From left to right,  Dara Hourdajian, Kevin Lehman, David Ganske, Secretary of Energy Steven Chu, and Jorge Ordonez. Photograph courtesy of Department of Energy website, Energy.gov

A team of five students from SIPA’s Energy Association won “Best Proposal” for one of four cases at the Department of Energy’s inaugural Better Buildings Case Competition, held in the White House on Friday, March 2^nd, 2012.

Energy Secretary Steven Chu announced the winners after an all-day event, where 110 students from 19 competing universities presented their proposals to judges in the Learning Annex of the White House.

The Better Buildings Case Competition, part of the Energy Department’s Better Buildings Challenge, reached out to the SIPA Energy Association (SEA) last semester, encouraging them to compete. This January, students from 19 schools received two different cases (Columbia University received the HEI Hotels and Resorts case and the City of Houston case). They had to submit a proposal for each case three weeks later and present at the White House a week after that. Both teams representing Columbia University were SEA student teams. 

The winning proposal was for the HEI Hotels and Resorts Case. Dara Hourdajian (MPA ‘12), Kevin Lehman (MS ‘12 in Sustainability Management), David Ganske (MIA ‘13), Jorge Ordonez (MPA ‘13), and Tristan Wallace (MPA ‘13) submitted the proposal for a hotel energy efficiency plan, within certain restraints.

“When we first read through the case, the main challenge for us was to identify what was the objective. I think that set us apart from other groups,” said Hourdajian.

The objective, they found, was for a New Jersey hotel within the Marriott chain to make changes that would increase energy efficiency, with limited resources. 

“Right away, we identified that this was a financial solution rather than a technical solution. So we started researching alternatives we could come up with,” explained Ordonez.

Their technique was to investigate what the State of New Jersey had to offer. They proposed depending on tax credits and incentives from the State of New Jersey rather than on financial assistance from the franchise, which was an objective that they had identified in the case.

“We saw that many universities tended to approach one side of the problem, instead of a comprehensive approach,” added Ordonez. “I think this was a strength of our case: being able to address the financial and policy side, making it attractive to industry professionals [who were the judges].”

The winning proposals will be posted on the Department of Energy’s website so people can have access to them and consider their recommendations.

“Hopefully we’ll be able to go back next year and defend the title,” Ordonez added. 

- Michelle Chahine

A team of four SIPA students have made it to the Final 10 in the competitive International Impact Investing Challenge, organized by Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management, partnered with the University of California, Berkeley Haas School of Business. Evgenia Sokolova (MDP ‘12), Vladimir Olarte Cadavid (MPA ‘12), Sandra Halilovic (MPA ‘12), and Helene Roy (MIA ‘13) will pitch their proposal—for a financial vehicle that would attract new sources of funding to areas that have high social benefits—to a panel of judges in the San Francisco Federal Reserve building on April 13^th, 2012.

According to SIPA Adjunct Professor Adam Quinton, the students proposed a unique independent study project, with the aim of entering this competition and creating the prospectus for the first round.

Quinton was the team’s advisor for the first half of the semester as they did independent research into potential financial vehicles. They submitted their prospectus in mid-March and were selected for the final round, competing against teams of graduate students from the University of Chicago, Stanford University, University of California, Berkley, Duke University and Northwestern University, among others.

“The submission had to be something that could be appealing to large investors and attract funding to for-profit enterprises that have a social benefit,” Quinton said. “If you’ve got to the finals in a competition like this, you’ve clearly done a pretty good job.”

Based on the presentations on April 13^th in the morning, the field will be narrowed to the final four teams, who will then compete for first place later in the day. $15,000 in prizes will be awarded to the winning teams.

Good luck to everyone! 

- Michelle Chahine

(Click here to read more about this competition on The Wall Street Journal’s MarketWatch.com.)