University of Louisville Researchers Convert
Campus Cooking Oil to Shuttle Fuel Blend
LOUISVILLE,
Ky. — Used cooking oil from campus restaurants at the
University of Louisville is helping to fuel a campus shuttle
bus in a research-based recycling pilot program.
Eric
Berson, assistant professor of chemical engineering, and
students at Speed School of Engineering are converting spent
oil from Sodexo Inc., UofL's campus food-service provider,
into biodiesel fuel that can be blended to power a UofL-owned
bus shuttling Belknap Campus students.
Initial tests have been successful in the effort to turn a
waste material into a useful product and to demonstrate
campus sustainability, Berson said. The project also is an
example of research at UofL's Conn Center for Renewable
Energy Research and Environmental Stewardship.
The
first shuttle runs have been on a blend of about 5 percent
biodiesel, although the mixture may be adjusted up to 10
percent to 20 percent later.
Oil
drained from food fryers is filtered and loaded into a
laboratory processing tank for three days of chemical
cleaning, processing and settling between steps. The process
involves stringent testing under ASTM (formerly American
Society for Testing and Materials) standards, and the effort
to cleanse the final product of impurities involves a
dry-wash system that eliminates waste water used in some
other processes. Recently purchased equipment allows the
group to run the experiments on a bigger scale – about 50
gallons at a time.
Preliminary work to run test batches on a small scale began
last year with chemical engineering undergraduate Kelly
Nicholson of Louisville, now a master's student. Sean Miller
of Eastview, a junior chemical engineering student, now
oversees the process as part of his engineering co-op – one
of three alternating semesters that Speed requires to
complete a master's degree. Amlan Chakraborty of India, a
chemical engineering doctoral student, also works on the
project.
Future research on the project will include converting waste
glycerin to methane for electricity generation and exploring
solid-based, reusable catalysts, Berson said.
Gov. Steve Beshear recently appointed Berson
to the state's new Executive Task Force on Biomass and
Biofuels Development. For more information, contact Berson
at 502-852-1567 or
eric.berson@louisville.edu
U
of L Speed School of Engineering students join Dr Eric
Berson at Cardinal Stadium on campus.
