certifications and student CVs. By registering on the blockchain server, the documents are cryptographically signed, tamper-proof, and shareable. This will be an alternative “opt-in” service in addition to the current service.

What is the problem this project is trying to address? Digital certificates or transcripts need to be protected from alternately forged documents. To protect these documents, current technology requires authentication either manually or via an on-line site from issuing institutions. In fact, traditional certificates in printed format must be authenticated, using conventional methods – graduates must make a request and pay the institutions for reissuing more copies. This process is not only bothersome in terms of time for graduates and employers, but also harmful for the environment with great amounts of printed papers.

How can this project serve to solve the problem? Blockcerts is an “open standard for creating, issuing, viewing, and verifying blockchain-based certificates.” Initially designed by MIT Media Lab and Learning Machine, this application is easily accessible for everyone to issue an online-verified document. To understand this application, we need to understand more about blockchain technology. Blockchain is a chain of blocks that are closely interconnected with information. As every block contains an information of the previous block, known as ‘hash’, this technology is error-prone and secure against third party hackers. Hence, digital certificates employing blockchain technology enable a third party such as an employer to verify the authenticity of the certificate easily, quickly and free of charge on the blockchain without contacting the issuing institution. The content of the official documents is saved in an electronic file in JSON format which can be verified and viewed (PDF/HTML format) at the HKUST official website: https://registry.ust.hk/verify.

How does this project support our sustainable smart campus as a living lab vision? The main goal of this SSC project is to enable students to own and control the sharing of digital versions of all documents relating to their studies at HKUST in an accessible, secure, verified format. Blockcerts project efficiently utilizes blockchain technology to reduce the consumption of paper significantly, as a first step towards our vision of a “paper-free campus.” Thus, this technology eliminates the process of visiting the institute and issuing a verified document by hand, thereby creating a convenient, smart, and sustainable community. The approach will save time and resources by cutting the verification process down to a matter of minutes.

Current progress The ARO has launched the information and verification webpage and issued Award Certification Letters in electronic format since August 2019.

What’s next? This project is targeted to launch the co-issuing of paper /electronic verifiable copies of transcripts, certificates (degree diplomas) and award certification letters to all graduates in 2020.

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Home Projects Facial Recognition for Library Services Facial Recognition for Library Services

What is the project? This project seeks to enhance the patron's Library experience by using facial recognition technology as an optional (voluntary opt-in) alternative to a campus ID card for Library access and counter services.

What is the problem this project is trying to address? Library patrons need to use card IDs to enter the gates, leading to crowding at peak times and when the entrance is crowded. This is exacerbated when users forget their cards, requiring staff intervention. The current system of ID cards can also be manipulated with shared or stolen IDs.

How does this project support our sustainable smart campus as a living lab vision? The technology will help streamline processes in the Library and save staff and resources. This pilot effort is also part of a learning process with potential for facial recognition to extend to further applications for university administrative, security, student housing, and facilities services. The feedback from this project will be shared as a knowledge base.

What’s next? The pilot should be ready for use at the ground floor entrance in February 2019, later expanding for LG1 entrance gates. If all goes well, the pilot can be extended for book borrowing later in 2019. The Library is also exploring facial recognition for attendance taking at library classes and events.

Home Projects Pulse of HKUST Pulse of HKUST

What is the project? This project is an online platform which aims to build a smart "3C" campus which can 1) Collect various real time information, 2) Communicate amazing stories of the university and 3) Connect the UST community.It serves as a data-driven platform to palpate the “pulse” of the campus community such as human crowds, facility availability, and events. The platform automatically senses real-time crowds based on Wi-Fi access logs and CCTV videos, and visualizes crowd distribution and movement appealingly. It further applies big data technologies to derive useful information about facility status, and utilizes AI techniques to predict crowds. Finally, it communicates those data to the public on various platforms including large-screen displays, Kiosk machines, and mobile websites.

What is the problem this project is trying to address? The absence of good and timely information manifests itself in a variety of inconveniences – unnecessarily waiting in lines, difficulty in scheduling activities, delays in communicating with colleagues, and wasting valuable resources. While this has been a part of our normal routine, new ways to collect and utilize data have the potential to eliminate these inconveniences. This project allows both the campus community and visitors to share the benefits of a smart campus. By analyzing and communicating campus big data, it provides a data-driven solution for smart decision-makings on mobility and facility management. As such, it promotes a better campus experience, quality of life, and a stronger sense of ownership, making HKUST a leader in the open-data movement.

How does this project support our sustainable smart campus as a living lab vision? The project provides a data-driven, evidence-based solution to promote smarter decision-making on mobility and facility management, which can enable us to use resources more efficiently. As the project allows all USTers to contribute, the learning outcomes will be active.

Progress and achievements Apr 2019: Our project won the Student Innovation Gold Award, Hong Kong ICT Awards 2019 (By Office of the Government Chief Information Officer), and was exhibited at HKTDC International ICT Expo (Smart City, Smart Living Pavilion). [Feature story by Ta Kung Pao]

Mar 2019: The South China Morning Post wrote a feature story about us, namely, Making long queues a thing of the past is the goal for two computing science master’s students at Hong Kong University of Science and Technology.

Feb 2019: Pulse of HKUST was highlighted in the HKUST Sustainable Smart Campus as a Living Lab launching event, and received extensive media coverage including 明報, 東網, 香港新聞網, 信報, 文匯報, 新浪教育, 人民網, 新華網, 香港01, 星島, 東方日報, 中联办, 頭條日報, 香港仔,灼見名家, 香港經濟日報, the Standard, China Daily etc.

Nov 2018: Our project was selected as one of the first seven HKUST Sustainable Smart Campus as a Living Lab initiatives and received a funding of HKD 2,600,000.

Dec 2018: Our story was available at the School of Engineering yearbook In Focus.

Oct 2018: Mr. Wu presented this work as an extended abstract at the VISComm Workshop, IEEE VIS at Berlin.

Sep 2018: We released our first demo at the Engineering Commons starting at the HKUST Information Day 2018, which visualized the real-time crowdedness such as waiting time at bus stops and available seats at canteens. Our project was also briefly covered by the Sing Pao Daily.

What’s next? Installations will take place at the north/south bus stations, entry/exit in the Multi-floor Car Park, campus canteens, and library entries. Achievements will be shown multiple times each day on the E-board, Engineering Commons, visitor center and mobile phones using advanced AI algorithms and visual narrative techniques. Development of a touchscreen interface for enabling a more interactive experience. Establishing an open data platform with ITSC in order to create a vast and easily accessible source of information. Optimizations for library seating and development of temperature visualization system will take place.

To visit Real-time data page of Pulse, please check out: http://pulse-api.hkustvis.org/

For more information, please visit: https://pulse.ust.hk/

Home Projects Smart Mini-grid of 100% Renewable Energy Smart Mini-grid of 100% Renewable Energy

What is the project? The objective of this project is to demonstrate a 100% renewable energy power system on campus with a mini-grid composed of solar panels and an innovative e-fuel energy storage system. All except solar panels will be developed by HKUST. The innovative e-fuel energy storage technology is scalable, efficient, inexpensive, durable, and site-independent.

What is the problem this project is trying to address? Renewable resources like solar and wind are essential for reducing carbon emissions, but are intermittent, meaning they are not always producing energy when they are needed. Further, traditional energy storage systems like batteries or flywheels have distance or discharge limitations. There is a need to demonstrate a fully integrated system that captures, distributes, and utilizes renewable energy resources when they are needed most.

How does this project support our sustainable smart campus as a living lab vision? The project will generate data that can be used in future energy storage research projects, and the project will become an educational tool that highlights fundamental knowledge of power generation, conversion, distribution, consumption, optimization, and management, and general understanding of energy conversion and storage, and specialization in solar energy, batteries and e-fuel cells. Moreover, the efficient, scalable, and inexpensive e-fuel energy storage technology that the project provides will put HKUST on the map for sustainable energy production and promote HKUST as a leading green university.

What’s next? Polycrystalline solar panels will be installed on the roof of the CYT building in the Spring of 2019, and then connected to the innovative e-fuel energy storage system and a mini-grid energy distribution system.

Home Projects Smart Mobility: Indoor Navigation and Bus Queue Analytics Smart Mobility: Indoor Navigation and Bus Queue Analytics

What is the project? This project will employ WiFi sensing and machine learning analytics technology to understand the current waiting time and level of people at our bus stops so we can react in real time. The same approach will be used to create Path Advisor 2.0, which senses indoor signal changes to discover one's current location. This will help users easily navigate their way through our campus buildings by showing their actual positions in real time at any location (or floor) on campus.

What is the problem this project is trying to address? HKUST is a maze to visitors, and even staff who have been here many years still get confused by our blocked hallways and endless winding corridors. Further, there is no way to know the actual number of people and current waiting times at the bus stops without going there in person. Getting lost and waiting in long bus lines are frustrating, a waste of time, and gives a bad impression to our guests.

How does this project support our sustainable smart campus as a living lab vision? This approach combines smart (award-winning) fusion-based indoor positioning with signal analytics to enable smart mobility for our campus visitors, staff and students while creating the conditions for smart crowd management in real-time. The data obtained by the system can be used for further analysis. As a sustainable operating system, it can be used as an experimental platform for future research projects. It will also help transportation companies dispatch their vehicles in a more timely manner.

What’s next? Wifi and ibeacon sensors will be installed in Spring 2019, and then paired with a user interface for members of our community to start using immediately afterwards. The ibeacons will be installed across campus with the capability to interact with user smart phones, and the new Path Advisor 2.0 will be available for campus users in early 2020.

Home Projects SmART Steps SmART Steps

SmART Steps; CYT Stairwell on Early June

What is the project? Using our stairwells as a “living lab,” this project combines public artwork and applied research to study the relationship and benefits public art exhibits and workplace health. This project seeks to transform the stairwell experience by lifts 3, 13-15, and 17-18 through two different types of visual arts installations, including those led by faculty and students. We will then assess whether the installations result in shifts in positive and healthy behaviors.

What is the problem this project is trying to address? Healthy and active lifestyles are keys to alleviating stress and promoting a sense of well-being. Taking the stairs is an easy and convenient way to maintain a healthy lifestyle, but many of our stairwells are inconvenient and visually unappealing, making them an unattractive option for members of our community.

How does this project support our sustainable smart campus as a living lab vision? Cutting-edge research on art in the workplace, health care institutions, and public spaces shows that visual and multimedia arts enhances productivity, reduces interpersonal conflict, and promotes a sense of well-being. Nature scenes, soothing sounds, and art can have restorative effects in a university otherwise known for stress & tension.

What’s next? Sensors and artwork will be added to the stairwells in the Spring 2019 and then the results will be evaluated to determine the behavioral impacts.

Home Projects Upgrading the Pond Water Treatment System Upgrading the Pond Water Treatment System

What is the project? This project will demonstrate a state-of-the-art wastewater treatment technology for providing a healthy ecosystem for fish and other inhabitants of the Chinese garden pond (located behind SSQ Towers 15-19). This will bring the pond back to pristine condition while creating an educational and learning opportunity.

What is the problem this project is trying to address? The Chinese garden is a significant feature of our HKUST Campus as it provides nice leisure space in a beautiful natural environment. However, the current pond water is turbid, greenish in color and has become a slimy eyesore. Simply put, the ecosystem is out of balance.

How does this project support our sustainable smart campus as a living lab vision? Turning this eyesore back into a harmonious natural ecosystem will enhance the environmental stewardship of our campus while providing an excellent educational exhibit to students and visitors by showing the operation and cycling of an eco-pond using advanced wastewater treatment technologies to achieve a well-balanced ecosystem.

What’s next? The new system will be installed in the Spring 2019. After completion, the water treatment system will be used as a vivid case study for civil and environmental engineering classes of HKUST.

Home Projects Facial Recognition for Library Services - Cloned USThing Extension What is the project? The extension of USThing services towards a Smart Campus will continue to engage and educate students, ensure students’ safety and reduce operating costs.

What is the problem this project is trying to address? The project will eliminate the paper work, administrative work and operating costs for physical student cards application, maintenance and provision for students services such as enquiries and academic advising. It also provides a centralized platform to consolidate different existing IT services and tools useful for the campus community and realizes ideas and visions from our students and offices.

How does this project support our sustainable smart campus as a living lab vision? The project allows students to experiment with new technologies, trends, and ideas to foster a creative environment that encourages collaboration and entrepreneurship. It provides linkages between different technologies and IT and physical services being offered by the University. It helps build a strong and stable community that grows together as the USThing platform and its services undergo continuous developments, updates and enhancements.

What’s next? The extension of USThing services will include

1. Electronic version of student card that allows students’ easy access to sports facilities and library services, taking attendance at events or exams and serves as security devices for access to student halls.

2. A chatbot using machine learning technology that answers students’ enquiries or gives academic advices.

3. Collaborations with other project teams such as Pulse and Whereami, where USThing serves as a centralized platform for consolidating different IT services and tools useful for the campus community.

Home Aquaponics in HKUST Aquaponics for HKUST

What is this project? This project aims to demonstrate an aquaponic farm yielding fishes and vegetables with the least consumption of resources. The project also hopes to demonstrate that green business is profitable and can promote environmental awareness, thus demonstrate a workable aquaponic farm to be implanted in an orphanage in Cambodia to help their community to be more self-sustained.

What is the problem this project is trying to address? Food production is one of the major energy expenses today. Many do not appreciate the energy spent during the production, and they are wasting food resources. Even though there are groundbreaking technologies that suggest a greener way to run the food business, people are skeptical of green businesses because of their profit generation. Regarding this issue, installing an aquaponic farm will not only create technological breakthrough but also serve as an educational medium to students.

Aquaponic farm consists of three major components: fishes, vegetables, and bacteria, with water running through each component in a closed circulation that is self-sustained through making use of ecological roles of fish, vegetables, and bacteria. This farm system minimizes the environmental waste generated in every process, thus serves as the platform for future technological testing for scientific researches on campus. On top of this, students will get to earn a perfect educational opportunity to understand the difficulty and complexity of modern farming and the global pressure of abundant food supply, as well as learn the idea of green lifestyle and environmental responsibility.

How does this project support our sustainable smart campus as a living lab vision? This project explores a sustainable way to: 1) recycle and treat water used to irrigate vegetables for raising fishes and 2) replace costly and environmental-harmful artificial fertilizer by naturally converted nitrate fueled by fish faces. A smart sensing and adjustment system will be developed to control the aquaponic farm to reduce the energy consumption and ensure the water qualities suitable for fishes and vegetables. Installation of sustainable farming system with a less-known, intelligent technology will spur the campus to become a living lab.

What’s next? The project team has already installed and has been working on the aquaponic farm in campus. Team members are currently trying to grow different type of vegetables in the aquaponic farm while optimizing the system with lower energy consumption, and ultimately figure out a profitable business model. Later, the team will apply this business to the Wat Opot Children’s Community located in Cambodia, while extending the usage of current site and make it serve for university as long as possible even after their site usage deadline on June 1st, 2020.

Home Solar Cell-Driven and Wifi-Functioned Clocks SOLAR CELL-DRIVEN AND WIFI-FUNCTIONED CLOCKS What is the project? By utilizing the organic solar cell technology, the project focuses on solar cell wifi clocks. With such features as semi-transparency, flexible, lightweight, and high indoor performance made from research conducted by HKUST, new clocks will make indoor facilities more efficient.

What is the problem this project is trying to address? Today in UST campus, most clocks installed in classrooms or lecture theatres are inaccurate. The clocks on campus are Quartz clocks, which run slow for a few seconds every day. This will accumulate over time and result in poor accuracy for most clocks throughout campus. Also, the battery of the clocks has to be replaced every year. In fact, it is quite costly to make a systematic manpower plan to replace the batteries or maintain accurate time for all clocks.

With the photovoltaic effect of organic molecules, they created the material known as OPV (organic photovoltaic). Such material is thin, flexible, and can be made in various shape to collect and generate electricity from both indoors and outdoors. With this technology, the project team will replace these clocks using solar cell driven and Wi-Fi functioned clocks. Now the organic solar cell will provide power so there is no need to replace the battery anymore. The Wi-Fi function will allow the clocks to automatically correct their times every few days so that all the clocks on campus will be accurate for long term.

How does this project support our sustainable smart campus as a living lab vision? Unlike the conventional method of using electricity from a power source, the new solar wifi clocks use clean and sustainable energy source to generate electricity. Researched directly from the campus, the project applies intelligent organic solar cell technology throughout the campus in an easily viewable form. As disposable batteries in campus as well as Hong Kong is a serious issue, such technology is an opportunity to not only decrease the waste but also educate the community about the use of smart, sustainable technology.

What's next? After installing solar wifi clocks in upcoming year, this indoor project can expand to other devices including smoke detectors, remote controller, laser pointers, small detectors, electronic locks and etc. to constantly reduce battery waste in HKUST campus. Eventually, the project team will move on to outdoor applications in further stage.

