2019 CMU VentureWell Energy Hackathon
As part of CMU Energy Week 2019, the Scott Institute hosted the inaugural CMU VentureWell Energy Hackathon. The competition was an opportunity for collegiate students to tackle some of the toughest challenges facing Honda, Chevron, the Port Authority of Allegheny County, and Pittsburgh Parking Authority. Students worked in interdisciplinary teams to combine their energy expertise, data analytics, business intelligence and economic reasoning to solve a specific problem presented to them. Participants had the chance to win $2,000 and network with energy companies, expert judges and mentors. The 2019 winners were:
- First Place ($2000): Team Bottlerockets [Joshua Pope, Lilan Huang, and Kwaku Jymafi] (Chevron Challenge)
- Second Place ($1000): Team Zap Bloom [Mohamed Abdelrahman and Bowo Akinlabi-Oladimeji] (Honda Challenge)
- Third Place ($500): Team E-Saver [Siliang Lu, Sarthak Chakraborty, Shichen Yang, Qingyang Liu, and Lili Yu] (Port Authority of Allegheny County Challenge)
- People's Choice ($250): Team HackOverflow [Athanasios Terzakis, Daksha Bopanna, Yuan Lee, and Wei Yu] (NextEra Energy Resources Challenge)
The Hackathon kicked off on March 25 at 8:00am with breakfast and a presentation of challenges by companies. Participants had the opportunity to ask questions and meet company representatives during this time. Following the presentations, students had 24 hours to complete the challenge and prepare a presentation.