Following the UW Alternative Fuels Team’s success at the EcoCar2 challenge, UWAFT’s spinoff team, the UW Alternative Feces Fuels Team, is turning a crappy idea into a profitable product. For the past year, UWAFFT has been developing a new automotive fuel based on nitrogen-rich Canadian goose poop. The patented fuel, called “Loose Goose”, can be harvested and processed for only a fraction of the cost of traditional fuels. The product is about to hit the market and UWAFFT is expected to flush all competitors down the drain.
It is being hailed as an environmental wonder because of the simple extraction and distillation process. Loose Goose was invented by UWAFFT founder Merdedes LeMerde after constantly cleaning goose poop off the floor of the Student Design Teams Centre tracked in by students walking to campus. The odour hit her first with nausea and then with inspiration. “This material is so abundant in Waterloo that it’s a shame we aren’t innovating with it,” explains LeMerde. “Every day we see geese walking out in front of cars as if to say that they’ve had enough with fossil fuels. And then they just sit there and move their bowels, hissing and screaming that they have the solution!”
LeMerde immediately went to work collecting samples with a rake and within an hour, her team had harvested two metric tonnes of goose turd without even covering most of the campus. The distillation process depends on how liquified the batch is to begin with. Adapting processes from the olive oil industry, each batch is cold-pressed at 40 degrees Celsius to encourage energy-rich bacteria to flourish. Once the solids that can harm engines have been filtered out, the fuel is ready to go! The best part is that goose poop is so abundant in Waterloo that they don’t have to keep geese captive, which keeps it cruelty-free.
The only glitch to work out is how to eliminate the unpleasant odour emitted when a car burns Loose Goose. When the fuel gets tested, especially when geese have eaten near the Plaza, their engines cause the entire campus to smell like manure. Fortunately, UWAFFT has procured sponsorship from Febreze, masters of odour-masking technology. Loose Goose may soon be available in flavours like “Bum-ble Berry Blast” and “Chocolate Explosion”.
Rumour has it that UWAFFT was approached last week by RIM stockholders, who were in town to sniff out new investment opportunities that won’t give such shitty returns. Could the Blackberry 10 smartphone be replaced by the “BlackBerry Number Two” smartcar? Now that’s an idea you can take to.
Loose Goose alternative fuel is such a desirable new product because, according to historical data, the annual volume of goose poop in Waterloo increases at a rate faster than Moore’s Law. That’s even better than renewable. Instead of letting it hit the fan and getting buried in it, why not turn it into a type of green you can put in your wallet? What’s that smell? It’s success UWAFFT-ing our way!
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