Home Smart Campus Air Network (SCAN) SMART CAMPUS AIR NETWORK (SCAN)

What is this project? This project is mainly about developing a campus wide smart air sensing network for real-time air quality health index (AQHI) and indoor air quality, while visualizing this technology for raising environmental awareness as well as identifying possible methods of improving indoor air quality.

What is the problem this project is trying to address? Air pollution is one of the key health risks as identified by World Health Organization (WHO) with various adverse health effects. In urban areas, people spend more than 80% of the daily time inside the buildings and indoor air quality becomes one major contributor of population exposure risks. Meanwhile, for a metropolis like Hong Kong, 54% of total energy end use in Hong Kong is in the form of electricity while about 90% of the electricity is consumed in building. The risks are exposed to us even today at the campus, and this requires a smart solution for clean indoor air quality and healthy building environment.

This project mainly utilizes smart sensing devices to create a Smart Campus Air Network (SCAN). With such sensors as air quality health index (AQHI) sensors and indoor air quality (IAQ) sensors, installation will take place at populated locations in both indoor and outdoors. Sensors will generate a quantifiable data, which will be used for visualization system for the community’s education on environmental consciousness. This will not only encourage every members of community to be environmentally friendly, but also benefit the campus management to be accurately informed on the building healthiness for sustainable operation.

How does this project support our sustainable smart campus as a living lab vision? The Smart Campus Air Network is crucial for the campus to become more sustainable. Although the Hong Kong Environmental Protection Department operates city air quality measurement station streaming hourly air quality health index, none of them is close to clear water bay. Installing SCAN will allow the faculty to accurately identify the crucial air quality problems in our campus and trigger more environmentally friendly actions. On top of this, installing intelligent sensors will spur more education for community members. This project is expected to involve interdisciplinary knowledge and expertise on environmental management, computer science and environmental engineering. This will later include UROP, FYP and Capstone opportunities, benefiting students to utilizing a smart technology. Ultimately, this project serves as an opportunity not only for the campus to raise environmental awareness and reduce health risk, but also for the community to self-educate with smart technology.

What's next? After installation AQHI and IAQ sensors, the project team will deploy the Smart Campus Air Network for one-year operation. The team will also create a mobile app to promote environmental awareness in a more accessible way, Then, the team is looking forward to perform data analysis with environmental conditions to improve indoor air quality in campus.

Please check out real-time campus air quality information here.

SCAN SMART CAMPUS AIR NETWORK Home Outdoor Air Quality Indoor Air Quality What's AQHI/IAQ About Us Campus Outdoor Air Quality Last Updated: 2021-01-13 15:00:00

4 AQHI Campus Average PM2.5 23 µg/m3 PM10 29 µg/m3 NO2 35 µg/m3 CO 626 µg/m3 O3 94 µg/m3 Temp 21 °C Humidity 22 % Campus Indoor Air Quality Last Updated: 2021-01-13 15:00:00 Good Campus Average PM2.5 11 µg/m3 PM10 12 µg/m3 CO2 433 ppm Temp 18 °C Humidity 30 % Your Location

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SCAN SMART CAMPUS AIR NETWORK Home Outdoor Air Quality Indoor Air Quality What's AQHI/IAQ About Us Outdoor AQHI Ranking Last Updated: 2021-01-13 15:00:00 LOCATION AQHI Conference Lodge 4 North Gate Bus Stop 4 Atrium 4 Conference Lodge Last Updated: 2021-01-13 15:20:00

4 AQHI • PM2.5 (μg/m3) 17 • PM10 (μg/m3) 19 • NO2 (μg/m3) 19 • O3 (μg/m3) 108 • CO (μg/m3) 674 20℃ / 27%

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SCAN SMART CAMPUS AIR NETWORK Home Outdoor Air Quality Indoor Air Quality What's AQHI/IAQ About Us Indoor IAQ Ranking Last Updated: 2021-01-13 15:00:00

All IAQ Lecture Theatre B Excellent Lecture Theatre A Moderate Room 2464 Excellent Room 2465 Moderate Room 2502 Excellent LG1 Canteen (A) Moderate LG1 Canteen (B) Moderate Concourse (SCI Home) Good Concourse (Outside LTJ) Excellent Room 4502 Excellent S H Ho Sports Hall Excellent LG5 McDonalds Moderate Computer Barn B Excellent CYT Room G009 Excellent CYT Room G010 Good LG4 Fitness Center Excellent LSK 1007 Moderate LG7 Canteen Excellent Starbucks Excellent Room 4620 Excellent Room 4504 Excellent Lecture Theatre L Excellent LSK 1003 Moderate LSK G003 Moderate Lecture Theatre B Last Updated: 2021-01-13 15:20:00 Excellent • PM2.5 (μg/m3) 7 • PM10 (μg/m3) 7 • CO2 (ppm) 441 19℃ / 29%

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AQHI & IAQ Air Quality Health Index & Indoor Air Quality Air pollution is one of the key health risks as identified by World Health Organization (WHO) with various adverse health effects. According to the global health risks report published by the world health organization (who) in 2009, outdoor air pollution in urban areas was listed as the 14th largest risk factor for deaths worldwide in 2004. Meanwhile, in urban areas, people spend more than 80% of the daily time inside the buildings and indoor air quality becomes one major contributor of population exposure risks. Air Quality Health Index (AQHI) To provide more timely and useful air pollution information to the public, the Environmental Protection Department (EPD) launches the Air Quality Health Index (AQHI) to replace the Air Pollution Index (API) from 30 December 2013. The AQHI informs you of the short-term health risk of air pollution and helps you take precautionary measures to protect your health. The AQHIs are reported on a scale of 1 to 10 and 10+ and are grouped into five health risk categories as shown below.

Indoor Air Quality (IAQ) Indoor air quality (IAQ) refers to the air quality inside and around a building which can affect the health, comfort and well-being of building users. Poor IAQ can lead to discomfort, ill health (e.g. headache, itchy eyes, respiratory difficulties, skin irritation, nausea and fatigue), and in workplace, absenteeism and lower productivity. Children, elderly and those with existing respiratory or heart disease are more susceptible to the effects of poor IAQ. Indoor air quality is affected by various gases (including carbon monoxide, etc.), particulates, microbial pollutants (molds, bacteria), or any substance or energy source that may cause adverse health conditions. Therefore, understanding indoor air pollution and monitoring its index are crucial to human health. More Details About AQHI More Details About IAQ

Sustainable Smart Campus As a Living Lab The HKUST Sustainable Smart Campus as a Living Lab (SSC) is an effort to transform our campus into one where the campus itself is a platform for learning, experimenting, and showcasing new ideas and approaches. By combining sustainability principles with smart and innovative approaches to solving problems – and by using our campus as the platform to see and experience the results – the SSC will demonstrate HKUST’s leadership in constructing a sustainable and smart pathway into the future.

Smart Campus Air Network(SCAN) The Smart Campus Air Network aims to establish a smart air sensor network in HKUST campus, also the first in Hong Kong, based on the cutting-edge sensing technologies to monitor the critical environmental quality in real-time both outside and indoor of different function rooms.

Indoor and Outdoor Sensors Indoor air quality sensor is designed for high-end indoor monitoring applications that require reliable air quality data information to inform the building management and users on the air quality information to mitigate the health risks. In this project, it mainly measures PM2.5, PM10 and CO2 concentration. Outdoor air quality sensor NAS-AF200 is a lightweight, small air monitoring station that uses active air intake, auto-zero correction drift, and is equipped with a four-sensor PM array for long-term real-time monitoring and up to 6 gaseous pollutants. In this project, it measures the concentration of carbon monoxide, nitrogen dioxide, ozone, PM2.5 and PM10. SCAN Project Team

The Aerosol and Air Pollution Group is a multidisciplinary team at UST focusing on the investigating the sources, characteristics, impacts and control of urban air pollution. Our mission is to contribute to the development of systematic and fundamental knowledge on air pollution to inform effective air quality management and to develop break-through technologies and control strategies to protect public health and mitigate climate change. Our research activities include the physicochemical and toxicological characterization of aerosol and air pollution from traffic sources and in urban atmospheric environment, and the characterization of personal exposure in complex and heterogeneous microenvironments. We also devise and develop new and aerosol related measurement and control technologies to meet the emerging environmental. Contact Us Room 2004, Sustainability Unit Office The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology Clearwater Bay, Kowloon, Hong Kong Email: envrscan@ust.hk Tel: (852)34692770

Home Internet of Tree Things INTERNET OF TREE THINGS

What is the project? Internet of Tree Things consists of sensors, an IoT network, and several servers. The DESR Node comprises an accelerometer, a gyroscope, and compass to obtain orientation and vibration data. All the data collected can be transmitted and analysed in real time, using the LoRaWAN IoT network. The strength of signal transmission is maintained even in severe weather conditions. Finally, the data will be sent to the internet server and stored in a scalable data center at the DESR Lab. The project aims to provide a more solid diagnosis for tree health and allow for preventive measures to be taken.

What is the problem this project is trying to address? After some unfavored weather conditions such as rainstorms and typhoons, many trees are damaged. These damaged trees often do not survive and cannot be rehabilitated as their root systems are injured. This project will create an effective system to deal with tree health and provide solutions in a preventative form by detecting symptoms and features before the tree falls down, allowing the responsible parties to take correct action.

How does this project support our sustainable smart campus as a living lab vision? Trees are a crucial part of our environment in the sense of both beauty and functionality. They improve air quality, prevent erosion, and support wildlife. Their survival is paramount in the fight against global warming. IoTT technology performs as a smart and effective method to monitor tree conditions and help enhance maintenance and safety management. The data collected can also be used to create visualizations by other parties to promote environmental awareness. Furthermore, collaborations with other departments enable IoT workshops and educational events on tree-care to be held.

What's next? The project aims to begin on the 1st of July 2019 and will last for about two years. Throughout the project, workshops on IoT and trees will be held, educating students on designing IoT devices and environmental science topics. After the project ends, the experience will provide room for more IoT technologies and the workshops for students can be continued.

For more information, please visit here.

Home Digital Twin for HKUST Campus DIGITAL TWIN FOR HKUST CAMPUS What is the project? This project will create a digital twin platform - a digital replica of living and non-living physical assets and systems - which can be used for various purposes. This will be coupled with real-time data to monitor the HKUST campus, predict or detect abnormalities in equipment, and enable more efficient allocation of resources.

What is the problem this project is trying to address? A digital twin can help the HKUST community and facility managers visualise the campus environment, conditions, and assets. It would also support research for technologies such as virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR) and internet of things (IoT).

How does this project support our sustainable smart campus as a living lab vision? Building a digital twin introduces a source of truth for physical data in a digital manner. Connecting it with the building management system (BMS) allows condition monitoring with real time sensor data, allowing simulations for greener campus planning, better facility maintenance, and increased HVAC system efficiency. Facility maintenance can become smoother, enabling the achievement of a sustainable and smart campus.

What's next? Digital twin model generation and field surveying will be conducted for main academic buildings starting July 2019, and for other campus buildings starting February 2020. Existing BMS will be integrated starting in October 2019.

Home Smart Water Network @ HKUST SMART WATER NETWORK @ HKUST What is the project? The project revolves around the time-reversal technology, where waves are measured through sensors, reversed and sent back. The technology rapidly pinpoints and anticipates problems in the pipeline in a non-disruptive manner. As the wave refocuses on the source, it locates the defect. The project will showcase the time-reversal technology in an exposed and accessible section of the pipeline system in HKUST, acting as a pioneer of such a high frequency probing of live water, thus providing the ability to create high resolution images of the faults.

What is the problem this project is trying to address? The numerous complicated labyrinths of pipelines in cities around the world are aging and becoming inefficient. Keeping in mind the wastage of water, leaks and bursts often result in economic losses, social disruption, and require expensive renewal strategies. The smart water initiative project is a step towards the timely diagnosis and mitigation of defects in pipelines, such that the large amounts of water and high costs of renewal and repair can be dealt with.

How does this project support our sustainable smart campus as a living lab vision? Information about the aging and weakening of the pipes will be shared with FMO on a regular basis, allowing the university to cut costs on repair and management. The technology will also be displayed to HKUST students and visitors educating them on the water loss and financial issues. The project will contribute to the vision of a living lab where students, professors and other departments can work together to explore the future of multi-sensor information fusion and new signal processing techniques. The project will also function as a laboratory exercise in some university courses.

What's next? The project is to be divided into five phases, beginning with the deployment of hydrophones in the pilot underground passage, then developing a real-time time-reversal technique, incorporating students through FYP and UROPs, developing case studies for student courses, and finally holding workshops to demonstrate the project by the first quarter of 2020.

Home GGT Smart Campus Writeup GGT (GLOBAL GRADUATE TOWER) SMART CAMPUS

What is the project? The project is going to install advanced technologies to monitor student hall energy consumption, and provide an improved and efficient online payment system for the air-conditioner and laundry rooms. This will be done by installing smart meters to record the room’s electrical energy consumption and populate the data into the IBM IoT cloud for analysis.

What is the problem this project is trying to address? Revamping the old payment system for facilities in the student halls has become a priority as it is currently outdated and inefficient. Moreover, it is necessary to reduce electric consumption and create a sustainable mindset within residents of the student halls.

How does this project support our sustainable smart campus as a living lab vision? By incorporating a comprehensive real time data analysis system, improving the payment experience and bringing it online, and allowing for greater autonomy regarding energy consumption. This will raise the awareness change students’ daily electricity usage pattern as they’ll be able to track it through a web portal.

What's next? By September 2019, two rooms in hall VI were using the GGT Smart Campus POC. After sufficient testing for integration and user acceptance, the mass rollout can be applied for the GGT building in around three months. The experimental trial of the GGT energy payment system was conducted on floors 8, 9 and 10 of UG Hall VI concluded in November 2019. In the experiment, rooms with residents who logged on to view their energy consumption showed up to 60% lower energy consumption than those on the same floor who did not. Some residents also reflected that they changed some of their habits in order to reduce energy use in their rooms. The trial run also demonstrated some potential issues that would need to be addressed before full implementation.

You can now read the full report by clicking here

Hall VI - BlueSky Energy Budget Experiment Wrap Up Report 1 BlueSky Energy Budget Experiment -- Wrap Up Report Goals of the Scheme The Hall VI energy budget scheme was created with the aim of reducing energy consumption through testing an experimental system of electricity charging under the “living lab” model of the Sustainable Smart Campus. In other HKUST undergraduate student residences, students are charged only for air conditioning usage by hour. Under this scheme, all electricity usage in a room was included in an energy “budget”, and students would only be charged for exceeding it. By changing electricity charging method, the scheme aims to change the energy usage patterns of students and promote more sustainable living habits. Details of the Scheme A dashboard from BlueSky used in the scheme. The energy budget scheme was planned to run during September 15th to November 30th in UG Hall VI. Energy meters had been installed previously for pairs of rooms on floors 3, 6, 8, 9, and 10. Floors 3 and 6 were chosen as control floors with no intervention, while residents in double rooms on floors 8. 9 and 10 were automatically opted into the scheme as participants when it began. Triple and single rooms were excluded from the scheme. Each room in the scheme was given an energy “point budget” based on past average energy consumption trends in rooms used in the scheme. The “point budget” was presented as 10 points for every kWh for a total of 2350 points. Participants of the scheme were able to view their current consumption and future budget via a dashboard provided by BlueSky. Electricity usage for plug loads, lighting and sockets was calculated using the energy meters installed for every two rooms, while air conditioning usage was metered on a room by room basis. Rooms which were included in the scheme were able to turn on and use their air conditioning for free, provided that they remained within the cumulative energy budget 2 provided for the semester. If rooms exceeded the energy budget, their air conditioning returned to normal and they were charged for the equivalent of the original cost. Residents that chose to opt their room out of the scheme would return to the normal air conditioning charging methods. Rewards were offered for residents whose rooms did not exceed the budget by the end of the semester, with better rewards for rooms with lower energy usage. Rewards included things such as solar powered gadgets, fans, and water bottles. A total of 41 double rooms were a part of the scheme, while 3 rooms contacted us to opt out of the scheme before it began. There were 54 rooms in the control floors on floors 3 and 6. Unfortunately, due to extenuating circumstances, the scheme was ended prematurely on November 7th. Results and Lessons Learned Overall, the scheme was somewhat successful in reducing energy usage in participating rooms when at least one occupant of the room logged in. However, a number of major issues were encountered during the scheme. The first issue was that a 78% of rooms exceeded the term’s budget, which was expected to be the average energy consumption. This was likely due to the record-breaking number of hot nights experienced this year, when compared with past years. Energy consumption per square meter increased by 37.5% and 21% for control and intervention floors respectively. Even though the energy consumption for rooms under the scheme increased less than outside the scheme, the presence of the energy budget did not offset the energy use caused by temperature. As a result, the energy budget appeared to be inadequate for most rooms, and future energy budgets may need to take changing weather into account in order to be fair for users at the potential cost of increased energy usage. This could be incorporated as a form of “buffer” of extra budget to be added in case the weather is hotter than usual. 3 Another issue was that 6 rooms (~15% of participating rooms) did not have a single resident logging into the dashboard used for the scheme, while some students were not aware of the scheme and thought there was free airconditioning for the whole semester. This may have been due to inadequate promotion; during this scheme, students were informed of the scheme by posters in the lobbies and leaflets in their mailboxes, while dashboard login details were sent to them manually via email. Rooms where both occupants logged into the system used (on average) 60% less energy than room where neither occupant logged in, while rooms with one occupant logging in used 20% less, showing a correlation between dashboard login and energy savings. However, this correlation may have been exacerbated by the lack of limitations on AC usage while under the budget, or increased likelihood to login for residents who were already more aware of their energy habits. Hence, better promotion of the scheme, or integration of scheme information with regular residents’ information packs is vital to ensuring effectiveness of the scheme. On the administrative side, the lack of information integration between housing, BlueSky, and the scheme in general made it inefficient to manage rooms who wished to opt-out of the scheme (which required action from multiple parties), rooms that had already exceeded the budget (requiring action from housing), provision of access to dashboard login, and change of residents during room swap. This also resulted in some confusion for participants, possibly contributing to lack of awareness or understanding about the scheme. In future, the flow of information about changes in residency and room status will be necessary to prevent problems arising from lack of information transparency. Despite these issues, residents interviewed in a focus group at the end of the scheme reflected changes in their lifestyles in order to save energy because of the scheme. Floors with the scheme did not use less energy per square meter than control floors; however, this was already true the year before the scheme began. There was a clear difference in energy use for rooms where residents logged in to the dashboard and rooms where they did not, which indicated the presence of a dashboard or awareness of the scheme may help contribute to reducing energy usage. There may have been some unintended consequences as a result of the lifestyle changes, such as moving electricity usage from rooms to common areas (such as the library), but adding load in these shared areas likely have lower energy footprint than energy consumption from within the rooms themselves. In addition, residents were often not aware of energy saving features (such as AC settings) or felt that energy tips provided were too general, and improved energy saving guides can help improve energy usage habits. In summary, future energy budget schemes should make efforts to take into account changing conditions through budget “buffers”, enhance scheme promotion to residents, and increase information transparency. This experimental scheme has shown that the 4 energy budget model does have the potential to reduce energy usage and change the habits of residents towards a more sustainable lifestyle, though repeated studies will be needed to evaluate its efficacy under different conditions or over longer periods of time.

