by Jbs050610 i3 — May 10, 2010—The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has awarded more than $1 million in grants to 14 college teams across the country who participated in the 6th Annual National Sustainable Design Expo on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Winners of the EPA’s People, Prosperity and the Planet (P3) Awards developed sustainable projects and ideas that protect the environment, encourage economic growth, and use natural resources more efficiently.
The national P3 award competition encourages college students to create sustainable solutions to worldwide environmental problems through technological innovation. Each P3 award winner receives up to $75,000 to further develop a design, implement it in the field, or move it to the marketplace.
Winners of this year’s awards are Harvard University, Clemson University, Texas A&M University, Humboldt State University, Appalachian State University, Clarkson University (two teams), Cornell University, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Roger Williams University, Virginia Tech, North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University, and Drexel University.
The winning student teams tackled such challenges as designing a light pipe that redirects daylight that is supplemented by solar-powered, energy-efficient lamps; removing viruses, bacteria and parasites from drinking water; designing landscapes based on natural ecosystems; and building a software module for a Building Information Modeling software package that can incorporate non-toxic industrial waste products into the architectural design process.
