The Maintaining Permafrost project was started by Sarah during her MASc. research in the field of mechanical engineering.
It is a volunteer project co-created with the help of her wonderful family, Wendy and Esther.
Sarah R Nicholson grew up in a remote community in the Amazon rainforest, with all the energy supplied by a diesel generator maintained by her father.
From these experiences she gained a deep love for nature, and an appreciation for how difficult it is to reliably (and cost effectively) supply energy from diesel combustion – especially when extreme weather events occur.
When she moved to Canada, she enrolled in the technical training of a mechanical engineer to learn ways to supply energy to remote communities in a more efficient and environmentally friendly way.
After struggling with her own housing issues, she became increasingly concerned about the access to sufficient heating for people living in the extreme cold climate. While her brother spent years living in Canada’s arctic, teaching northern farming for food security, and working on ice planes, she gained practical experience about the complexity of challenges faced in northern regions. This led her to complete her Master’s of Applied Science in mechanical engineering (after graduating with an undergraduate degree in mechanical engineering as well). She devoted her research to identifying a new solution for heating homes in northern and remote communities with less energy use and no combustion required.
Ultimately, Sarah’s goal is to empower communities and individuals with the scientific knowledge and research that she learned and developed, in order to establish their own energy independence and climate resilience.
Her love of nature, and concern for the comfort and safety of people living through extreme climates grew this work into an award winning research project. She published several articles and research works during her studies, as well as presenting her findings internationally.
Seeking hope from the discouraging projections of climate change, Sarah’s solutions focus on practical systems that can be designed with existing technology and industry knowledge. If it can’t be easily built, easily understood, and cheaply accessed, a solution will not be able to be widespread enough to have the required impact.
Professionally, Sarah continues this work through the company that she has co-founded, Umny Inc. There, she works with a team of experts to build artificially intelligent software and research that “models nature’s complexity,” predicting key environmental variables and energy system performance to help designers and innovators build sustainable technology that works in harmony with nature.
As well, science communication is an important mission of Sarah and Umny Inc, this Maintaining Permafrost site is created for the purpose of widely communicating the science of:
- permafrost melting,
- heat pumps,
- geothermal energy,
- northern/environmental challenges and solutions,
- heat exchange,
- and renewable energy.
Sarah loves to connect with researchers across the world, and to collaborate with people from all backgrounds.
If you are interested in this project, have some ideas or feedback – please feel free to reach out. Communication can come in French, Portuguese, or Russian, but stay patient as she is still learning these languages.