Home Projects Self-cleaning Multipurpose Nano-coatings SELF-CLEANING MULTIPURPOSE NANO-COATINGS

What is the project? This project aims to showcase an in-house developed self-cleaning multipurpose/multifunctional nanocoating that can be applied to various surfaces that is long-lasting, inexpensive and saves labour too.

What is the problem this project is trying to address? How to automatically keep windows crystal clear and buildings clean? The first is to apply on cement surface to keep it self-cleaning upon raining or water flushing; the second is to apply on the window glass surface and the cover glass on solar panel for maintaining self-cleaning and transparency and the third is to apply on mirror surface in the washroom to keep it clear during showers.

How does this project support our sustainable smart campus as a living lab vision? Nano-coating provides durable self-cleaning functionality on the cement wall and glass surfaces via superhydrophilic surface feature. Cleaning passively occurs since the water on the coated surface is able to spread out to form an ultrathin continuous layer to unstick/loosen any fouling debris. This novel nano-coating once applied on campus, such as curtain wall and solar panel cover glass, will lead to an extended service life and reduced expense on labour, rinse water and electricity. This greatly reduces the need for manpower and minimises human intervention.

What's next? The team will collect data and make real-time analysis that will help train and equip students with practical problem-solving skills and an innovation mindset. Such a project further inspires them to critically think about daily life problems that could be solved via materials innovation. After completing this project, students even can bring this nanocoating from campus to their living home to realize a more sustainable and smart society. In the future a detailed technology transfer plan will be proposed.

Home Projects Autonomous Greywater Treatment AUTONOMOUS GREYWATER TREATMENT

What is the project? The unit resembles the conventional wastewater treatment plant, which is miniaturized and consists of primary, secondary, tertiary treatments to effectively remove the pollutants and disinfect the reclaimed effluent in the greywater. In addition, the built greywater system is remote-controllable by the developed mobile application via Arduino controller board, with a machine learning algorithm implemented to study the habit of freshwater consumption and optimize the purification process.

What is the problem this project is trying to address? Water crisis is one of the most important environmental issues in this generation. Only 0.007% of the planet’s natural water resources is freshwater that is readily accessible for human consumption, but as the rapid increase in population and activities in both commercial and industrial sectors, the freshwater consumption and pollution have skyrocketed over the past few decades.

How does this project support our sustainable smart campus as a living lab vision? Reclaiming greywater from domestic sewages of the HKUST facilities can significantly reduce water consumption by recycling the water for watering plants, fish ponds, flushing water for toilets or even drinking water etc. The autonomous remote-control system minimises the power consumption by smart control. A mobile application will be available to show the wastewater level, UV operation, ozone consumption, pH change, as well as the organics level. The usage of BOD/COD optical sensor probe helps to achieve real-time BOD/COD monitoring is a new element in the designed prototype, estimating the required power for chemical oxidation based on the pollutant concentration. Collected data from the app can be used for big data analytics to create a platform for the machine to learn the habits of water consumption.

What's next? The optimized unit can be further applied for other kinds of greywater treatment such as the kitchen sink effluent and the washing basin effluent. The built prototype will be installed and sampled at different locations of the HKUST campus, including the school halls’ restrooms, sports hall’s showing facilities, and the labs’ flushing devices. In addition, practical training will be provided in developing the machine learning algorithm for the greywater treatment unit.

Home Projects Urban Spring Smart Dispenser Meter URBAN SPRING SMART DISPENSER METER

What is the project? Urban Spring Smart Meters will be plugged into 50 standard mechanical drinking water dispensers to read water consumption & operational data in order to enable efficient drinking water facility management and to demystify water quality to the HKUST community. Through connecting to a cloud database with NB-IoT connectivity, critical information such as water leakage, and filter capacity are collected for management purposes. With public dashboard display and individual bottle-tracking, users will see their collective and personal environmental footprints regarding single-use plastic bottles and water consumption. It aims to cultivate the Bring Your Own Bottle (BYOB) behavior through multi-level data visualization and innovative user interaction.

What is the problem this project is trying to address? Currently, HKUST’s water dispenser management is manual and costly. Although HKUST closely monitors drinking water quality with water testing and frequent filter changes, much of our campus managers’ effort is not communicated through to users, resulting in a lack of trust in water quality. Moreover, plastic pollution awareness campaigns could have a short-term effect on the behavioral change of BYOB. This project targets to improve operational efficiency and long-term community engagement.

How does this project support our sustainable smart campus as a living lab vision? By digitizing dispenser management, it provides a smart approach to managing water resources on campus, enabling data-driven facility upgrade and expansion in the future. Plastic and filter wastes could be reduced through dispenser usage maximization and education. The project takes an agile and experimental approach to test the effectiveness of public and personalized data analytics, and reward systems to encourage long-term sustainable habits within the HKUST community. Besides, the team brings passionate students along the solution-building journey through hands-on Sustainability x Tech workshops on environmental awareness and resource management, integrating real-life experiments and education.

What's next? Extensions can be installed to other fluid-related resource management such as greywater, shower water, etc. Collaboration with USThing app with an individualized water analytics feature that involves incentive and environmental footprint point system.

Home Projects You Will See a Hoopoe YOU WILL SEE A HOOPOE (AI BIRD WATCHING)

What is the project? Birds play a vital role in the environment. With the rise of AI technologies, it has given HKUST community a perfect opportunity to discover the campus’ beautiful and vibrant side. Green AI cameras deployed at certain locations on campus can capture bird images and analyze the data, before sharing it with the public. Bird watching campus tours will be available for staff and students to get to know the richness of the biodiversity and the sheer beauty of our feathered friends. Edge AI workshops will be held, where students can have hands-on experience of using the technology, which can resolve privacy problems with the use of cameras. Besides, by launching crowdsourcing and labeling, people are encouraged to send in images of birds they take on campus and use them to train the AI model for bird detections and identifications of different species.

What is the problem this project is trying to address? HKUST Campus is a perfect location for people to learn about nature. Yet, currently, there are insufficient opportunities provided to achieve that. Without understanding and learning about the campus, it is hard for the community to create a sense of belonging to the university.

1,200 species of birds are facing extinction in the next century, and many of them are suffering from severe habitat loss. In Hong Kong, one-tenth of the bird species are at risk of extinction. However, awareness on campus is yet to be raised regarding bird biodiversity protection.

Moreover, there are often problems regarding privacy when it involves cameras, which discourages photo-taking.

This project aims at increasing the community’s awareness of bird protection and the sense of belonging to HKUST in a smart way, without potentially compromising privacy.

How does this project support our sustainable smart campus as a living lab vision? Biodiversity is essential for sustainability. This project reminds our community to stop our footsteps and admire the beauties of nature, thus promoting the environmental awareness of bird protection. By using advanced technology like the Green AI camera, which is the most advanced and smartest bird-watching system in Hong Kong, we can overcome constraints and constantly monitor birds, in order for us to get to know them and ultimately cherish them more.

What's next? Based on the experiences learned from the two years of the project period, the team in the DESR Lab will continue to invent more powerful and versatile AIoT devices, not only for bird watching but also for other critical applications.

AIoT workshops can continue to be provided to university students, and also can be further developed as an experiential learning course for a common core course or a senior-level UG elective.

In collaboration with ITSC and relevant parties, student competitions can be organized to encourage them to invent various kinds of AIoT devices, ultimately to pave the way towards sustainable and smart campus, in a joint effort from all the members in the HKUST community.

Home Get involved EXPRESSION OF INTEREST PROPOSAL The goal of the HKUST Sustainable Smart Campus as a Living Lab is to transform our campus into one where the campus itself is a platform for learning, experimenting, and showcasing new ideas and approaches. Everyone is encouraged to participate! HKUST Students, faculty, staff, and alumni are all eligible to apply for funding and implement an on-campus project. If you have a project idea that can demonstrate a smart approach to making our campus more sustainable, form a team and submit a proposal. Make sure the projects include the following:

Project Champions - Projects must have at least one champion who is a full time staff or faculty serving as the project team leader and point of contact. Stage of development - Projects must already be sufficiently developed and ready to be implemented on campus. Visibility and Educational Potential - Projects must demonstrate an ability to provide a visible educational or learning outcome for the HKUST community. Sustainable and Smart - Projects must demonstrate that they can satisfy our definitions of being sustainable (improving the conditions by which humans can thrive over time within planetary boundaries) and smart (use of ICT tools, technologies, and behavioural insights to communicate, connect, share information to build a vibrant community).

Value for money - Projects will be evaluated on certain value for money metrics, such as life-cycle costs and benefits and impact to our community.

If you are interested in applying for the SSC funding, please submit the full proposal form by 1 January 2021.

You can click here to download the full proposal form and contact us for enquiry at ssc@ust.hk .

Deadline of Expression of Interest form submission 30 November 2020 Deadline of Full Proposal submission 1 January 2021 SSC Committee Review Meeting Mid January 2021 SSC Pitch Day Mid February 2021 Announcement of results Early March 2021

STUDENT COMPETITION Do you have great ideas for ways to improve our campus to be smarter AND more sustainable? Have you identified areas where new technologies or innovative approaches can improve our campus?

Campus Project Competition (Turn your idea into reality)

Form a group to propose an on-campus project that will improve our campus conditions and make us smarter AND more sustainable. The top five successful group proposals will be provided a budget of up to $25,000 to implement their project on campus during the 2020/21 academic year.

Innovative Solution Competition (Share a cool idea)

As a group or individually, offer a unique and creative idea on solving one of our pressing campus sustainability problems. The top five most innovative ideas will receive cash awards of $2,000 each.

A group of students have submitted their entries for the SSC student competition in fall semester 2020, you can now vote for your favorite, click here now. For activity details, you may read more details by clicking here.

Home STUDENT PAPER COMPETITION 2020 SUSTAINABLE SMART CAMPUS STUDENT COMPETITION 2020

About the Competition Do you have great ideas for ways to improve our campus to be smarter AND more sustainable? Have you identified areas where new technologies or innovative approaches can improve our campus?

If so, check out these two new SSC Student Competitions:

Campus Project Competition

Form a group to propose an on-campus project that will improve our campus conditions and make us smarter AND more sustainable. The top five successful group proposals will be provided a budget of up to $25,000 to implement their project on campus during the 2020/21 academic year.

Innovative Solution Competition

As a group or individually, offer a unique and creative idea on solving one of our pressing campus sustainability problems. The top five most innovative ideas will receive cash awards of $2,000 each.

Challenge your creative minds to come up with innovative and people-centric solutions by integrating technologies and sustainable concepts that can help us improve our campus. You can focus on the landscape, buildings, facilities, mobility, learning and living spaces, catering, or supporting services. Or, you can identify any other area that will benefit from a creative new approach.

If you want to turn your idea into reality… form a group and enter the SSC Campus Project Competition. Your team will identify something specific that can be done on campus within this academic year that will improve our sustainability performance. Propose work that can be undertaken by your team and can have a budget of up to $25,000. The top five teams will receive funding, training and guidance to turn the idea into real project for implementation on campus. Through meeting faculty and senior university administrators, the winning teams can build leadership skills, gain project management experience, and enhance their critical thinking and problem-solving abilities.

If you just want to share a cool idea… then enter the Innovative Solution Competition. For the competition you will present your creative idea and make a case for why this new concept is relevant and important for us to consider. It is not necessary to implement this idea – just give us your concept and amaze us! You can enter as an individual or a team. The top five winners will receive a cash award of $2,000 and the bragging rights of being an SSC creative champion!

Submission Process Submit a paper of up to four pages in length (all-inclusive of photos, graphics, and text descriptions) describing your idea. All submissions will first be reviewed by a judging panel who will select a short list of finalists. Shortlisted teams / individuals will be asked to create a short (3 minute, max) video or an electronic poster for public viewing. Voting results from UST members and SSC committee members will be consolidated to determine the winners.

Students can submit more than one entry. Submission deadline: 5 October 2020 We recommend each group to have 3-4 members

Eligibility All UG and PG students are eligible for participating in the competition.

Evaluation Criteria All papers will be assessed based on the following three criteria-

(a) Significance of Problem - problem that is identified and well-defined with empirical observation

(b) Novelty of Solution - solution that is original and creative in addressing the problem

(c) Feasibility of Implementation - solution that is technically feasible and cost efficient

CLICK HERE TO SUBMIT>>>

Important Dates Information Session (on zoom): 9 September 2020, 5pm-6pm via zoom (For details please refer to promotional email)

Paper submission deadline: Extended to 16 October 2020

Judging panel review: by 27 October 2020

Shortlisted students’ submission of posters and videos (for public voting): by 8 November

Public voting: 16-22 November 2020

Announcement of winners: 25 November 2020

Training and implementation of team projects: December 2020- June 2021

Prizes Most innovative solution awards (top 5 individuals or teams): $2000 cash prize

Campus project awards (top 5 teams): budget of up to $25,000 to implement their project on campus during the 2020/21 academic year.

*In addition, we will provide training on project management, support and guidance for project implementation on campus. To learn more about the SSC projects, please visit https://ssc.ust.hk/projects.

We believe that every student should be given the chance to contribute towards making the campus a green, innovative and energizing place. Be our partners. Your ideas matter.

For the top 10 entries of the last SSC student paper competition held in Spring semester 2020, please click here to learn more about their project ideas.

Home SSC Student Paper Competition CO-CREATING A SUSTAINABLE SMART CAMPUS: STUDENT PAPER COMPETITION We are proud of the excellent entries in this year’s SSC Student Paper Competition. Thank you for those who voted for your favorite entries. We are grateful to announce that after consolidating the votes from UST members and SSC Committee members, the winner of HK$2000 cash awards go to the following students:

ACCESS- Air conditioning control and educational sustainable system By Chiu Yui Fan Charlie, Chan Chun Hin

Harvesting Water at Foggy University By Cheung Ka Wan Natalie

All the top 10 entries include ideas on innovative and people-centric solutions that will make our campus a much more sustainable place to enjoy. The Evaluation Committee selected these top 10 from a group of nearly 60 entries, and they concluded that each of them were innovative ideas that were feasible for implementation on our campus.

We hope this is just the beginning! To make this a reality, we’ll need active support. If you are interested in getting involved to further develop one of these project ideas, we’d love to hear from you. Please let us know at ssc@ust.hk. If you are a faculty member, please consider creating a UROP or USEL or take an idea for a class project. If you are a staff, consider becoming a student mentor to help them move the project forward. If you are a fellow student, please volunteer to join a project team. Together we can make this a cutting edge, Sustainable, Smart Campus!

