CURRENTS

Dan Fink ’09, Dave Borrelli ’09, and Eric Weissmann ’10 (from left) are leading a project at the University to convert waste vegetable oil from University dining centers into biodiesel to fuel a campus bus. The team is currently building the biodiesel processor and is planning to make the inaugural bus run in conjunction with Earth Day, April 22. See photos and get the latest updates on the project at their blog www.urbiodiesel.com.

Those oily French fries might be bad for your waistline, but an ingenious team of undergraduates is putting the food’s fatty byproduct to good use. UR Biodiesel is collecting excess fryer oil from Dining Services and converting it into biodiesel to fuel a campus bus.

Chris Babcock ’07, David Borrelli ’09, Dan Fink ’09, and Eric Weissmann ’10 entered the idea in the Charles and Janet Forbes Entrepreneurial Competition in fall 2006. Their business plan proposed a way to save the University money by converting waste oil from River Campus dining centers, which were paying to have the waste removed, into biodiesel to power buses. Earning a second-place win, and garnering encouragement from the judges, the team decided to put their plan into action.

From the start, the team members—down to three after Babcock graduated in 2007—knew that a unique aspect of UR Biodiesel was its interdisciplinary nature. Fink and Borrelli are both chemical engineering majors, and Weissmann is majoring in political science.

“This is multiple disciplines working on a multidisciplinary problem,” explains Ben Ebenhack, senior lecturer in the Department of Chemical Engineering and UR Biodiesel’s faculty advisor. “To have a venue that thrusts them together to work on the technical and social aspects is very valuable; they’re working together and sharing ideas.” Though UR Biodiesel is a student-run project, its success depends on support from administrative units, including Dining Services, River Campus Facilities, and Parking and Transportation Services.

In fact, two crucial project supporters, Jeff Foster, director of River Campus Facilities and University Properties, and Eris Oleksyn, trades supervisor and area manager for Facilities, took a road trip with the biodiesel team to tour a working facility located at Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.

“We were able to study the logistics of building a biodiesel lab, what it could look like, what it could smell like,” says Oleksyn, who has coordinated much of the planning for the processor. “We walked away with ideas on how to create a cleaner, safer facility.”

The Rochester team set their sights on designing a lab that was both safe and sustainable, and University Facilities has supported them all along the way. Water pipes were laid under the floor for radiant heat, and the group showed its resourceful side by identifying a range of items across campus that could be reused and repurposed. A shelf was built with parts from three separate buildings, and the processor was constructed from a discarded water heater. A copper coil from a refrigerator rests against a wall, waiting to find its purpose.

The team has even elicited a few volunteers from Facilities, who now keep their eyes open for anything that can be repurposed for the project—even unused items from their own homes. Some employees have even brought in fryer oil left over from dinner.

The UR Biodiesel facility, located on Wilson Boulevard, has transformed in recent months into a fully functioning lab. Waste vegetable oil is transported from dining locations to holding tanks. From there the oil is prefiltered, then pumped into a water heater that warms it while mixing in methanol and potassium hydroxide. Next, the liquid travels to three more tanks for additional cleaning and drying. Once the mixture is dry—voila!—the biodiesel is ready. It takes about three days to process a batch.

Initially, the shuttle bus will run on a blend of 80 percent diesel, 20 percent biodiesel.

Just as the team collaborated with Facilities to design and build the lab, they also had to manage logistics to obtain the waste vegetable oil from the dining locations. Cam Schauf, director of Campus Dining Services and Auxiliary Operations, lended Dining’s support. With Dining’s emphasis on sustainability in recent years, Schauf says UR Biodiesel complements their mission and reinforces the idea that students and administrative units can forge collaborative efforts.

“It’s not often Dining Services gets to contribute to academic endeavors—although we believe we can—and when we get the opportunity, we want to take advantage of it,” adds Schauf.

“The students see we care and that we want to be involved,” says Mary Locke, director of operations for Dining Services, who has worked closely on UR Biodiesel. “We live in this community and we have a lot invested in what’s going on here.”

While the UR Biodiesel project focuses heavily on the green rewards, there’s a significant academic component to the effort. Former Dean of the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences Kevin Parker was instrumental in pushing the project forward, and the current dean, Robert Clark, along with faculty advisor Ebenhack, have been equally and supportive.

In addition to allowing Borrelli and Fink to run experiments in his lab to test the science behind the biodiesel processor, Ebenhack has also encouraged students in his Energy Alternative Design Lab to take on UR Biodiesel as a class project. Four students did, two working directly in the facility. The students are required to define research objectives, meet to discuss progress, and create a final report of their findings.

“Students respond enthusiastically to opportunities to apply their engineering education to real problems and issues,” says Ebenhack.

When it comes to the long-term viability of the project, Ebenhack, Schauf, and Oleksyn all have a strong commitment to UR Biodiesel, but agree it’s the students who will keep it going. With Borrelli and Fink both graduating in May, student groups like Engineers for a Sustainable World are recruiting underclassmen to commit to the project.

“A lot rests with the students staying involved and discovering what else can be done to improve the lab and make it grow,” says Oleksyn.

For Borrelli, Fink, and Weissmann, awareness is one way to build student support and support from the broader campus community. “This initiative is good in terms of the green movement,” says Weissmann. “The bus itself will serve as a billboard for the University’s commitment to sustainability.”

The bus, donated by University Parking and Transportation Services with the assistance of the department’s director Glen Sicard, is being painted with a new design, chosen from a competition sponsored by the Art and Art History Undergraduate Council.

The bus celebrates its maiden voyage appropriately enough on Earth Day, Wednesday April 22, at 1:30 p.m. The event, which is open to the public, will feature President Seligman and other University personnel involved in the project. The bus will depart from the Hopeman Engineering Building (a stop on the Silver Line), shuttling faculty, staff, and students to the biodiesel lab beginning at 2 p.m. The University community also is invited to the Munnerlyn Atrium of the Robert B. Goergen Hall for Biomedical Engineering and Optics to view presentations on biodiesel. They’ll also be giving away free coupons to The Pit—a little insurance, perhaps, to keep folks coming back for those fries.

Want to help?

Interested in advertising on the UR Biodiesel Bus or making a contribution to support the project? Contact eric.weissmann@rochester.edu.

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