Engineering students win international recognition in ASHRAE 2025 student competition

Two of our undergraduate engineering students, Helena Paice (St Edmund Hall) and Yu Chen (Lady Margaret Hall), have been recognised with a prestigious Rising Star award in the 2025 ASHRAE Student Competition, which attracted entries from over 100 universities worldwide. Their innovative project, EcoLinc, a net-zero energy intervention designed for Lincoln College, formed part of their Third-Year Design Project (3YP) in the Department of Engineering Science, supervised by Prof Jesus Lizana, Prof David Wallom and Dr Scot Wheeler.

The ZERO Institute is helping to coordinate participation in this student competition as part of its new student engagement initiatives, aiming to foster innovation and experiential learning in the pursuit of net-zero solutions. The Building EQ category focuses on the energy performance of existing buildings and encourages students to propose realistic, impactful solutions to improve building energy efficiency. Helena and Yu’s project demonstrated not only deep technical understanding but also a clear vision for sustainable design and real-world impact.

Reflecting on the journey of this competition and winning the award, Helena said: “The Zero Carbon Energy Buildings third-year project set us up perfectly to enter the competition. It was great to gain experience with ASHRAE and to work with Lincoln College as our case study. I look forward to consulting on more historical buildings in an effort to make them carbon neutral in operation.”

Yu Chen said: ‘‘I feel incredibly honoured to receive this award. Working on this project has been such a rewarding experience; I’ve learned so much through our teamwork and been inspired every step of the way. I’m proud that our collective efforts can contribute, even in a small way, to a more sustainable future.’’

“We’re incredibly proud of Helena and Yu for their success in such a competitive international field,” said Dr Jesus Lizana, Associate Professor and Programme Leader for Zero-Carbon Space Heating and Cooling at Oxford’s ZERO Institute. “This is a testament to their hard work, creativity, and the relevance of their work to real-world decarbonisation challenges.”

Oxford is the sole UK institution to be recognised in this category for this year’s international competition. The results of the 2025 DESIGN COMPETITION were as follows: The first-place award went to the School of Social Work Building from the University of Washington in the United States. Second place was awarded to Aggie Go Green from Texas A&M University, also in the United States. The third-place honour was given to Equilibrium from CEPT University in India. Finally, the Rising Star award went to EcoLinc from the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom.

Stay tuned for more updates as Helena and Yu continue their journey in sustainable engineering.