Group Entries

ACCESS- Air conditioning control and educational sustainable system Chiu Yui Fan Charlie, Chan Chun Hin ACCESS is a 2-stage internal control system for both air conditioning centralised management …

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Towards a sustainable and smart indoor swimming pool at HKUST Yin Ran, Lee Sum Yi Angel, Lung Cheuk Wai, Wong Leong Sang This project proposed to upgrade the current water treatment processes for the indoor swimming…

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Project Solartaics Alconaba John Paul Domingo, Gurung Binay, Lama Sujak This project is called Project Solartaics, which aims to introduce Solar-Panelled Umbrellas to…

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USTaste Sieun Kim, Minji Kim, Jooran Lee USTaste is a mobile application which enables users to order menu at spot, through real-time…

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Biogas system Dorothy Chiu, Shriya Sriram Inspired by foreign households’ practices, “Edible to Renewable'' aims at turning HKUST’s food…

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Harvesting Water at Foggy University Cheung Ka Wan Natalie Fog Harvesting takes advantage of the annoying fogs at HKUST in spring to mitigate water…

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PMV Based Micro Thermal comfort sensing system for smart energy efficiency HVAC Applications IZHAR Most of the rooms on HKUST campus are too cold. The conventional HVAC system on Campus use only…

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USThrift Mohana Sindhuri Madhurakavi USThrift is an amplified version of the ‘Give and Take’ table. It is an initiative, in the form…

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NeoPlastic Initiative Jean Baptiste Grassin The concept is to launch an hands-on and fun plastic recycling and awareness workshops. The key…

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Shared space design Leung Hau Yan Targeting four issuess including poor IAQ, low levels of privacy and flexibility, lack of rest…

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ENTRY DETAILS GROUP ENTRIES ACCESS- Air conditioning control and educational sustainable system Chiu Yui Fan Charlie, Chan Chun Hin ACCESS is a 2-stage internal control system for both air conditioning centralised management with a software-driven mathematical model and environmental protection education with a digital energy dashboard, with an aim to reduce the excessive consumption of the current air-conditioning system in HKUST.

GROUP ENTRIES Towards a sustainable and smart indoor swimming pool at HKUST Yin Ran, Lee Sum Yi Angel, Lung Cheuk Wai, Wong Leong Sang This project proposed to upgrade the current water treatment processes for the indoor swimming pool at HKUST by simply installing an ultraviolet (UV) unit after the current disinfection unit. The co-exposure of UV and disinfectants can initiate advanced oxidation processes to simultaneously remove the emerging contaminants, chlorine-resistant microorganisms and “chlorine” smell.

Project Solartaics Alconaba John Paul Domingo, Gurung Binay, Lama Sujak This project is called Project Solartaics, which aims to introduce Solar-Panelled Umbrellas to create charging stations for students at the University. The name Solartaics is derived from the word “Solar” which represents the energy radiated by the sun and “Photovoltaics” which is the process that converts solar energy into electrical energy.

USTaste Sieun Kim, Minji Kim, Jooran Lee USTaste is a mobile application which enables users to order menu at spot, through real-time updated system and digital receipts. It has great potential to contribute to making a smart and sustainable campus in both technical and environmental areas!

Biogas system Dorothy Chiu, Shriya Sriram Inspired by foreign households’ practices, “Edible to Renewable'' aims at turning HKUST’s food waste, through composting, into biogas which can replace traditional gas used in HKUST canteens. By introducing a circular food system, we hope to take HKUST one step closer to becoming a Smart Sustainable Campus.

INDIVIDUAL ENTRIES Harvesting Water at Foggy University Cheung Ka Wan Natalie Fog Harvesting takes advantage of the annoying fogs at HKUST in spring to mitigate water insecurity problems in Hong Kong. This effective, economical and eco-friendly technology helps UST smartly achieves sustainability by working towards self-sufficiency in water resources

INDIVIDUAL ENTRIES PMV Based Micro Thermal comfort sensing system for smart energy efficiency HVAC Applications IZHAR Most of the rooms on HKUST campus are too cold. The conventional HVAC system on Campus use only temperature sensor to control the indoor climate. However, human thermal comfort, in addition to temperature, depends on several other personal and environmental factors. This project proposes a low-cost thermal comfort sensing system, which considers all the key factors effecting the human thermal comfort, for smart energy efficient HVAC system to achieve optimum thermal comfort with reduced energy consumption.

USThrift Mohana Sindhuri Madhurakavi USThrift is an amplified version of the ‘Give and Take’ table. It is an initiative, in the form of an app, that aims to reduce waste on campus by giving the HKUST community a chance to exchange items that they were going to discard. A thrift store in the palm of your hands!

NeoPlastic Initiative Jean Baptiste Grassin The concept is to launch an hands-on and fun plastic recycling and awareness workshops. The key is to let consumers engage themselves in the recycling process by using easy-to-operate machines for shredding, injection moulding and extrusion making it possible to create objects out of plastic waste.

Shared space design Leung Hau Yan Targeting four issuess including poor IAQ, low levels of privacy and flexibility, lack of rest area and separate booking system, this new design allows us to make better use of resources, including space, glass, anything in the shared space while taking care of students’ health and wellness.

Home SSC Student Paper Competition 2020 SUSTAINABLE SMART CAMPUS STUDENT COMPETITION 2020 The Sustainable Smart Campus initiative has invited HKUST students to challenge their creative minds to come up with innovative and people-centric solutions by integrating technologies and sustainable concepts that can help us improve our campus.

We are proud of the excellent entries in this year’s SSC Student Competition. Thank you for those who voted for your favorite entries. We are grateful to announce that after consolidating the votes from UST members and SSC Committee members for the top 10 entries in each category, the winning awards go to the following students:

Campus Project Competition Circular Vertical Campus Farming Jean-Baptiste Marie Grassin, Leung Cheuk Yau Yoyo, Leslie Anne Yasis

Mask but not the least Kavya Geetha Balaji, Inika Kandwal

STEPP! Tiffany Yang, Simar Gangar, Minjin Gu, Kyu Suk Cho

Precious Plastic to Art Jacky, Chung Jin Teng, Bengi Agcal, Lee Hsuan Yi

Hygiene, with Lighting Zhao Jing, Lee Ting Hsi

The top five successful group proposals will be provided a budget of up to $25,000 to implement their project on campus during the 2020/21 academic year.

Innovative Solution Competition Water is the New Electricity Anhad Singh Chawla

Breer Anushka Purohit, Deevansh Gupta, Naman Tekriwal, Suyash Mohan

Zero Waste Events - the Use of Beacons and Augmented/Mixed Reality Or Ka Lai, Yip Wun Yan

Revitalizing One-World-Fountain Park Leo Agung Panggagas Darminto, Kevin Kent, Quintina Maura, Amrita Saraswati Sutedja

T-RECS Anhad Singh Chawla

The top five most innovative ideas will receive cash awards of $2,000 each.

We hope this is just the beginning! To make this a reality, we’ll need active support. If you are interested in getting involved to further develop one of these project ideas, we’d love to hear from you. Please let us know at ssc@ust.hk. If you are a faculty member, please consider creating a UROP or USEL or take an idea for a class project. If you are a staff, consider becoming a student mentor to help them move the project forward. If you are a fellow student, please volunteer to join a project team. Together we can make this a cutting edge, Sustainable, Smart Campus!

Campus Project Competition

Circular Vertical Campus Farming Jean-Baptiste Marie Grassin, Leung Cheuk Yau Yoyo, Leslie Anne Yasis We aim at turning campus plastic and organic waste into a Circular Vertical Campus Farm. Benefit…

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Hygiene, with Lighting Zhao Jing, Lee Ting Hsi Our goal is to make UST campus a more safe and sustainable place to live. Thus, we proposed a…

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Mask but not the least Kavya Geetha Balaji, Inika Kandwal Our proposal assesses the lifecycle of mask, a product we take for granted today. It illustrates…

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Precious Plastic to Art Jacky, Chung Jin Teng, Bengi Agcal, Lee Hsuan Yi With HKUST-2020 sustainability challenge on reducing waste production, we envision to promote…

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STEPP! Tiffany Yang, Simar Gangar, Minjin Gu, Kyu Suk Cho Introducing the upgraded version of STEPP!, a piezo-powered installation art tunnel that lights…

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LOL! ??Let's Order Less! Ku O Sane, Liu Chi Hin, Wong Tsz Yu, Yam Nga Yu “LOL! Let’s Order Less” displays food waste data of HKUST restaurants in real-time. Scales will…

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PosVi Drone Kwok Tze Fung, Tang Hau Tung Candy, Hu Zhaoxu PosVi Drone is a solar panel inspection drone using smart technologies. PosVi Drone implements a…

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Recycling of Disposable Face Masks Karuna Arachchige Shan D Ratnayake, Fanta Conta, Soham Parija, Anish Mishra We are developing a process to sanitize the used masks using ozone treatment and shred the mask…

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Vegitude Sudeepto Das, Deevansh Gupta, Mudit Sanghavi Holistic solution for the adoption of a vegetarian lifestyle and combating the ill-effects of…

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ZeroPlastic LO Kok Kit, Nathan Wong ZeroPlastic try to build a Zero Waste Market in HKUST to encourage people go green. We will…

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Breer Anushka Purohit, Deevansh Gupta, Naman Tekriwal, Suyash Mohan Breer is a food upcycling startup that reduces bread waste and utilizes it for brewing beer. It…

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Revitalizing One-World-Fountain Park Leo Agung Panggagas Darminto, Kevin Kent, Quintina Maura, Amrita Saraswati Sutedja Located near Fusion and LG7 Canteen, passed by students every day – the One-World-Fountain Park…

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T-RECS Anhad Singh Chawla T-RECS uses water collected from rainwater harvesting to cool solar panels present on campus.…

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Water is the New Electricity Anhad Singh Chawla This project depicts a way water can be used to reduce air conditioner electricity requirement…

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Zero Waste Events - the Use of Beacons and Augmented/Mixed Reality Or Ka Lai, Yip Wun Yan This solution reforms current large-scale university events and pushes forward the…

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Black Soldier Fly: The Solution to Food Waste Chan Cheuk Lam 1/3 of our food produced turns into waste. HKUST alone contributes 4 tons of food waste each day…

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Grab a seat @UST Li Chun Pong, Tien Ning Chee, Tse Lok Yiu, Yu Chak Hei Spending extra time on finding unoccupied seats by walking around in the library always…

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Low FOODprint Katrin Bruels With Low FOODprint we can reduce the resource footprint from our food consumption by making easy…

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S2R – Smart and Social Recycling Platform Xiangan Tian An innovative platform for improving the experience of garbage classification and recycling as…

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STOREASY Mudit Prashant Sanghavi, Dhruv Manoj Jain Storeasy is a platform that will aim to provide sustainable and cost-effective storage solutions…

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CAMPUS PROJECT COMPETITION Circular Vertical Campus Farming Jean-Baptiste Marie Grassin, Leung Cheuk Yau Yoyo, Leslie Anne Yasis We aim at turning campus plastic and organic waste into a Circular Vertical Campus Farm. Benefit from delicious organically-grown vegetables while saving the environment! Our ambition is also to raise awareness in the UST community towards more waste separation and reduction in the first place by concretely showing its value.

CAMPUS PROJECT COMPETITION Hygiene, with Lighting Zhao Jing, Lee Ting Hsi Our goal is to make UST campus a more safe and sustainable place to live. Thus, we proposed a smart light-based disinfection system in the UST elevators. This system can increase the disinfection efficiency in the elevator, and decrease the costs for disinfection operations.

Mask but not the least Kavya Geetha Balaji, Inika Kandwal Our proposal assesses the lifecycle of mask, a product we take for granted today. It illustrates a method of creating PPE-paper composite wood that can be incorporated back onto campus. We aim to make HKUST the first institution in HK to implement an effective mask recycling and utilising system.

Precious Plastic to Art Jacky, Chung Jin Teng, Bengi Agcal, Lee Hsuan Yi With HKUST-2020 sustainability challenge on reducing waste production, we envision to promote plastic upcycling with artwork creation. We propose to introduce an on-campus plastic recycling technology to repurpose plastic waste into versatile materials for arts and design. By organizing workshops, we cultivate innovative ability, building a clean and artistic campus.

STEPP! Tiffany Yang, Simar Gangar, Minjin Gu, Kyu Suk Cho Introducing the upgraded version of STEPP!, a piezo-powered installation art tunnel that lights up motivational messages as you walk through the tunnel. Audio-visual experiences have been shown effective to relieve stress. Mixing this with fun, and inspirational messages, our team believes that it could positively impact the student’s mental health.

LOL! ??Let's Order Less! Ku O Sane, Liu Chi Hin, Wong Tsz Yu, Yam Nga Yu “LOL! Let’s Order Less” displays food waste data of HKUST restaurants in real-time. Scales will measure the amount of waste and the information will be shown next to cashiers and kiosks. It aims to raise awareness of customers and encourage them to order wisely.

PosVi Drone Kwok Tze Fung, Tang Hau Tung Candy, Hu Zhaoxu PosVi Drone is a solar panel inspection drone using smart technologies. PosVi Drone implements a Tile Pattern-Aided Vision Positioning Algorithm, providing a safe, speedy and cost-effective method of inspection. It will greatly reduce the burden of future nursing work of the solar farm system in HKUST and ensure the solar farm operates desirably as expected.

Recycling of Disposable Face Masks Karuna Arachchige Shan D Ratnayake, Fanta Conta, Soham Parija, Anish Mishra We are developing a process to sanitize the used masks using ozone treatment and shred the mask to the required size before incorporating in ‘papercrete’ to produce concrete of desirable characteristics to make building products such as bricks, blocks and paving tiles.

Vegitude Sudeepto Das, Deevansh Gupta, Mudit Sanghavi Holistic solution for the adoption of a vegetarian lifestyle and combating the ill-effects of consuming meat. By offering easy recipes, tips on plant-based diet as a student, and a live carbon footprint tracker, we will mitigate the potential difficulty in making complete switch because of lifelong habits. Hence, we will build a community of changemakers.

ZeroPlastic LO Kok Kit, Nathan Wong ZeroPlastic try to build a Zero Waste Market in HKUST to encourage people go green. We will source some "plastic-package-free product" and "green product" which can give student a green alternative before they buy what they need.

Breer Anushka Purohit, Deevansh Gupta, Naman Tekriwal, Suyash Mohan Breer is a food upcycling startup that reduces bread waste and utilizes it for brewing beer. It introduces a novel taste of beer, while remonetizing wasted bread. Beer is brewed with 3 ingredients. Breer collaborates with breweries to replace the 78% of barley needed for beer, with bread.

Revitalizing One-World-Fountain Park Leo Agung Panggagas Darminto, Kevin Kent, Quintina Maura, Amrita Saraswati Sutedja Located near Fusion and LG7 Canteen, passed by students every day – the One-World-Fountain Park has long been underappreciated by the HKUST community. We aim to integrate a water-saving pond, solar PV systems, and upcycled furniture to make this park more beneficial for the HKUST community and support the UN SDGs.

T-RECS Anhad Singh Chawla T-RECS uses water collected from rainwater harvesting to cool solar panels present on campus. The proposed system can be implemented on the rooftops of the Hong Kong Jockey Club Enterprise Center where the upper roof can be used as a rainwater harvesting site and a water tank located nearby can release water to the lower roof when necessary. Since solar panel efficiency is improved when at ideal temperature, electricity generation can be improved in a cost-effective manner.

Water is the New Electricity Anhad Singh Chawla This project depicts a way water can be used to reduce air conditioner electricity requirement by using evaporation. The key benefits of this idea is that it proposes to evaporate collected rainwater outside the library – effectively cooling the surrounding at no cost. The evaporation site already exists outside Library LG4 and it is therefore cheap to carry out this experiment.

Zero Waste Events - the Use of Beacons and Augmented/Mixed Reality Or Ka Lai, Yip Wun Yan This solution reforms current large-scale university events and pushes forward the transformation into a smart and sustainable campus. Beacon Technology and Augmented/Mixed Reality will support this change by avoiding wasteful promotion as well as creating the one-of-a-kind digitalized and interactive visitor experience.

Black Soldier Fly: The Solution to Food Waste Chan Cheuk Lam 1/3 of our food produced turns into waste. HKUST alone contributes 4 tons of food waste each day. In nature, Black Soldier Fly can eat up the food waste and produce organic fertilizer. The cycle can be used and applied in our school to reduce food waste.

Grab a seat @UST Li Chun Pong, Tien Ning Chee, Tse Lok Yiu, Yu Chak Hei Spending extra time on finding unoccupied seats by walking around in the library always frustrates students at HKUST. The team proposes to install sensors to detect real-time seat occupancy, helping students to look for available seats in the different learning commons immediately.

