The Sustainable Future

This video invites viewers to imagine a more sustainable future and shows us how we can apply the 12 principles of green chemistry to live in a more environmentally friendly fashion.

A Proposal to Processing & Using Biodiesel

One of today’s biggest environmental concerns is the emission of greenhouse gases and other harmful substances from the burning of fossil fuels. There is much need today for alternative energy sources, one of which is biodiesel. UC Berkeley dining services consumes an incredible amount of oil that UC Berkeley could both process and use as its own created biodiesel. Along with being a more environmentally safe and less toxic energy source than traditional fossil fuels, biodiesel could be economically viable and practical for the university. The applications of the made bio-fuels include anything from heating the dormitories to powering buses and other campus vehicles. In the long term, UC Berkeley could offset its monetary costs by promoting a more resourceful, direct, and community-based way of operating its systems.

A Novel Recycling of Used Cooking Oil

This project proposes that UC Berkeley generate its own biodiesel using the 500 gallons of used cooking oil generated weekly by Crossroads Dining Commons, Foothill Dining Commons, and the Golden Bear Café, for consumption in the campus’s Bear Transit buses. The team has been able to project production of 500 gallons weekly if two reactors are used. Fuel can be produced for $1.44 per gallon and could be sold to Bear Transit for $2.00 per gallon, potentially making the operation financially sustainable.

Waste Into Fuel

“Waste Into Fuel” is a plan that will allow the Berkeley campus to harness the energy potential of the waste cooking oil that it currently disposes to replace various diesel-using appliances and utilities on campus — resulting in an overall savings of $30,000 annually after the first year of use. “Waste into Fuel” proposes that the campus convert waste cooking oil into bio-diesel by investing in 55-gallon steel drums and a Freedom Fueler Deluxe w/ Drywash, a machine which will conveniently carry out the process to create the biodiesel. The project will also use a MR-50 Methanol Recovery System to separate the byproduct of the energy extraction process into methanol. This will lower costs of the needed methanol and potentially result in a monetary gain, as the glycerin could then be used to make soap on campus or even sold to companies that process it. The goal is to not only create a system that can produce and use biodiesel, but also to execute the idea in a way that is most optimally cost-effective and environmentally friendly for the Berkeley campus.

Developing a Portable Method to Predict Dengue Virus Infection

Dengue virus causes the most common mosquito-borne viral disease affecting humans, with 3 billion people at risk for infection and an estimated 50 million cases each year. The goal of this project is to prevent severe illness and death from dengue through the use of a portable method in the field to identify the most at-risk patients. The first part of the project will develop risk scores to predict which patients presenting with fever in dengue-endemic areas are infected with dengue virus and of those infected, who will progress to develop severe dengue. In order for the risk scores to be used effectively in the field, the project team will also develop a mobile application for the iPhone that will enable any health professional to instantly calculate a patient’s risk score. The iPhone risk score application will enable physicians to distinguish dengue cases from cases of other illnesses that cause fever, as well as mild dengue cases from severe dengue cases, so they can provide patients with the appropriate medical care sooner. Additionally, it will help physicians prioritize the treatment of dengue cases in lowresource settings, where medical care and supplies are limited.

Zaakta

Energy efficiency represents a vast, low-cost energy resource—but it can only be unlocked with an innovative and comprehensive market based approach. There is growing demand for an alternate financing mechanism for the implementation of energy conservation measures to reduce energy consumption and thereby lower greenhouse gas emissions. Zaakta is a webbased marketplace that brings together customers, technology experts, contractors, and financiers to implement energy efficiency projects. This platform will target under-served markets that either lack the direct funds to invest in these projects or the scale and scope required to attract interest from current energy service companies or utilities for financing.

Monte Verde Solar

On Calle de Monte Verde in Nicaragua, poor farmers with no daily earning, depend directly on agriculture for their livelihoods and survival. Water is raised from wells by hand-cranked levers which lift small buckets from the depths to the surface where they are detached from the well rope and dumped into a larger bucket located on carts drawn by oxen. This project will seek to improve the efficiency of this highly labor-intensive process by testing solar or treadle pump technologies in this setting. If successful, this project will enable farmers to more efficiently manage their crops and their time. It would thus allow farmers to diversify crops and increase yields sufficiently to allow them to enter the market and generate income.

INSTAR (INertial STorage And Recovery)

Today’s hybrid and plug-in electric automobiles are able to recover some of the energy normally lost to friction during braking. Even in today’s cutting-edge vehicles, however, a large amount of kinetic energy is still lost to braking during the typical stop-and-go urban commute. INSTAR is a system designed to greatly improve on existing technologies in order to recover the maximum amount of kinetic energy normally lost during braking. The energy recovered will be converted into usable electric energy. This recovered energy can then be used to power the vehicle, thereby increasing the travel-range and battery life of plug-in and hybrid vehicles. By increasing the efficiency and functionality of hybrid and electric vehicles in this way, the INSTAR system could make these vehicles significantly more attractive to consumers and increase adoption rates.

DC Microgrids for Developing Regions

Like rural areas in many developing countries, India’s rural regions lack reliable electricity. Energy needs are often met by kerosene or highly inefficient power generators. This project will address this problem by developing micro-grids that will bring reliable, efficient and inexpensive electricity to regions of rural India. The project combines local, small-scale energy production facilities with innovative means of billing, storing and distributing energy to create a new “microgrid” system optimal for rural areas. The new microgrids will provide reliable, energy-efficient and inexpensive electricity to areas that were previously dependent on highly inefficient and expensive forms of energy.