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THE PNG University of Technology’s (Unitech)
innovative invention to separate oil and lubricants from wastewater has
won a place among 30 of the top engineering projects out of 801 that
were submitted on July 18 from around the world.
The university’s next aim is to make it into the top 10 to win the
Mondialogo Engineering Award given by DaimlerChrysler and Unesco.
“Currently we are among the winners; hopefully we will get into the top
10,” the head of Unitech’s Civil Engineering Department Dr Jay Rajapakse
said.
“The project explores the possibility of separating oils and lubricants
from wastewater in garages and workshops before discharging into sewers
or other water courses,” Dr Rajapakse said.
“If it is not disposed of properly, waste motor oil can interfere with
the operation of sewer systems and can easily get into our groundwater
and streams. In fact, it takes only one gallon of waste oil to
contaminate a million gallons of drinking water,” he said.
A new device called coconut fibre-charcoal filter separator (Coco-Coal-COfilSEP),
had been constructed and tested in the civil engineering department at
Unitech by Dr Rajapakse.
After some initial experiments, an innovation patent was granted for
Unitech by IP Australia for the device.
The Mondialogo proposal was a collaboration of two institutions, that
is, Unitech and the Michigan Technological University (MTU) in the
United States. The partnership was initiated in 2005 in Berlin at the
Mondialogo Symposium where team members from both institutions met.
The duo plan to stay in contact for the next two years and continue to
work together on the project including commercialising the device.
Meanwhile, MTU’s interest in the international development in working
with developing countries around the world through its Masters
International Programme (IMP) make it easier to work together.
MTU’s Sustainable Future Institutes that runs IMP for engineering
students to incorporate the ‘triple-bottom’ line of society, environment
and economics into projects.
This would be the 4th international award in three years for Unitech’s
civil engineering department.
The first award was from Mondialogo in 2005, second from the World Bank
DM Award for innovations in water, sanitation and energy last year, and
the third from the Mondialogo again this year.
 
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