Low FOODprint Katrin Bruels With Low FOODprint we can reduce the resource footprint from our food consumption by making easy green choices on campus, such as switching out regular milk for plant-based milk, making vegetarian options more available and by offering visual tools to understand the food’s impact.

S2R – Smart and Social Recycling Platform Xiangan Tian An innovative platform for improving the experience of garbage classification and recycling as well as raising people’s awareness of environmental protection.

STOREASY Mudit Prashant Sanghavi, Dhruv Manoj Jain Storeasy is a platform that will aim to provide sustainable and cost-effective storage solutions for international students. Our app will use Machine Learning and Augmented Reality technology to connect people looking to store their luggage over the summer to people already on campus.

SMART CAMPUS, SMART CITIES The implementation of SSC projects will be coordinated through the GREAT Smart Cities Institute, in collaboration with the HKUST Sustainability Unit, which will report directly to G5 and the University Administrative Committee (UAC).

GREAT Smart Cities Center Tel: (852) 3469 2685

Email: gsc@ust.hk

Room 3595, Main Academic Building

The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology

Clear Water Bay, Kowloon, Hong Kong

HKUST SUSTAINABILITY UNIT Tel: (852) 2358 8227

Email: ssc@ust.hk

Room 2004, Sustainability Unit Office

The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology

Clearwater Bay, Kowloon, Hong Kong

Prof Hong Lo, Director of GSCI, is charged to be the academic lead and Davis Bookhart, Head of SUST will be the administrative coordinator to support this initiative.

“Expanding Frontiers, Converging Minds” – The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (Guangzhou)

“Our Campus Our Living Lab” published by the Sustainable Smart Campus Initiative

“Expanding Frontiers, Converging Minds” – The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (Guangzhou)

“Our Campus Our Living Lab” published by the Sustainable Smart Campus Initiative

THE HONG KONG UNIVERSITY OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY Sustainable Smart Campus as a Living Lab • •

Embracing Digital Resources for Livability Our Campus Our Living Lab Published by the Sustainable Smart Campus Initiative which is led by Prof. Hong Lo, Director of the GREAT Smart Cities Institute, with Mr. Davis Bookhart, Head of the Sustainability Unit, who is also the administrative coordinator of the Initiative. Sincere gratitude to all who have contributed to the production of this publication. Editorial and Project Coordination by: Vivian Chan, GREAT Smart Cities Institute Chami Kim and Dorothy Chiu, student writers from School of Engineering Design and Illust ration by Media Technology and Publishing Center (MTPC) Printed by MTPC Printshop on FSC paper. The carbon footprint of this publication was neutralized to minimize impact on the environment. Room 2004, Sustainability Office, The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Clear Water Bay, Kowloon, Hong Kong. Website: https://ssc.ust.hk © 2020 The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Clear Water Bay, Kowloon, Hong Kong. All rights reserved. ISBN: 978-988-78037-7-5 Contents 04 Preface 05 Foreword 06 Embracing Digital Resources for Livability C 08 Check Your Pulse u 12 Do You KnowYourWay? 16 An Information Hub 20 Supporting Biodiversity and the Ecosystem 22 Be Like a Tree 30 You Will See a Hoopoe 34 A Secret Oasis 38 Protecting Our Scarce Resources 40 Saving the Drops of Life 42 Smart Management of Water Pipes 44 Be More 'Energetic' 48 The Spirit ofTrying 52 Empowering Our Community for Positive Change 54 Securing Your Future 58 An Irreplaceable Gift 62 Art Infusion 66 The Power of Knowing 72 Acknowledgements 3 Prcfocc Prof. Wei SHYY President Campuses are microcosms of global cities. They both have transportation, commerce, housing, food and beverage, and office settings. With our laboratories, you could even argue that campuses have industrial networks, even if on a much smaller scale. Campuses also face many of the same challenges that are impacting cities, including the urgency of clean and affordable energy, protecting our biodiverse landscapes, and providing a local environment where people can thrive as they live and work. While the scale of global challenges facing our cities in the 21 st century is daunting, we recognize that if we solve some of these challenges at the campus level. we can demonstrate feasible solutions that can scale up. In 2019 we officially launched the HKUST Sustainable Smart Campus as a Living Lab to begin the transformation of our campus into an active platform for learning, experimenting, and advancing new ideas and approaches with sustainability as a guiding principle. This "living laboratory" framework emphasizes home-grown HKUST project ideas that are both smart (new and innovative) and rooted in sustainability (providing positive environmental and social benefits). This booklet represents just the beginning of what is possible when we are committed and focused. It is our sincere hope that our unique focus serves as a source of inspiration to our Hong Kong Community in ways that communicate a positive vision for a sustainable world.

PULSE OF HKUST 8 Total Wi-Fi Connections

Foreword Prof. Hong LO Director of the GREAT Smart Cities Institute Mr. Davis BOOKHART Head of the Sustainability Unit Over the past several years we have been fortunate to work with an exceptionally talented and creative group of people, and this booklet is a celebration of some of the outstanding work that is making our campus smarter and more sustainable. It is easy to focus only on the projects themselves, seeing how the use of a certain technology can provide a positive outcome, or how a different approach to a problem can result in interesting and sometimes unexpected results. But the projects themselves are merely the products of the extraordinary people who worked tirelessly and selflessly to fulfill the mission of our contribution to a smarter and more sustainable world. In the following pages you will see the results of dedicated work from our students, faculty, operations staff, and even alumni. In most cases the work is the combined effort of teams, where the mixture of ideas of people from different disciplines and backgrounds germinate the seeds of innovation. In all cases the projects look a little different near the end than we thought they would at the beginning, reminding

us that the real value of these exercises is the process. Through trial and error, revising, tweaking, and always being open to new ideas, these projects are never quite finished; rather they are works in progress, and a true reflection of the spirit of our HKUST community. There are too many people to thank-in addition to the project teams themselves- who have contributed to the success of SSC, including well over 100 people who have pitched project ideas, dozens who have helped judge or evaluate those concepts, and many staff who have opened doors (literally and figuratively) and helped guide the facilitation of the projects on our campus. In particular we would like to thank Ms Vivian Chan and Ms Loretta Luk for their tireless efforts in keeping the projects running smoothly. We'd also like to give our appreciation to all the various campus units who go beyond their normal operations and duties to make the projects possible. Finally, we owe a deep debt of gratitude to our brilliant Interns, Chami Kim and Dorothy Chiu, for providing the lion's share of work in pulling this booklet together. We all know the word "digitalization·: Every year, huge amounts of money are poured into the development of digital technologies. Digitalization can be used for perfecting the functions of A l cameras or creating an advanced data analytic system. Yet, if we ask a random person how A l cameras benefit his or her life, we may not get a specific answer. Why is that the case? In a world where resources are running short, we have learned that creating digital technologies per se is not enough. They have to be applied 1n a way that brings convenience, accurate information, visualization-something that benefits people's work or their lives, or sometimes even both. The Facial Recognition proiect that was trailed at the Library in HKUST is an illustration of how biometrics technology helps students and staff to have easier access at the entrance of the library. It enhances security by preventing manipulation by means of shared and stolen ident ity cards too. Indeed, digital technology means nothing unless it is being used. As one of the leading universities in science and technology, HKUST values how digital devices developed by our students and staff are being utilized. Our university community is eager to test various digital initiatives and applications of new smart resources. For instance, the popular mobile application USThing that was created by a group of students provides a centralized platform to consolidate different resources and services that are useful for the campus community With d1gitalizat1on, we want to make an actual improvement for our community, and perhaps someday for our larger society Campus Traffic Academic Bldg Hall • CYT Bldg • LSK Bldg • Canteen • Library • IAS Bldg • Bus Stop • Sports Center • • • Busiest Area • • • • • • • • • Incoming Outcoming PG Tower A 17 Laboratory L 14 Atrium 12 LG1 Canteen 10 Enterprise Center 9 Starbucks 8 Library 7 UG Hall 1 5 PG Tower A 19 Ent erprise Center 16 UG Hall 1 15 Laboratory L 13 Library 12 Atrium 10 LG 1 Canteen 7 Starbucks 6 • • - Daniel is a sophomore studying marketing in HKUST. His schedule is packed today and he barely has time to take a break. He already feels wobbly after an intense morning. 'HKUST sure is a tough institution!' he thinks as he drags his feet to the Piazza. It is time for a hot meal. HKUST has many canteens and restaurants but with over 15,000 students and staff shuffling here and there, empty seats are a miracle at lunch hour ... PULSE! Daniel takes his phone out and checks the Pulse web page. The LG1 canteen is relatively quieter than the LG7 canteen. He quickly calls his friends to come to the LG1 canteen. His day is finally over. But Daniel doesn't want to queue up in the heat so he checks Pulse again to see if the bus stops are crowded or not. Well, it is the peak hour, so, no surprise, they are full of people. He decides to study at the library and wait for a while before he heads home. Daniel reflects on what the lecturer from his technological innovation and sustainability course told him: "Technology is a double-edged sword, but if we put it into good hands, the whole world could benefit. Our university does not only want to be smart and convenient in many different ways, but we also want students to be environmentally aware of their consumption and behaviour. Technology will be useless if the community doesn't start to make a change in lifestyle:· He thinks of how Pulse saved him today. He is very aware of how he has started to make decisions based on numbers and graphs, instead of on gut instincts or his mood that day. He realises he is making informed decisions all the time. As Daniel leaves HKUST, he is really glad he got into this university and has the opportunity to enjoy smart features like Pulse and the indoor navigation application. They allow students and staff to manage the campus resources efficiently, and they bring a positive change to people's lives.

Pulse of HKUST Prof. Huamin OU HKUST can have up to 20,000 students and staff on campus every day. Without a system that is able to sense crowd flow, great inconvenience arises. That is why two years ago, a team of passionate students and staff took the initiative to develop a smart campus system, Pulse, that aims at alleviating problems created by overpopulation. By counting the number of people connected to campus Wifi, Pulse can record the degree of crowdedness at a particular location on the campus. This data is processed and presented on a dashboard, showing estimated crowdedness at various sites, like the library, canteens, laboratories, etc. Also shown is a percentage that indicates how full the space currently is. With such information, we are able to make smarter decisions regarding our on-campus activities, as well as to better utilize our time. The dashboard is projected on a wall in the Engineering Commons for people to look at. People can also go to the Pulse website for convenient access on their mobile devices to information about crowdedness . Transportation to and from HKUST can be a little bothersome, especially during the spring and fall semesters. Specialized cameras installed at both the north and south bus stops allow bus queue length to be observed. Moreover, the departure time of each public vehicle is included. This allows people to work out the best ways to reach home with a minimum of aggravation and delay. Privacy is a serious issue and a priority for our university. Any sensitive data that could act as identifiers of individuals (e.g. video recordings) are not stored. CCTVs at the bus stops are installed at a distance sufficiently far that they do not capture any faces. The success of Pulse was marked by its winning the Student Innovation Gold Award at the Hong Kong ICT Awards 2019, and the Research and Innovation Award at the Asia-Pacific ICT Awards 2019. It was exhibited at HKTDC International ICT Expo as part of the Smart City, Smart Living Pavilion. In order to let people at HKUST utilize this technology more fully, further collaboration with existing mobile applications are being explored. Pulse records everyone who is 'pulsating' through the campus and turns big data into useful indications and guidelines for campus users. It is crucial to enhance the livability and well-being of our community by enabling a smarter decision-making process. Busy individuals can also manage their time better. This resonates with our SSC vision of turning our campus into a living lab, where innovations can inspire positive changes. Campus Movement (Last 3 Minutes) • Bus Stop • Canteen • Library • Sports Academic Hall Restaurant Traffic Starbucks 33 LG1 Canteen 32 LG7 Canteen 14 McDonald's 13 Passion 4 LSK Restaurant 3 Sport Facilities Court 1 Occupied Court 2 Occupied Tennis Court 3 Occupied ,4 Court 4 Empty Court 5 Occupied Court 6 Empty Court 7 Occupied Court 8 Occupied Badmintc Court 1 Occupied

Court 2 Occupied Court 3 Occupied Court 4 Empty Table Tennis Court 1 Occupied • Court 2 Occupied Court 3 Occupied Library Traffic 1/F 19 G/F 10 LG1/F LG3/F 2 LG4/F Transportation 50 40 30 20 10 North Bus Station Traffic m 1ramc Out 06:00 09:00 12:00 15:00 18:00 21:00 24:00 Avg. Waiting Time (mini People Status North Bus Station 6-12 14 Few People Route 12 > Sai Kung 10 min 12 > Po Lam 8min 11M > HKUST 5 min 11M > Hang Hau MTR 13 min 792M > TKO 3 min 792M > Sai Kung 18 min South Bus Station Tra cm 1ramc Out 06:00 09:00 12:00 15:00 18:00 21:00 24:00 Avg. Waiting Time (mini People Status South Bus Station < 6 26 Few People Route 11 > HKUST 6min 11 > Choi Hung MTR 12 min 91M > Diamond Hill MTR 18 min Engineering Common 000

