Waterloo students continued to promote our innovative image by winning the best overall design for innovation in sustainability at the WERC Competition at the New Mexico State University. Sasha Smith, Elise Bingeman, Jamy Kallikaden and Naomi Zimmerman attended the WERC competition, a consortium for environmental education and technology development under the faculty supervision of Dr. W. Anderson and Dr. D. Henneke. The team of 4B Chemical Engineering students were congratulated by the judge for producing a solid and marketable by-product as part of their design.
The team entered a design in the Carbon Sequestration category. Their design was based on dissolving carbon dioxide in seawater using the concepts of Henry’s Law. Depending on the pH of the water, carbon dioxide will dissolve into either carbonic acid, bicarbonate or carbonate ions. At the natural pH of seawater, 7.8 to 8.3, bicarbonate ions are dominant; however, if the pH is raised to 8.8-9.3 region, carbonate ions become the most common species. This allows carbon dioxide to be sequestered since the carbonate ions react almost instantaneously with calcium and magnesium ions present in the water to form solid precipitate. The precipitate can then be used for various applications including agricultural lime and reactant for flue gas desulphurisation. The team designed and optimized an electrochemical cell to ionize the water and produce predominantly OH- ions, raising the pH of the seawater.
The team really enjoyed participating in the competition thanks to their sponsors (BASF Canada, SSF, Chemical Engineering Department and the Dean’s Office) and recommends the competition to future Waterloo Students. More information about the competition can be found on www.werc.net.
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