Students Take Top Honors at Environmental Design Competition
By Laura Walikainen
A team of Michigan Tech students
took a first-place award and was honored for submitting the best paper
overall at the 12th Annual WERC International Environmental Design Contest,
held last month in Las Cruces, N.M. The students also took home $3,000
in prize money. The team competed against 24 universities from the United
States, India and Mexico.
In the contest, student teams
attempt to solve any of a number of environmental problems. The MTU team
competed in three different areas. Teams also had to construct a working,
small-scale model to test their solution to various tasks, submit a paper
on their solution and present their findings.
Michigan Tech students took
first place in the task "Remediation of Petroleum Contaminated Soil."
The best paper award was given to the MTU students who entered the "Treatment
of Explosives in Soil" task.
"The judges were really
impressed with our students," said Professor James Mihelcic (Civil
and Environmental Engineering), the team's advisor. "The students
also got the opportunity to compare their solutions to those of other
teams and judge themselves, in a way."
Students' designs were evaluated
on a variety of criteria including feasibility, ease of implementation,
cost and the adherence to all relevant local, state and federal regulations.
They also had to develop a health and safety plan and a strategy to involve
the local community and a nearby tribal nation in their solution.
"The
competition was a great learning experience," said team member Jim
Harris. "Getting an opportunity to compete against some of the world's
top universities--and hiking through White Sands National Monument and
the Gila National Forest--made all of the long hours spent working on
the project worthwhile."
