The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) said on Friday that Deputy Administrator Stan Meiburg will open the 11th Annual National Sustainable Design Expo on Saturday in Alexandria, Virginia.
This exposition draws college student teams from around the country to showcase their work in sustainable design, with the chance to win the agency's People, Prosperity and the Planet Award. This year's competition boasts 40 teams.
This is the second phase of competition, and the winning team will receive a $75,000 grant to further develop its design for real-life applications. Projects that are eligible for this competition can serve a wide array of environmental topics and issues in the fields of energy, water use, materials and chemicals, agriculture and green infrastructure.
All teams competing at the expo already have received $15,000 grants to finalize their entries for submission.
Previous winners of this competition include a team from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, based in Florida and Arizona, with its air conditioning system that runs on solar energy; a joint project from Cornell and Johns Hopkins Universities that produce a water-quality monitor; a team from Iowa State University, with a fabric made from yeast and bacteria fibers that could be used for environmentally friendly clothing; and a University of Wisconsin–Madison team, with its campus recycling program for Styrofoam products that led to nearly 2,000 units being removed from landfills over a six-month period.
The event begins at 10 a.m. EDT at Oronoco Bay Park in Alexandria.
Alerts Sign-up