People 15 Avg.Time of Stay 99 Powered by HKUST Vislab. Data last updated: 16:45 14 16 "Turn left and take Argyle Street ... then turn right at the corner to reach your destination." Does this ring a bell? Yes, that is indeed Google Maps. Navigation applications like these assist us greatly in going anywhere we want to, despite our being completely ignorant of the area. But what if... "Turn left and take Argyle Street...then turn right at the corner to reach your destination." Does this ring a bell?Yes, that is indeed Google Maps. Navigation applications like these assist us greatly in going anywhere we want to, despite our being completely ignorant of the area. But what if. .. "Turn right and you'll see the Social Science Commons at the end of the hallway ... then turn left ... " This is not Google Maps. This is a customised HKUST indoor navigation application. Yes, this pipe dream has finally been fulfilled. Navigating indoors can be a nightmare. Have you ever missed an important event or meeting just because the venue was nowhere to be found? Many classrooms or conference rooms are located deep inside the academic buildings; students and staff have to snake through hallways and take multiple twists and turns before they reach their destinations. Or they have to take longer routes because they do not know there is a shortcut. These problems are very familiar to all of us. For this reason, a team of HKUST professors decided to develop an indoor navigation technology called Wheramifor people to navigate within the HKUST campus and put an end to such frustrations. The application acts as a beacon, making sure staff, students and visitors do not get lost and giving them a sense of guidance. It brings the outdoor navigation experience based on GPS to the indoors where GPS signals are weak or absent. Paranoid about queueing up for buses in the sweltering heat?Yet another technology based on Wifi sensing, SmartAP. is there for you. With just a few simple clicks, you can literally catch a glimpse of what is happening at the bus stops, such as waiting times, allowing users to make smarter decisions in daily life. It's all too good to be true, right? But in fact it is happening right before our eyes. HKUST strives to make the campus as user-friendly as possible. Since a large number of classrooms and offices are concentrated in a tiny space, winding corridors are inevitable. But we can transform ways of thinking and decision-making processes. How could the pathways become more transparent to students and staff? How could people get to their destinations as quickly as possible? These questions inspired the team to reflect on their project from time to time, filling gaps and fixing any potential errors. This project reflects one of H KUST's overarching missions: to become a beacon for students and equip them with necessary skills and knowledge so they can defy the odds and move swiftly to their desired destinations. Are you ready to discover more about the Smart Mobility projects? / / Indoor Navigation and Bus Queue Analytics Prof. Gary CHAN, Dr. KK LAI Exploring a new place can be exciting-but it can also be intimidating for those who don't have a good sense of direction. This was the dilemma the project team was trying to solve when they thought about developing indoor navigation applications. 'Smart Mobility: Indoor Navigation and Bus Queue Analytics' stemmed from the government's active promotion of a smart city, and the idea of helping newcomers or visitors in finding their destinations in unfamiliar places, such as malls, schools, retail outlets, etc. The team aims to extend the path-finding functions of the current pathadvisor2.0 with real-time user positions and navigation and to develop a mobile application that users can easily download onto their phones. It will be an upgraded version of the current Path advisor because this new system uses fusion-based indoor positioning. Fusion technology utilizes Wifi signals, Bluetooth signals, geomagnetic fields and atmospheric pressure to pinpoint one's location on campus as no spot has the same parameters. This enhances the accuracy of location-pinpointing, and HKUST is the first tertiary institution ever to use fusion technology in navigation. The indoor localization technology is called "Wherami',' which comes from the combination of "Where am I? ': Besides finding users' desired destinations in daily life, 'wherami' can be applied in scavenger hunts during student orientation camps. In addition, the time needed to go from one point to another is worked out for users immediately after users input their destination. iBeacon devices, that is, gadgets which emit Bluetooth signals, will be deployed around the campus to support indoor localization. Currently, the team is working on map preparation and conversion to IMDF (Indoor Mapping Data Format) to support largescale campus deployment. In the coming months, the team will improve the algorithms of both systems and deliver the best navigation application possible to people. It will also integrate with the project 'Digital Twin', which is actually a 30 campus model, allowing viewers to see the campus from an oblique view and making the application more interactive. This is a promising project indeed, as indoor navigation is a puzzle everyone has to solve in everyday life. The team is determined to bring greater convenience to users by including bus queue analytics, that is, by sensing crowd movements at the north and south gates with the SmartAP (assess points) technology they developed. SmartAP can provide real-time bus queue analysis (through an interface) and show queueing time and the number of people waiting in the same web interface. Implementation is always a major headwind in any project. Yet, we believe the 'Smart Mobility' project, which includes both indoor navigation and bus queue sensing as two separate technologies, will surf the waves of challenges and eventually benefit not only HKUST staff and students, but the larger Hong Kong society as well. 17 h Starbucks 33 .ft 1111---------------, 7 ·. LG1 Canteen 32 .ft LG7 Canteen 14 .ft McDonald's 13 .ft I -----:-:::; Passion 4 .ft LK Restaurant 3 .ft Restaurant Traffic If you are traveling to another country, would you pack everything into one big piece of luggage with many compartments, or would you carry tiny little bags with one item in each of them? Similarly, would you rather visit a supermarket that carries almost every product you need, or would you prefer going to 10 shops selling only oranges or only eggs? Modern technology enables us to create and develop a wide range of systems that assist and improve people's lives. Plenty of information and programs, commercial or not, exist. But without a way to organize them, it is exactly like carrying hundreds of tiny little bags onto a plane. It just does not make sense, especially in a world where convenience is highly prioritized. A consolidated platform with compartmentalising features is what we aspire to nowadays. At some point we are all annoyed by the fact that there are far too many applications on our mobile phones. They take up our phone storage, and receiving separate notifications from each of them gets on our nerves sometimes. What we really need is a model that can integrate and visualize data, as well as provide various necessary functions. Imagine successfully publishing a book that you wrote. Would you print out copies and try to sell them one by one to people you met on the streets? Or would you put your books in a bookshop? Without a suitable platform, it is difficult for the product you have created or the technology you have developed to be used-not because it is bad, but because it is not known. or is simply too difficult to access. What is missing is a place to let your hard work shine. Looking at the issue from the perspectives of both the producers and the users, it is crystal clear that the most logical way to improve all our lives is to have an organized system that enables the ut ilization of new resources by our targeted community. Only then can we truly attain the effectiveness and convenience that we deserve. h Starbucks 33 .ft 1111---------------, 7 ·. LG1 Canteen 32 .ft ---------------•~• I LG7 Canteen 14 .ft ------- McDonald's 13 .ft------• Passion 4 .ft LK Restaurant 3 .ft Restaurant Traffic 22 Digital Twin Prof. Jack CP CHENG With the rise of 3D technologies like Virtual Reality, Building Information Modeling (BIM) and 3D GIS in recent years. Digital Twin technology has been growing ever more popular. Some countries, such as the United Kingdom and Singapore, have been keen on digitizing the w hole country for some time already. In particular, the United Kingdom has launched the national Digital Built Britain initiative, w hich is currently managed by the Center of Digital Built Britain (CDBB) at Cambridge Universit y, to digitize its built environment for smart city development. Our university is always trying its best to adopt cutting-edge technologies and provide the best learning environment and services to our students and staff. Therefore, a team of experts in BIM and smart buildings started the SSC project on Digital Twin for the HK UST campus. This aligns with the vision and policy of the Hong Kong government to make Hong Kong a smart metropolis through 3D maps and digitalization. A digital twin is a digital replica of physical assets (physical twin). processes. people, places. systems and devices that can be used for various purposes. It is a dynamic, virtual model of the physical world. enhancing our ability to understand, simulate, learn. predict. and explain changes in the built environment. The HKUST Digital Twin SSC project aims to bridge the physical and digital world by generating 3D BIM models for all campus buildings based on drawings and field surveys. The project also aims to develop customized user interfaces based on the generated 3D models to support different applications such as indoor navigation, space management. and visualization of indoor air quality data. Excellent Tennis Court 1,. Court,2

court 3. Court7 , Coo",8 . Occupied Occupied Occupied,' . Empty Occupied Empty Occupied ····Occupied Badminton Court 1 Court 2 Court 3 Court 4 Table Tennis Court 1 Court 2 Court 3 Occupied Occupied Occupied Empty Occupied

Occ~ The project team has currently completed the modeling of the HKUST academic building, as well as the CYT, LSK and IAS buildings. For instance, the BIM model of the IAS buildings contains all architectural, structural, mechanical, electrical and plumbing (MEP) components, which were generated based on the original construction drawings. This model contains a high level of detail (LOD400) that can be used to facilitate various activities during building operations and maintenance in the future, such as simulating and validating the indoor ventilation conditions remotely. The HKUST Digital Twin is interwoven with other SSC projects. The project team will collaborate with the SSC project Smart Mobility: Indoor Navigation and Bus Queue Analytics on path planning and indoor positioning; these will use Wi-Fi signals and iBeacon to determine current position and use the geometric information of the BIM models to calculate the shortest path. In addition, they will incorporate sensor data from the PULSE project (which gauges crowd movement) and SCAN project (which tracks indoor air quality) all over the campus, into the 3D digital twin model. The development of HKUST Digital Twin comes with great challenges. Leaving aside the complexity of handling obsolete drawings and constructing 3D models, the integration of the BIM models with different technologies is no easy task. A digital twin is effective only w hen it is integrated with sensor information and uses data visualization technologies to monitor and predict the activities of the physical twin. As a digital twin is a hub that links up various sets of campus data, synergy with other systems is the key to its success. The HKUST Digital Twin also opens up enormous research opportunities for students to enrich their understanding of 3D modelling and smart buildings. These include integration between BIM and loTT. data processing such as Power Bl and machine learning algorithms, as-built 3D model verification, and building performance simulation and analyses of the HKUST campus. HKUST is the first university to implement Digital Twin on its entire campus. We hope to inspire applications of the system in other sectors in Hong Kong. Only by creating the fundamentals can more ideas be developed, which is why we believe that the HKUST Digital Twin will bring unlimited possibilities to our campus by facilitating the visualization and convenient utilization of various projects and types of data. Emb1 g Digital Resources fo1 L vab• ty 23

Be like a tree. Embrace positivity, like how it always points towards the sun. Be like a tree. Aim high, like how it never stops growing taller. Be like a tree. Never give up, like how its branches are reborn again after being cut down. Be like a tree. Stay strong, like how it withstands storms. Be like a tree. Have acceptance, like how it lets others rest inside. Be like a tree Develop flexibility, like how it moves with the wind. Be like a tree. Record memories, like how it creates rings in its trunk. Be like a tree. Recognize the reality, like how it always stays on the ground. Be like a tree. Work on inner strength, like how its roots dig deep into the soil. Why should we care about nature. when we have so many other things on our minds?This question is usually asked by someone who has no idea of how our lives are closely related and affected by the natural environment. Since the first day humans walked on the Earth, Mother Nature has been providing everything that is necessary for our survival. Yet, we often forget how dependent we are on her. HKUST strongly believes that raising awareness about preserving biodiversity and protecting the health of our ecosystem is essential to our university education. Located at a vibrant and natural site teeming with life, our Clear Water Bay campus is a perfect place for our community to learn more about these issues through the use of technology, as well as to engage more in environmental protection and restoration. We want to show that, whatever we do for our local environment is, in the end, a service to ourselves. 28

30 Internet of Tree Things Prof. Yu Hsing WANG With advanced medical technology nowadays, it is not too difficult for us to understand our body conditions. Yet. have you ever wondered how we are supposed to know if a tree is healthy? In our beautiful clear water bay campus, thousands of diverse trees surround us and live with us every day. Even if we hire arborists, it is impossible for them to care for all the trees. We need a way that can help us monitor trees' health and save the vulnerable ones. Back in 2017, the Hong Kong Government invited Professor Wang Yu Hsing (the project leader) to develop a kind of tree sensor that is both effective and long-lasting. Yet, the notion of applying this technology to our campus grew only after typhoon Mangkhut hit in 2018 and killed more than 300 trees. Seeing damaged trunks, scattered branches and uprooting of trees. Prof. Wang and his team decided to install sensors on selected trees around our university, measuring mainly the tilting angle and vibration. A special feature of the smart sensors is that it can transmit real-time data even in extreme weather conditions. Conventional sensors in the market fail to achieve this. Using the LoRaWAN loT network, the data can be analyzed and stored, giving an accurate diagnosis of tree health. Another feature is that the battery inside the sensor is extremely long-lived. With little energy consumed, these sensors on trees can function for a long period of time. 32 AI Bird Watching Prof. Yu Hsing WANG Birds play a vital role in the environment. The rise of Al technologies has given the HKUST community a perfect opportunity to discover the campus' beautiful and vibrant ecological side. Green Al cameras deployed at certain locations on campus can capture images of birds and analyze the data, before sharing it with the public. Bird-watching campus tours will be available for staff and students to get to know the richness of the local biodiversity and the sheer beauty of our feathered friends. So far, more than 35 trees have been monitored with our tree sensors on campus. These trees are either injured by the past extreme weather events or the ones growing on steep slopes. Once the trees are diagnosed with a potential risk of falling, consolidation work can be done in an attempt to save them through pruning and reinforcement. Some have to be removed to ensure the safety of people passing by. With the data, we can also know which trees need extra help from us to consolidate their stability before a typhoon hits during summertime. This project does not just aim at providing better care for trees on campus. By creating a better visualization of tree health with the data, it allows our community to pay more attention to these majestic friends. Educational events and workshops about tree care and Al technology are held in order to let students and staff have an opportunity to engage in environmental protection. Although trees don't speak our languages, they have their own stories to tell. As most loyal friends, they have always been there for us, providing shelter and oxygen and so much more. Let us not forget what they have done for us, make good use of the technology and skills we have to finally do something for them.

Photo credit: Prof. Wei Shyy Prof. Yu Hsing Wang Edge Al workshops will be held, where students can have hands-on experience of using the technology. This can also resolve privacy problems that arise with the use of cameras. What's more, launching crowdsourcing and labelling encourages people to send in images of birds they obtain on campus; these are used to train the Al model for bird detection and for identification of different species .

"To plant a garden is to believe in tomorrow," said the famous Hollywood actress Audrey Hepburn. We may not have a crystal ball to predict our future, but we know that taking a small step every day will eventually become a giant leap from nothing to something. Sometimes that small step needs more than our own courage, or support from loved ones-a place for reflection and practicing mindfulness is essential in achieving our daily goals. A garden, perhaps? A garden is vital to students' mental health. A garden is not just a garden, a place with trees and ponds and fish and plants. These elements, in fact, merge to become a giant healing sphere that brings security and calmness. A garden is therapeutic. Students and staff need such a place to untie the knots inside their heads and listen to their hearts. It also cultivates creative thinking; one can organize one's thoughts and let new ideas blossom. Birds chirping, the sound of water crashing against the rocks, soft breezes ruffling your hair ...

JS 42 Upgrading the Pond Water Treatment System Dr. Vincent WANG, Ir. Yiu Wing HA, Ir. Allan LEUNG Behind a beautiful facade always lies hard work. With our university's 30th anniversary approaching, we are redesigning a space that can not only demonstrate technological integration with the environment, but also can enhance our community's well-being. Before the project team took the lead to improve it, the garden's water was the very opposite of appealing. Water was stagnant with algae. decomposed leaves, and other pollutants accumulated, which made it difficult for any living things to survive. The greenish colour of the water revealed its unhealthiness. Yet, the team saw its potential. After almost one year of exploring different wastewater treatment technologies, they designed a state-of-the-art wastewater treatment technology and replaced the existing sand filtration equipment. Their goal was to achieve a wellbalanced ecosystem for fish and other inhabitants of the garden pond and provide an excellent educational exhibit for students and visitors. As mentioned before, the main problem of this pond was the build-up of organic materials such as leaves, sticks, grass, and fish waste. Organic materials decay over time and produce ammonia. High levels of ammonia are harmful to the pond ecosystem and highly toxic to fish . The advanced wastewater treatment system utilizes both physical and biological technologies to prevent ammonia build-up. In the first step, the pond water 40 Does HKUST have this kind of oasis on the campus?The Chinese Garden located near Towers 15 to 19 in the staff quarters area is a perfect venue for restoring peace within our minds. It is a hidden gem; not many people have discovered it yet. It sits far away from the more crowded areas on campus and allows people to temporarily pause their fast-paced lives. Not long ago, this garden was desolate, with dying animals and wilting plants. For such beauty to be wasted was a pity. But two years ago, a team of passionate professors resolved to bring this garden back to life. They were determined to retrofit it and make it known to the wider HKUST community. A garden pond like the majestic Chinese Garden in HKUST is powerful. Nature is always magnetic; it does not talk but it draws you in, listens to you and soothes you with tranquility. Countless studies have shown that cancer patients recover faster when they can see nature every day, because it reduces the level of stress and pain, boosting the immune system. So ... the next time you want to throw a tantrum, or feel bored, or feel unhappy, you may as well pay a visit to the Chinese garden. You'll come out of it differently. 41

is drawn through the skimmer, which is used to collect floating debris with a size greater than 7 mm, such as leaves. This is accomplished by means of two submersible pumps that are housed in the sump pit. The two submerged pumps are used to circulate the pond water through two separate wastewater treatment systems. One pump circulates the filtered pond water through a micro-screen for further filtration of fine particles greater than 75 μm, such as fish waste, and then to a Moving Bed Biofilm Reactor (MBBR) for biological treatment inside a cabinet next to the pond. Finally, the effluent from M BBR is further treated by UV light in a UV filter to kill algae before returning to the pond. In the MBBR, microorganisms grow on small plastic media, called carriers, for removal of organic pollutants and ammonia. The carriers are kept suspended by aeration within the reactor to keep the biofilm thin, eliminating the need to remove and replace the carriers. To enhance the functioning of the pond, internal circulation of pond water is carried out by the other pump, and aeration tubing is also installed to maintain an adequate dissolved oxygen level for supporting aquatic creatures. Smart meters measuring pH level, dissolved oxygen level, etc., are also installed to provide us with a more accurate understanding of the water's condition. The whole operation is automated and functions 24(1. Now, the Chinese Garden can finally be an ecosystem where aquatic animals and plants can reside. Birds are also attracted to the spot. Our university community can utilize the space for leisure activities, such as meditation and chess-playing, while looking out over the clear pond with different creatures in it. The space has also been redesigned with running water, grounding rocks and seasonal flowers. The East Asian atmosphere can be translated and presented in a way that makes the garden livelier and inviting. With this revitalization, we all can have a relaxing place that fosters well-being. To bring the pond to life at night, a submerged LED lighting system is installed at the bottom of the pond. Every evening, our pond is brightened by LED lights of various colors. We are positive that it will become a popular spot for both campus residents and guests to visit. With this project, students can have a real-life water treatment model to look at and learn from too.

