Loyola's own biodiesel

Ashley Slovinski

Issue date: 11/14/07 Section: Closer Look

In a small lab on the ninth floor of Damen Hall, cardboard lines the floor and grease coats every surface. Students use wood and recycled pieces of scrap to build large apparatuses that hold a reactor comprised of two large white tanks connected to a smaller one and a fourth blue tank. The reactor has its own plumbing as pipes and hoses feed through each of the tanks. This isn't your typical lab, but then again, this isn't your typical class.

The class is known as STEP (Solutions To Environmental Problems) Biodiesel, and it takes a very unique approach to teaching students about the importance of environmental sustainability.

"Whenever I tell people about the program, everyone brightens just a little bit because Loyola is doing something hands-on to get involved," senior Zachary Waickman said. "People get excited and encourage us."Twenty-one students from many departments work side -by-side and take turns in groups of five or six to create two batches of fuel throughout the semester. The class also includes a lecture series featuring 13 faculty and staff members from many different departments. This interdisciplinary approach is used to give students various perspectives on working with an alternative fuel source from every angle involved in the process. They learn about everything from the actual chemistry and physical production of biodiesel to legislation involving alternative fuel sources. They also learn what is needed to make the project not only environmentally efficient but also economically feasible.

"My favorite aspect of the class is the hands-on aspect of working directly with higher ups within the university to get the program off the ground," Waickman said. "We also get to be in the lab and get down and dirty with the biodiesel; we're building and doing everything ourselves. There's an amount of satisfaction because of everything the 21 of us are accomplishing together and on our own with the 'gentle guidance' from our mentors [the lecturers]. We don't have actual professors but mentors providing information to make us experts to better accomplish our own goals within the class."

Biodiesel is a fuel made from used vegetable oil that is normally thrown out by the campus dining halls. The class is producing biodiesel to use in campus vehicles. So far they have tested the fuel in the lab director Shane Lishawa's diesel Mercedes and are using it in different lightweight vehicles throughout campus. They hope to eventually use it in the shuttles since biodiesel can be added to regular fuel without any necessary changes to the engine. This is pending approval, however.

On Nov. 1 the class held a "mini-parade," as Lishawa described it, testing the fuel publicly in the parking lot behind Mundelein. Students from two classes as well as members of the public gathered to watch as the biodiesel was pumped into communication chair Elizabeth Coffman's car. Coffman took a victory lap around the parking lot as the students cheered.

The miles to gallons a vehicle can obtain while running on biodiesel varies between engines, but there is a slight decrease in mileage (usually about 5 percent). Using 100 percent biodiesel, however, significantly reduces emissions. Particulate pollutants are reduced by 55 percent; biodiesel made from non-recycled vegetable oil reduces carbon dioxide by 78 percent. Using waste products only further reduces emissions such as carbon dioxide.

"Biodiesel is really easy to make," Waickman said. "It is a very simple reaction […] Loyola usually pays to haul the vegetable oil away, but taking it to make fuel for the university will make it more sustainable. Not only will it be cutting costs for dining services, but it will also cut fuel costs and emissions."

"Our goal is to be sustainable, not necessarily to make as much biodiesel as possible," classroom coordinator Alison Varty said. "If we're recycling all waste at Loyola then we're closing the loop."

STEP is a subset of Center for Urban Environmental Research and Policy, created by Nancy Tuchman, the associate provost for research at Loyola, as an interdisciplinary approach to looking at environmental problems and finding solutions on campus. According to Gina Lettiere, the coordinator of CUERP, the World Wildlife Federation had recently released a national report card on the "environmental literacy" of undergraduate students attending universities throughout the country, concluding that most students were environmentally illiterate. To members of CUERP such as Tuchman and Lettiere, this was a problem.

"Students are leaving with a degree and are not even aware of common environmental problems in the 21st century," Lettiere said.

The STEP Biodiesel class was created in response. According to Lettiere, STEP chose to work with Biodiesel because it is a "hot topic," and other universities are doing similar research, although in a very different manner. Many universities may not offer such courses within the curriculum or may not necessarily have the full support of their administrations.

"The primary focus here is education," Lettiere said. "As an educational institution we have a responsibility for students to get this interdisciplinary experience and critical thinking."

The STEP curriculum also aims to help the university in its effort to reduce its "carbon footprint" and to look at its energy consumption and waste to come up with a strategic plan for reduction. The class' objective during the first part of the semester was to create the biodiesel and now it is testing the product in various ways to determine if biodiesel really is an efficient alternative on campus. The class is divided into five groups based on the different departments involved, each with separate goals specific to that field. The five groups are communication, business, public policy, comparative emissions analysis and working with algae.

The communication group focuses on generating PR for the project on and off campus. The comparative emissions analysis group is working to figure out how to measure emissions from vehicles using the produced biodiesel. They attach a contraption at the end of the vehicle's tailpipe to collect gases in order to analyze the different pollutants in the fuel. They measure the particular matter found (the soot and grime that comes out of automobiles) with a filter to compare it to the matter contained in regular petroleum diesel emissions.

The public policy group focuses on governmental relations between Loyola and the various levels of government (from local to state and federal). Their primary project is to create a guide to help other universities and small labs by explaining their role in the tax structure and how to expect to be regulated accordingly.

"Any success here we would love to spread," senior Blake Anderson, a group member, said. "Our larger goal is to get people on a large scale, widespread basis to start thinking about alternative fuel sources."

The group will also be working with policy analysis to judge how beneficial the current legal mindset will be to environmental progress and what hurdles, if any, they will have to overcome.

"We want to evaluate how effective the small fuel production market is," Anderson said. "Our intention is to draft a bill proposal trying to make the Chicago and Illinois legal environment more conducive and friendly to alternative fuel sources. We may find that biodiesel is not the answer and would much rather see Illinois give more funding to academic projects like this or call to use more renewable resources in general."

The business group is working to pool together a comprehensive business plan to look at the production as a small business and how to sustain it. The algae group is working on growing and cultivating algae to extract specific oils they can use to make biofuel.

The class is also partnering with Highland Park High School. Some of the students within the class are creating a lesson plan that will condense the course to fit into a high school level curriculum. Their goal is to help Highland Park create their own production facility to conduct similar research.

The course will be offered again next semester but the direction it takes, as before, will be entirely up to the students. Some projects may be continued while new ones are a possibility. An advanced biodiesel class will also be offered to students wishing to continue with the course. The biodiesel class, however, will not be a permanent part of the university curriculum. Biodiesel is the main focus now, but every couple of years there will be something new to allow STEP to evolve with the interests and the needs of the university.

"The use of fossil fuels is a complex issue with a lot of information," Lishawa said. "The best thing about this class is making students think about their choices and the use of fossil fuels. Even though this isn't a silver bullet for our woes, getting conversation started is a very important part of the course."

The biodiesel class will be holding a public forum on Dec. 6 at 2:30 p.m. in the Crown Center auditorium. The students will be presenting their projects to showcase the progress they've made throughout the semester. One of the groups will also be showing a documentary they filmed during the duration of the class. Anyone interested in applying for the class next semester is encouraged to e-mail Alison Varty at avarty@luc.edu.

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