Student Semifinalists Seek To Eliminate One-Third of Worldwide Mercury Pollution

The core of OroClean is a small-scale, hand-powered centrifuge that builds on proven technology for separating gold from silt.

A team of students from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and the Denmark Technical University (DTU) has advanced to the semifinals of the Dell Social Innovation Competition. More than 500 students from 30 countries participated in the contest, with solutions to address poverty, healthcare, access to potable water, and a host of important social issues. More than 700 ideas were submitted by students from over 200 countries around the world.

Established in 2006, the RGK Center for Philanthropy and Community Service in the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas introduced the competition as a way to engage students in social entrepreneurship, encouraging the next generation of leaders to dream up solutions to today’s most pressing issues.

“The competition is designed to spark the enthusiasm and idealism that exists across college and university campuses,” said Peter Frumkin, director of the RGK Center in the LBJ School of Public Affairs. “By channeling young people’s impulses to change the world in a positive direction, we think this project can generate a large number of innovative solutions to longstanding public problems.”

The Rensselaer-DTU team, known as OroClean, is proposing to eliminate up to 30 percent of the world’s mercury pollution by creating an innovative and effective mining method for artisanal miners. The team comprises students from a range of disciplines that include civil and mechanical engineering and management. Members include Rensselaer undergraduates Sydney Crump, Carl Liebfried, and Kyle Weichold. DTU graduate students Trine Duelund, Jakob Filippson Parslov, JeanneLønstrup, and Lærke Holstebroe make up the rest of the team.

While the biggest man-made source of mercury pollution is power-plant emissions, the number two source is from gold mining in the developing world, which emits 1,000 tons of mercury into the air every year, according to the United Nations Environmental Programme. This mining is done in some 55 countries, mostly developing nations.

“In our research, we found that one-third percent of all mercury pollution that circles the globe today comes from artisanal, small-scale gold mining in the rural areas of such places as South America, Africa, and Asia,” said Liebfried, a Rensselaer junior majoring in mechanical engineering.“More than 15 million gold miners use mercury to extract gold from river silt, and then evaporate the mercury into the air over an open flame. We know that mercury is a deadly and insidious toxin, capable of destroying nervous tissue and crippling children, so we are working to develop a solution to solve the problem.” 

“Of all the environmental problems we face today, one of the most important is mercury pollution; it travels the atmosphere, gets into the food chain, and is the most toxic non-radioactive material that exists,” said Crump, a Rensselaer senior majoring in management.

The partnership between the students resulted from work that they did together at Rensselaer as part of the Inventor’s Studio course develop Burt Swersey, a lecturer in the Department of Mechanical, Aerospace, and Nuclear Engineering and a member of Rensselaer’s Product Design and Innovation (PDI) faculty. Each semester, students in the course work on defining important social and environmental problems that most people don’t even know exist, as well as inventing and patenting solutions. The course helps prepare students to design products and develop technologies for the 21st century that will make the world a better place.

In 2006, the project had some early-stage funding support from the National Collegiate Inventors and Innovators Alliance (NCIIA). Last fall, as part of the Rensselaer Education Across Cultural Horizons, or the REACH program, students from DTU who were spending the semester at Rensselaer joined the project and made significant improvements, and have been working this spring with the Rensselaer students. The REACH program offers students the opportunity to participate in structured study abroad programs, as well as other international experiences such as internships, exchange programs, or other overseas opportunities. 

“OroClean may be a viable solution,” said Duelund, a DTU graduate student majoring in civil engineering and design and innovation. “The core of our solution is a small-scale, hand-powered centrifuge that builds on proven technology for separating gold from silt. We hope to take advantage of the opportunity to create a product which not only can increase the income of rural miners, but also address the worldwide plague that is mercury pollution.”

“Win, win, win. I truly believe that this passionate team of students will produce a win for the miners by increasing their incomes from higher daily production of higher quality gold, without the expense of purchasing mercury,” said Swersey. “It will eliminate the health problems of the miners and their families caused by mercury and will eliminate 1,000 tons of mercury that is produced each year. More than one-third of worldwide mercury in the atmosphere threatens everyone and ends up in the food we eat and the air we all breathe. The students are developing a device that is at a very low cost, and it’s a wonderful acknowledgement of their efforts that they have been recognized as semifinalists in the competition.”   

With Dell as its sponsor, the Social Innovation Competition expanded its reach to a worldwide audience of students in 2009.

“Supporting the global community and inspiring students around the world is at the heart of our Dell Giving program. The Dell Social Innovation contest is an example of how we can help change the world with ideas from diverse cultures and regions while utilizing the speed and seamlessness of the social media world,” said Gil Casellas, vice president of corporate responsibility at Dell.

Submissions are judged on overall concept, demonstration of the opportunity, assessed social impact, financial viability and sustainability, demonstrated leadership ability, management team, performance benchmarks, assessed risk, and contingency plans.

Following the semifinal round, three teams will be invited to Austin, Texas, to present their proposals to a panel of judges for the chance to win the grand prize. Students winning the grand prize in the Dell competition will receive $50,000 to turn their ideas into a new business or nonprofit with a mission to change lives for the better.

Along with students, citizens worldwide are invited to comment on, vote for, and discuss the ideas in the online community forum. The public’s preferences help to select the grand prize winner. Voting ends on April 14.

Last year, three teams walked out of the final round of competition with prize money and new Dell computers to immediately launch their global projects. The grand prize winner, Gardens for Health, is dedicated to enabling people living with HIV/AIDS to improve their nutrition, health, and treatment adherence through sustainable agriculture. The Gardens for Health team, with graduates of Yale and Brown universities, is currently working in Rwanda in partnership with cooperatives of people living with HIV/AIDS.

For more information and to vote for the OroClean team, visit: http://www.dellsocialinnovationcompetition.com/.

Contact: Jessica Otitigbe
Phone: (518) 276-6050
E-mail: otitij@rpi.edu