Supporting Biodiversity and the Ecosystem 43 Our resources are running short It is alarming and it is true. On the other hand, with population growth, there is no way we can simply stop using them. What we can do is to use our resources wisely. How so? By managing them efficiently Energy efficiency has long been valued and is increasingly adopted. For other forms of resources, like water and food, technology is equally important in terms of assisting conservation and eliminating unnecessary wastage. We are in an age when we need to act intelligently, and act quickly. HKUST will not hesitate to discover new possibilities to innovate in this vital time One of our teams is looking into training Al cameras in food recognition to identify common forms of food wastage and analyze our community's food consumption habits; another team is exploring the use of solar energy to power clocks throughout the campus. By making our campus a place for both scientific and social experiments, we hope to inspire the larger society to utilize our limited resources in a smarter and more sustainable way GreywaterTreatment Unit Oxidation Tank Sedimentation tank 46 Cyclic Activated Sludge Technology Upper Cyclic Activated Sludge Technology Lower Storage Tank Autonomous Greywater Treatment System Prof. Frank LEUNG, Prof. DesmondTSOI, Prof. Xijun HU What does greywater make you think of? Greycolored water? Shady water? Greywater is a type of wastewater produced by households or office buildings. Thousands of litres of greywater are disposed of in the ocean every day by Hong Kongers. Water is ubiquitous; it is in our bodies, in the air around us, in the plants we see everyday. Yet only 0.007% of the planet's natural water resources is fresh water that is readily accessible for human consumption. That is why a team of professors has created an autonomous greywater treatment process to effectively remove pollutants and disinfect the reclaimed effluent in the greywater, i.e. recycling water back into the system and reducing water consumption. The treatment plant is miniaturised and it consists of primary, secondary, and tertiary treatments. It comes with the perk of remote smart control as it is equipped with an Arduino Data Flow controller board and a machine-learning algorithm to study the patterns of freshwater consumption, optimizing the purification process. The built prototype will be installed and sampled at different locations on the HKUST campus. including the restrooms in the school hallways and the flushing devices in labs. We live in a world where depletion is happening much, much faster than production, and thus this system undoubtedly helps students and the public to realise the importance of conserving the Earth's resources. Arduino Mobile Application II • Programmable microcontroller • Control electronics in water purification umt • Sensor types - pH sensors - Temperature sensors - Water level sensors • Collect data from treatment unit • Use Ionic as main development tool • Provide notifications and data visualizations • Relay commands from users ~

• Online database • Acts as relay point of data transfer • Storage of past data for future retrieval

• Monitor performance of purification unit with data visualizations • Control the unit by sending commands in user interface Protec. g Our Scarce Resources 47 48 Smart Water Network @ HKUST Prof. Mohamed S GHIDAOUI, Prof. Moez LOUATI Did you know that leaky water pipes and even faucets waste a huge amount of water annually? A leaky faucet that drips at the rate of one drip per second can waste more than 3,000 gallons per year! Leaks and bursts often result in economic losses and social disruption, and require expensive renewal strategies. Some have even happened on a larger scale and caused massive flooding in urban areas. Fortunately, here at HKUST there is another SSC project that could crack this problem- the Smart Water Network! The project revolves around the time-reversal technology of transient pressure waves. These waves are actively generated into a system to propagate along the pipe and reflect information about any existing defects they meet along their propagation paths. Reversing in time the measured response signals and convolving it with the system model, the waves refocus on the sources, indicating the locations and types of defects. The vision of the technology is to have the pressure system responses measured by sensors at different access locations which are connected to wireless data loggers that communicate the data to a cloud server. The pre-processed data in the server is automatically input into a hydraulic model that includes developed algorithms of time-reversal techniques. Given the input data, the hydraulic model displays in real time the health condition of the pipe system which is shared with the Campus Management Office, al lowing the university to cut costs on repair and management. The technology will also be displayed to HKUST students and visitors, educating them on water loss and financial issues. With these measures in place, water lost from our university will surely decrease. As we are on the brink of a water crisis, technological innovations like these are crucial to alleviating difficulties related to water insufficiency.

Protecting Our Scarce Resources 49 e-fuel storage system e-fuel charger e-fuel charged 50 e-fuel - electrically rechargeable liquid fuel e-fuel discharged e-fuel cell e-fuel cell Sm~rt Mini-o-rid of 100% Renewable Energy Prof. Tianshou ZHAO Lethal heat waves, catastrophic hurricanes and rising sea levels impact all of us. Imagine Hong Kong without Christmas because the temperature is too high to be called winter anymore; imagine super-typhoons visiting us every year and wiping everything out...We must act as one to mitigate climate change by reducing our energy consumption and making the transition to renewables. For decades, HKUST has been relying heavily on power plants. Our greenhouse gas emissions soar every year, and thus renewable energy generation on campus becomes more important than ever. A mini grid of 100% renewable energy providing electricity to our university was born out of concern over this situation, and it aims to adopt a fully integrated system without the use of traditional batteries or flywheels that have distance or discharge limitations. Polycrystalline solar panels were installed on the roof of the CYT building and they are connected to an innovative e-fuel energy storage system and a mini-grid energy distribution system. As the project further extends beyond the building and stretches across the main academic building and Piazza. the ratio of fossil fuels to renewables can be changed, allowing us to rely less and less on SHARY USE OF RESOURCES 1• ) Smart Mini-grid of 100% Energy polluting energy resources. Led by Professor Zhao, this multidisciplinary project not only generates data for future research projects, but also is an educational tool to train and inspire students to integrate energy knowledge and applications practically. g Sea eR 5' 52 Self-cleaning Multipurpose Nano-coatings Prof. Jing lei YANG Among all existing sustainable energy methods, wind and solar reign supreme. In particular, solar energy has become a promising trend in the global energy market. Many different types of panels of varying efficiencies are currently produced. However, the glass cover of these panels often becomes filthy and blotted by pollutants from the environment. reducing the amount of sunlight reaching the panels and their overall efficiency. Manual labour is needed to clean these panels frequently. In addition, particulates such as PM2.s also gradually compromise the appearance of buildings as they are deposited on glazing materials and cement walls. The removal of deposits costs a lot too. To raise solar panels' efficiency and reduce costs incurred by window and wall cleaning, Professor Yang and his team from the Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Department developed a self-cleaning multipurpose nanocoating that could solve all these tricky problems. A superhydrophilic surface feature passively cleans these surfaces by leading the water on the coated surface to spread out to form I Nonoport,du I Mouomol.cu1e Chcun, with superhydroph11ic feature an ultrathin continuous layer that unsticks or loosens any debris, as well as preventing fogging. It is more robust and durable than commercial self-cleaning coatings. It extends service life and decreases inputs of labour, rinsing water and electricity too, thus reducing the campus' energy consumption. Furthermore, the team will collect on-site data and undertake real-time analysis that will help train and equip students with practical problemsolving skills and an innovative mindset. This project further inspires them to critically think about daily life problems that could be solved via materials innovation. With oil and petroleum reserves being depleted ever faster around the globe, producing clean energy for elect ricity usage becomes imperative. HKUST is determined to make the change happen. 54 56 Plants filter water Fish discrete for the fish Introduction to Aqua ponies urine

.1 1000x ,

Nitrifying bacteria convert ammonia in urine into plant nutrients Aquaponics at HKUST Dr. Li LING, Ms. Miranda MAN Aquaponics could be a panacea for food shortages in dry seasons across the globe. In an aquaponic system, fish waste can be transformed by a biofilter into nutrients for plants; plants uptake those nutrients to f urther clean up the water so fish can live in it. A smallscale demonstration project was established in Cambodia and it proved to be effective. Aquaponics not only alleviates food crises, but it is beneficial to the environment. The system reduces the demand for water and nutrients for raising fish and vegetables and reduces the use of pesticides and herbicides. In 2018, the farm was built at HKUST; there are four student volunteers who help maintain the farm. Tilapias were raised in the pond along with different types of vegetable seedlings. Vegetables are harvested either weekly or after about two months of growth, depending on the species. The team is currently working with the coastal marine lab in HKUST to grow sea urchins in order to explore different types of aquaponic farming. They have started an lnstagram account (aquaponics.hkust) to promote it. Education is the main 'nutrient' in growing the 'aquaponics idea'. Therefore, they are also seeking ways to make it known to the wider college community. An academic course offered by the Department of Civil Engineering has incorporated the farm into the curriculum as a case study to teach students the importance and mechanism of a closed ecosystem. By matching different plants and marine species together, the team is hoping to find the best combination that can produce the greatest yield. The team is looking into options to optimize growing conditions by making the system smarter. They are building suitable smart automatic water sensors to monitor water quality so that the operators can learn what needs to be supplemented and what needs to be removed, and are exploring how to enhance the vegetable and fish yield of a fragile ecosystem in the process. They are also building a smart system consisting of smart water pumps, air pumps, and equipment to adjust water quality in order to reduce labour needs and ensure the functioning of the system. Aquaponics has an enormous potential for sustainable food production. It is hoped that more devoted and passionate research students will participate in this project.

Protect Our Scarce Resources 57 58 Empowering Our eommunity for Positive Change Turning an innovative idea into a functioning practice is almost impossible without the spirit of trying. What would happen if the salmon in Alaska gave up swimming upstream to spawn after encountering the initial challenge of water falls? Similarly, the road of science and invention does not run straight. The famous engineer Nikola Tesla, despite all the hardships he endured and being overshadowed by Edison. remains one of the world's most important inventors. "I have not failed. I just found 10,000 ways that won't work;' he said. What drives innovators to keep going is simpler than you think-it is passion. The Aquaponics team started off small. It was a group of enthusiastic people sharing similar ideas. A trip to Cambodia inspired them to innovate in order to create something beneficial to our campus community. After struggling with finding a suitable site for the project, the aquaponics system was finally built with the limited amount of resources they had on hand and through experimentation. Using a simple mosquito net to protect the farm did not seem secure. so they adopted a greenhouse cover. It turned out that the net provided better ventilation for the living things to survive. The team learned from this and moved on. When they harvested their first batch of crops, their joy was indescribable. The journey is never easy. Yet. that does not mean it cannot be enjoyable. With real passion. every difficult task is ultimately a great learning opportunity that can bring deep satisfaction. Aquaponics demonstrates the essence of turning HKUST into a living lab by showing us that when you are doing something you like, the long road to success is actually the most fulfilling part. Protecting Our Scarce Resources 55 Protecting Our Scarce Resources 53 There is a famous Chinese saying: 'A single palm cannot clap'. It shows the importance of teamwork. Filled with talented and diligent individuals, HKUST could go a long way in making a positive change if we come together. Yet, in the end, will and enthusiasm are not enough; it also boils down to whether or not our community has the assets to go forward. Without suitable tools and resources, it is hard to encourage members to collaborate and actively contribute to the overall development of HKUST. This is the reason why SSC initiatives aim at providing the platform our community needs to receive more accurate information and make more informed decisions. By means of such empowerment, we want to foster more responsible and sustainable consumption habits on campus, as well as improve our well-being by leveraging technology such as big data analytics and narrowband ioT. Through more interactive engagement, we want all students and staff to feel like the future is really in our own hands. 59

In the past people thought that the safest way to secure their belongings was to keep them insight, or even hold them in their hands if necessary. Then came the rise of banks. Money was turned into a number and people no longer put all of their wealth under their pillows. As time passed. more and more things have been digitized for countless reasons. Writers work directly in Google Drive where everything is automatically saved. Attendance is taken by card-swiping instead of signing in with a pen. Messages are sent to our phones for us to fill in verification codes during online transactions. What do all these examples tell us? In modern times, where information can be created out of nowhere and data can be forged, we are all desperate for verification and proof. How can we know that the news is real? How can we know if this product actually kills 99% of bacteria? It is not difficult to see why we want evidence for everything. We want the truth. Of course. we as individuals do not want to be questioned about the things that we have acquired over the years. such as knowledge, skills and qualifications. This includes our hardearned university degree. It would not be fair if your degree were to be copied and used by someone who has done nothing to earn it. Now. what if I tell you that it can easily happen? Or that it is, in fact. happening every day? Without a system to secure your degree, we are like the people in ancient times who buried their money in their yards. One day you wake up and it is all gone. Being one of the most sophisticated and secure systems. blockchain technology leaves you with nothing to worry about. It not only provides the convenience you need when you upload or share your degree with third parties, but it also gives you the security that you crave. All the examples of digitization we see happening around the world signals that this is a trend. It is necessary and it is happening right in front of our eyes. As the first university in Hong Kong to launch Blockcerts technology, we are a pioneer and are leading other institutions towards a more convenient and safe society.

Why Do We Need Blockchain? G

' Blockcerts Prof. Oifeng CHEN, Mr. James Alan PRINCE, Dr. Samuel KWAN The 21st century is a whole new era. It is a digital age where dangerous medical procedures are replaced with robot arms, Alpowered chatbots answer customer inquiries, etc. In light of this, every step our university takes with the help of science and technology is for the best for our community. In the past, graduates had to submit a request for formal documents like a diploma certificate or transcript and pay their university to reissue more copies. This was time-consuming, expensive and bothersome. Even now, sometimes it takes a lot of time to send physical transcripts to multiple universities and they may get lost during the process. Blockchain technology, as its name suggests, is a chain of blocks w ith each block containing information, a hash (a unique identifier), plus the hash from the previous block. Blockchains have an extremely high security level because they are tamper-proof. The hash makes each block different from all the others and because it is maint ained by a wide network of users, the only way to change a single block is to change the whole chain of blocks, all at exactly the same moment, which is impossible. This makes it extraordinarily difficult for attackers to manipulate them. If a third party wishes to know something about a certain graduate, the graduate just has to provide them with either a link to a secure website or send them a .JSON file, which they then can use to see and verify information that is stored efficiently and conveniently. Many other universities in Hong Kong are trying to solve the problem of excessive paper in offices, so Blockcerts is undoubtedly a good model for others to follow. One of the key decisions for the project team was which format they should use for the documents (.PDF. .HTML, etc), as well as the specific blockchain to use-there are various choices in the market such as Hyperledger, IBM blockchain platform, Bitcoin and Ethereum. Ultimately, the team chose to use Bitcoin and adopted and then adapted a version of the MIT Blockcerts platform, because of its stability and the work that had already been invested in it. Another potential barrier to success in this project, whose aims include the reduction of labour costs and gradually changing people's habit of printing out graduation letters. was differing views and feelings about moving away from hardcopy documents in this formal context. However, the team strongly believes that Blockcerts will transform the public's view of digital certification and the conventional use of hardcopies. In fact, the university will still issue both Blockcerts and paper certs (hardcopies) to students and families. giving the community a choice. Blockchain technology can have many applications, such as marriage certificates, overseas transactions, cryptocurrencies, etc. As change-makers in Hong Kong, we need to stay open-minded and have faith in the potential of the technology. As we leave our comfort zone, we can truly embrace technology and fuel a positive change for our society. Empowering Our Communityfor positive change 63 We care about what we eat. Research shows that an ordinary person spends around 15% of his or her day thinking about food; it is even more for some office workers! We count our calorie intake, check the food nutrition charts, and read recommendations on restaurants serving cuisines from all around the globe. Yet, we rarely pay attention to something fundamental to us that we inhale every second-air. Feel free to do a little self-reflection. How often do you think about the air you breathe in? Do you know whether the air you're breathing right now is safe or not? A person can survive two weeks without food but cannot live more than four minutes without air. The COVID-19 pandemic has probably made us more aware of air-we will never forget wearing masks all through a hot, humid summer. Lifting your mask and breathing in cool fresh air was like tasting water in a desert. With urban development, air pollution has become one of the biggest issues city dwellers have to combat. Harmful substances like nitrogen dioxide and PM2.5 fill the atmosphere and are trapped within high-rise buildings. Many city slickers see country parks as their sanctuary, but with deforestation, we really cannot say how many of these will exist in the future. Luckily, disruptive innovation is our ally in this changing world. Imagine if we could look up air quality and components of both indoors and outdoors environments from an elaborated system. With such knowledge, we would have an idea of where in particular the air quality needs to be improved. What's more, we could have an awareness of how our actions correlate with air pollution. Articles about oxygen being commercialized in the future were published years ago. Even though it may not happen, just the fact that this idea has been explored is alarming. So far, there is not one known planet besides Earth where humans can survive without wearing spacesuits or using elaborate equipment to supply breathable air, something you may not have in mind often, but which you definitely cannot live without. Marshall McLuhan once said, "There are no passengers on spaceship Earth. We are all crew." We should not take a single breath of good-quality air for granted. Essential to our livelihood and well-being, it is a valuable gift that is worth preserving. Visualizing air 66 Smart Campus Air Network (SCAN) Prof. Zhi NING, Prof. Jimmy C H FUNG, Prof. Alexis K H LAU Air quality is vital to our health and well-being. Many of us fail to remember it is an important factor in our lives, as we can neither touch it nor see it. It is closely related to not just our respiratory system. but also our productivity and mental health. With urban encroachment and development showing no signs of slowing down, air pollution is one of the toughest challenges we face in Hong Kong. Research shows that people nowadays spend around 80% of their time indoors. We believe that the university community may spend even more time indoors. As a university of science and technology, we have long recognized our mission to translate and integrate our research with technical skills to make an actual difference. We are proud to say that with the launch of the Smart Campus Air Network (SCAN), HKUST is the first university in Hong Kong to monitor and present real-time data on air quality both indoors and outdoors. The 30 smart sensors installed indoors all around the campus help to record and analyze air quality indicators like particulate matter (PM) concentration and carbon dioxide (CO2) level. A more efficient ventilation system can then be adopted, where ventilation time is customized and better techniques can be applied to places with poor air quality. Time can also be saved due to real-time data transmission. On the other hand, outdoor sensors measure the level of carbon monoxide (CO), sulfur dioxide (SO2), nitrogen dioxide (NO2). etc. All the numbers Sport Hall Q LG 1 Canteen Q Starbucks Real-time monitoring and visualization of air quality • Bus Stop"

