Engineering students excel in Ohio State sustainability challenge
Twelve Buckeye engineering students were part of four teams that received project funding through the Smart Campus Challenge, a venture capitalist-style student sustainability competition presented by Ohio State Energy Partners ENGIE and Axium Infrastructure.
The six student teams who advanced to the finals were awarded a total of $144,000 in February to implement their dream projects that support Ohio State’s sustainability goals.
First-place winner Wasted Opportunities—a proposed startup that collects otherwise wasted food from campus locations and donates it to local organizations—was awarded the full $54,000 they requested to implement their project. Each team member also received $250 in cash and a trip to Paris for ENGIE’s innovation week.
The team is made up of two fourth-year mechanical engineering students, team captain Michael Scherping and Timothy Kirby, plus mechanical engineering graduate student Danny Freudiger and third-year environment, economy, development and sustainability major Mike Fackler.
Students from the Food Recovery Network and Smart Campus organizations came together to form the Wasted Opportunities team and apply for the challenge.
Food Recovery Network students had been collecting wasted food from different campus cafes and then manually logging all of it outside. Because they are trying to track purchasing trends, the Food Recovery Network attempts to record every item donated. Since volunteers can’t touch or handle the bags, sometimes they have to guess how many food items are in a bag, explained Scherping.
“Once the food gets transferred from all the cafes, we stand outside the Ohio Union and manually log it,” he said. “What we’re actually recording is helpful, but it’s not super accurate.”
Ohio’s cold winter mornings motivated the food collectors to find a better method of logging the donations, so Smart Campus students offered to create an app to make the process easier.
The app will allow cafes to log the food as they’re bagging it, providing more accurate food waste data to optimize purchasing patterns. The funding they received will also support daily food pickups.
In addition to the top three finishing teams, three other finalist teams also received funding.
The Solar Bus Stop team received $20,000 to install solar panels with an interactive touch screen at one of the bus stops on campus. The touch screen allows students to learn quick facts about renewable energy on campus and around the world. The team includes five engineering students: mechanical engineering majors Matthew Bisbee, Madison Cupp and Andrew Kosir (project manager) and electrical and computer engineering majors Molly Loughridge and Nader Shaheen.
Charles Moritz and Patrick Henson, both chemical engineering students, were a part of the Surfactant Addition team that was awarded $10,000 to test if the addition of an oil to Ohio State’s East Regional Chilled Water Plant increases energy efficiency of the plant’s chilled water loops.
We CAN Change the World also received $10,000 to implement a weeklong campus event called Clash of the Cans where students will compete to collect and submit the most recycled products. The event will enable students to see their physical impact on the environment and gain a better understanding of Ohio State’s recycling policies. The team includes mechanical engineering major Evan Luikart and environmental engineering major Kathryn Mays.
“Congratulations to all of the finalists for entering the competition and putting their best ideas forward,” said Ohio State Energy Partners CEO Serdar Tufekci, a mechanical engineering alum. “Even for teams that didn’t make it to the final event, our goal was to create a good learning opportunity for them on what it takes to turn ideas into real-world projects. We look forward to working with the winning teams to make Ohio State more sustainable and hope that the experience teaches valuable business and project management skills to the students involved.”
Ohio State Energy Partners is a joint venture of ENGIE and Axium Infrastructure, which operates, maintains and optimizes Ohio State’s utility system at Columbus campus.
by Alex Andrews, College of Engineering student communications assistant