Library Atrium

IAS Bldg collected are presented on a website (scan. ust.hk) open to all students, staff, and visitors, allowing them to check the air quality at specific locations at that exact time. Unlike the 16 stations that the government has established all over the city that serve to ascertain the general background of air quality in Hong Kong using regular measures, the indoor air quality monitoring sensors on campus are more localized, inexpensive, personal, lightweight and small. They can be deployed in indoor environments. By providing real-time monitoring and visualization of air quality, our community can definitely have a better understanding and awareness of this issue. Sensitive groups of occupants can be informed, alerted, and protected by taking preventive actions. In the long run, we hope to encourage campus users to review their energy consumption patterns and understand how it is closely related to the air quality around them. The data also gives the university an overview of locations that need improvement and allows it to adjust the performance of heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) systems and the building management system (BMS) so we can work on them to make the indoor environment more comfortable. For instance, when outdoor air quality is good enough, increasing the ventilation rate will be the dominant strategy to reduce energy consumption; but when outdoor air quality is deteriorating, the filtration system may need to be activated. The SCAN project team is planning to collaborate with other projects, such as the Digital Twin and ITSC API platform, to broaden the application of SCAN and increase data sharing. As Prof. Ning mentioned during an interview, "We may not be able to shut down all the world's factories or stop the traffic to reduce the air pollution, but we can work with our tight-knit community to raise awareness about using advanced technology to allow effective mitigation measures that will maintain the comfort levels of learning and working inside our buildings and make a significant difference:· Empowering Our Community 67 68 When it comes to telling a story, there are many different ways. If I ask you to tell the story of HKUST, what would you choose to talk about? How would you describe us? Talented and diverse people? Innovative designs? Ever-changing campus? It is not surprising that you don't think of art immediat ely. Maybe it's because of our university name, or because the campus is filled with geometric structures and plain colours that give you instant associations with either science or technology, or very often with both. A typical stereotype is that science and technology are practical areas, in which only logic and numbers are involved and valued. We often forget that creativity is a big (if not the biggest) part of inventions and experiments. It is not related to knowledge per se, but more to how we use our brains. A perfect way to communicate with our brains and let our minds flow is, unsurprisingly, through art. Consider this: whenever you need ideas, do you stay inside a room and stare at a blank white wall? Or do you prefer going outside, taking a casual stroll, and looking at colorful things? As a university, we strive to provide not just a comfortable environment for our students and staff, but an inspiring and enlightening atmosphere, where thoughts can fly freely, and imaginations can be ignited. As learning and growing individuals, we record our thoughts and express our ideas in ways that others can resonate with, and there is no better place to do that than on our campus. We want to bring you on a journey where math can be lyrical, where technology can be alive and visual, where numbers dance with colours, where stories can be embraced and told. At the same time, we never forget our mission to foster a greener and more sustainable campus. Nothing speaks more powerfully than a piece of art. Some say that art is merely a luxury that not everyone can afford. Take a look around, and you may realize that art is literally everywhere. We want to make art as interactive as it can be and break the stereotype that art can only be put in a frame and admired from afar. By decorating and redefining stairways, students can engage with art, or even be a part of it. "Nothing compares to a journey made on your own feet :· We firmly believe that with reallife interaction and art pieces, a stronger idea of sust ainability can be conveyed and a broader awareness raised. So the next time when you visit our campus, we invite you to walk up those art-infused steps and feel the stories that the artists want to tell as those stories may very well be yours. , I I I 70 SmART Steps Prof. Kellee TSAI, Prof. King CHOW, Dr.Anna KWONG This project was inspired by the idea of enhancing the aesthetic experience of using stairs on campus. We also hope to use the staircases as a living laboratory for facultymentored student projects on the impact of artistic interventions on perceptions of well-being, mood, and usage of stairs versus elevators. A couple of staircases on campus (those at lifts 3, 13-15, and 17-18) were chosen as pilot schemes to test the idea. The outdoor staircase outside the Cheng Yu Tung (CYT) building was picked as well. A competition was held beforehand to collect students' ideas about decorating the campus. Many students pitched visions with a lot of creative visual elements. At last, the outdoor staircase was painted as a vibrant ocean filled with different aquatic creatures. Each stairwell manifests a theme, such as conservation and environmental data displays, campus connectivity (monitoring traffic and canteen use), purely artistic, attention-grabbing multimedia displays, etc. The stairway by lift 3 showcases the photography and artwork produced in HART (studio courses offered by 72 the School of Humanities). as well as facultymentored individual and group projects, while those by lifts 13-15 and 17-18 have digital art installations that entail dynamic visual displays. The whole process was supervised by seasoned artists from Hong Kong. Social behaviour analysis is one key research area of this project. Motion sensors were installed to collect data on how often people choose to take the stairs because of creative designs, as the team wanted to know how effective their stairs are in promoting walking. The implementation was not as smooth as expected. Heavy rain poured down while volunteers and artists were trying to paint the outdoor steps outside the CYT building. They had to wait a long time before the gloomy clouds dispersed, and so the number of helpers available was greatly reduced. In addition, time was tight for the whole team. Neon lights originally installed on the staircase needed to be dimmed for the sake of unique artworks from HART courses. a development which was not widely accepted by students. Fire safety issues limited the types of materials and lighting the team could use. Nevertheless, the team worked diligently and many features were completed. A questionnaire was given to a batch of students to obtain feedback regarding the new paintings. They were invited to walk on and observe the stairs and report their evaluations. Results showed that the students considered the aesthetic stairs to be more pleasant and refreshing than previously, and they supported the idea of introducing artwork to stairs and the campus in general. 'SmART Steps' not only has a restorative effect for university people and improves their physical health, but it also fosters collaboration across units for collective benefits. The awareness of such a feature will be raised through student orientation camps, for example, in scavenger hunts or on campus tours, to encourage taking the stairs and reducing electricity consumption from lifts. Our Guangzhou campus will have a new programme, 'Computational Media and Arts', where undergraduates will learn how art and science are intertwined and combine to revolutionize our lives . The power of knowing One of the biggest lessons we learn in growing up is that we bear the consequences of our own actions. It hit me-and my bank account-hard when I first got my very own credit card and the monthly bill came. The main reason was there was no easy way for me to know how much I had spent until the day I was asked to pay the bill. That is probably why I still get surprised every month. The electric bill works the same way. We get a letter around the end of each month with a number, and we pay it without questioning. There isn't any data citing our consumption rate or pattern, so we barely give it a second thought. This surely does not empower our community to change our behaviour. How are we supposed to save energy and deal with related environmental issues when we don't even have a good understanding of our consumption in the first place? Developing smart cities is a major goal of many places. A university, in particular, is an ideal place for innovation and trial and error, as it behaves like a mini society. Imagine you are a student residing in one of the halls. You open a mobile application, and see that you rank the highest in electricity consumption; your hall is being labelled as the most polluting dorm ... how would you feel? You have the information to make smarter and better decisions about using various appliances, to save not just the planet but your money too. We all have a tendency to resist change. We find age-old habits most comfortable. To overcome this inertia, it helps to provide a relevant incentive. In this case, it is about both the monetary benefit and the feel-good factor of protecting the environment. Positive impacts can be made on campus without you even noticing. It is almost like someone helping you record all your credit card spending and showing it to you from time to time. Provoking self-reflection can help us adjust consumption patterns and help ease the depletion of Earth's resources. Big changes are all made up of little steps. Letting consumers know and be conscious of their energy uptake is one of the first things we can do to contribute to sustainability education.

74 GGT Smart Campus Mr. Derry FONG, Mr. Alan HUI Electricity consumption in residential halls contributes a lot to the massive greenhouse gas emissions from HKUST The traditional longstanding metering and payment system was pivotal in changing the consumption behaviours of undergraduates in the university's transition to a greener campus. With that in mind, Global Graduate Tower (GGT) focuses on 'smarting up' students' electricity usage, which comes mainly from air-conditioning, lighting and sockets. Enhancement of laundry efficiency is also a goal. For the time being, we will enhance students' hall experience by monitoring the vacancy of laundry appliances A limit of electricity usage will be set. Students whose consumption exceeds the limit will be charged per kilowatt-hour, while those whose consumption is below the limit will be rewarded with free electricity distributed to their rooms. The tedious way of paying by student ID cards will be switched to better online payment methods including Visa, Master, Unionpay, Alipay, Wechat Pay, and FPS. Student consumption will be read by sensors and meters located in the switch rooms. The amount to be paid will be displayed on a mobile application named HKUST STUDENT. which will be developed by prominent IT teams and software engineers from our university. The app is a one-stop platform for every student, where they can also check their course information, exam timetable, grades, upcoming events, etc. A second user interface-a new website for looking at real-time data analytics-will be built to give a clearer picture of how electricity is consumed differently across all floors and rooms in a particular hall every second. If students delay their payments for a prolonged period of time, electricity will be cut off automatically through controllers installed in the switch room, which are connected to banks and related servers in HKUST by the Internet of Things (loT). Once the students have paid, realtime data will be transmitted from the banks and electricity provision will be resumed. Indeed, the results have been encouraging. Students started to pay attention to details they would normally ignore. Energy reduction reached 60% for two occupants per room, compared to the control floor, and 20% for one occupant per room. Refill

Bring Your Own Bomte

UST Dashboard A

USThing Influence Other Students & Staff Thank you for Bringing Your Bottle! 39,009 Bottle saved since Feb 1, 2020! We are close to reaching our reduction target! Create a Plastic Free Campus Urban Spring Smart Dispenser Meter Ms. Janice WONG, Ms. Katherine LAM, Dr. Meike SAUERWEIN Speaking of energy personalisation, many are baffled by how exactly they are helping the environment by bringing their own bottles to campus: Why do I need to do that? How's that going to change the status quo? What can a steel bottle do? Urban Spring Smart Dispenser Meters could answer all these questions. Plastic pollution awareness campaigns have only a short-term effect on behaviour by encouraging a change to BYOB (bring your own bottles). This project better facilitates community engagement by allowing users to see their collective and personal environmental footprints as regard single-use plastic bottles and water consumption through public dashboard displays and individual bottle-tracking. Moreover, manual management of dispensers is costly, inefficient and passive. This project contributes to smooth operational efficiency. • The meters will be plugged into 50 standard mechanical drinking water dispensers; they are easy to connect, wireless and flexible so they can work with different dispenser models. The dashboard allows managers to remotely and actively do maintenance, by viewing real-time water dispenser conditions online. OR codes will be attached to bring users back to this project's milestones, its philosophy, water dispenser information, and so on. As a result, long-term behavioural change can be encouraged. In fact, the project leaders have teamed up with a student society to host training workshops in school for students to gain practical experience and to network with people from different academic backgrounds to create a smart and sustainable talent pool. Customised technological systems enable us to see what we are doing for the Earth. Everything becomes tangible and personal. Let's hope environmentally friendly habits can become a norm in the near future.

78 Acknowledgments Pulse of HKUST Prof. Huamin OU, Professor, Department of Computer Science and Engineering Aoyu WU, Postgraduate student, Department of Computer Science and Engineering Bon Kyung KU, Postgraduate student, Department of Computer Science and Engineering Wai TONG, Postgraduate student, Department of Computer Science and Engineering LeniYANG, Postgraduate student, Department of Computer Science and Engineering Smart Mobility: Indoor Navigation and Bus Queue Analytics Prof. Gary CHAN, Professor, Department of Computer Science and Engineering/ Director, Entrepreneurship Center Dr. KK LAI, Manager (Innovation and Product Development), Department of Computer Science and Engineering Digital Twin for HKUST Prof. Jack CHENG, Associate Professor, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering Dr. Edward CHAN, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering Dr. Kevin CHEN, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering Dr. Weiwei CHEN, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering Facial Recognition for Library Services Prof. Oifeng CHEN, Assistant Professor, Department of Computer Science and Engineering Dr. Samuel KWAN, Director, Information Technology Services Center Mr. KT LAM, Associate Director, Library Services & Head (Systems and Digital Services), Library Mr. Edward SPODICK, Head (IT and Services Infrastructure), Library USThing Prof. Kar Yan TAM, Chair Professor, Department of Information Systems, Business Statistics and Operations Management/ Dean of Business and Management 80 Smart Water Network @HKUST Prof. Mohamed S GHIDAOUI, Chinese Estates Professor of Engineering/ Chair Professor, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering Prof. Moez LOUATI, Research Assistant Professor, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering Smart Mini-grid of 100% Renewable Energy Prof. Tianshou ZHAO, Professor of Engineering and EnvironmenV Chair Professor, Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering/ Director, H KUST Energy Institute Self-cleaning Multipurpose Nanocoatings Prof. Jinglei YANG, Associate Professor, Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Dr. Samuel Wenjun LUO, Postdoctoral and Project Leader, Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Aquaponics in HKUST Dr. Li LING, Research Assistant Professor, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering Ms. Miranda MAN, Manager (Co-curricular Programs)/ Program Manager (HKUST Connect), Dean of Students' Office Ms Jayde CHAN, Assistant Officer (Co-curricular Programs), Dean of Students' Office Ms Beryl LAM, Manager (Co-curricular Programs) and Program Manager (HKUST Connect), Dean of Students' Office Mr Jimmy LAM, Assistant Manager, Office of Knowledge Transfer Ms Helen WONG, Head (Co-curricular Programs) and Program Director (HKUST Connect), Dean of Students' Office StudentTeam (2017-2019): Mr Kai Kong LIU, Year 3 undergraduate, Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Mr Byeongkeun SONG, Master of Science, Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, 2019 Mr Kwan Ngai Benjamin WONG, Year 3 undergraduate, Civil Engineering Mr Xihan YAO, Year 3 undergraduate, Environmental Management and Technology Internet of Tree Things Prof. Yu-Hsing WANG, Associate Head/ Professor, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering/ Director, Data-Enabled Scalable Research Laboratory (DESR Lab) You Will See a Hoopoe Prof. Yu-Hsing WANG, Associate Head/ Professor, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering/ Director, Data-Enabled Scalable Research Laboratory (DESR Lab) Upgrading the Pond Water Treatment System Dr. Vincent WANG, Research Associate, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering Ir. Yiu Wing HA, Works Manager, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering Ir. Allan LEUNG, Engineer, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering Mr. Victor TANG, Technical Officer, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering Solar-cell Driven and Wifi-functioned Clocks Prof. Henry YAN, Professor, Department of Chemistry Smart Management for Dining Halls: Eating Pattern and Food Waste Analysis Prof. Hongyu YU, Associate Professor, Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Prof. Tim CHENG, Chair Professor, Department of Computer Science and Engineering/ Dean of Engineering Prof. Huamin OU, Professor, Department of Computer Science and Engineering Autonomous GreywaterTreatment Prof. Frank LAM, Lecturer, Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering Prof. Xijun HU, Professor, Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering Prof. DesmondTSOI, Assistant Professor of Engineering Education, Department of Computer Science and Engineering Acknowledgments 79

82 SmART Steps Prof. Kellee TSAI, Chair Professor, Division of Social Science/ Dean of Humanities and Social Science Prof. King CHOW, Professor, Division of Life Science, Chemical & Biological Engineering, Public Policy/ Director, Center for Development for the Gifted and Talented/ Acting Dean of Students Dr. Anna KWONG, Senior Lecturer, Division of Humanities/ Program Director (Center for the Arts), Center for Education Innovation Prof. Kevin Kim-Pong TAM, Associate Professor, Division of Social Science GGT Smart Campus Mr. Derry FONG, Director, Information Systems Office Mr. Alan HUI, Manager (Applications Systems), Information Systems Office Urban Spring Smart Meter Dispenser Ms. Janice WONG, HKUST Alumni Ms. Katherine LAM, Director of Business Analytics of Urban Spring Dr. Meike SAUERWEIN, Lecturer, Division of Environment and Sustainability Ms. Fanny HO, Senior Manager (Electrical Services), Campus Management Office Mr. Lau HUNG, Manager (Building Services), Campus Management Office THE HONG KONG UNIVERSITY OF SCIENCE W AND TECHNOLOGY Current Student Team (2019-2020): Mr Ching Him CHAN, Year 2 undergraduate, Environment Management and Technology Mr Ka Shing CHAN, Year 3 undergraduate, Environmental Management and Technology Ms Sze Chun Vanessa LEE, Year 2 undergraduate, Finance (FINA) and Professional Accounting (ACCT) Mr Kwan Ngai Benjamin WONG, Year 3 undergraduate, Civil Engineering Blockcerts Prof. Oifeng CHEN, Assistant Professor, Department of Computer Science and Engineering Mr. James Alan PRINCE, Academic Registrar, Academic Registry Dr. Samuel KWAN, Director, Information Technology Services Center Mr. Tony C.W. LAU, Senior Manager (Registry Systems), Academic Registry Mr. Junzhe XIA, Undergraduate student, Department of Computer Science and Engineering Smart Campus Air Network (SCAN) for Community Environmental Awareness Prof. Zhi NING, Associate Professor, Department of Environment and Sustainability Prof. Jimmy C. H. FUNG, Professor, Department of Mathematics/ Head of Division of Environment and Sustainability Prof. Alexis K. H. LAU, Professor, Division of Environment and Sustainability/ Professor of Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering Mr. Fimence Youru TAN, MPhil student, Environmental Science, Policy and Management/ Executive Project Manager, SCAN Project Ms. Zoey SUN, Ph.D. student, Atmospheric Environmental Science/ Key Project Member (Air Quality Research) Ms. Kiwi ZHANG, Research Assistant, Division of Environment and Sustainability/ Senior Project Manager, SCAN Project Acknowledgments 81