Montana Tech's Environmental Design Team Wins Award at Environmental Design Contest

The 2015 Montana Tech Environmental Design Team recently competed at the 25th IEE/WERC Annual Environmental Design Contest in Las Cruces, New Mexico. The team won the IEE Resources Center Pollution Prevention/Energy Efficiency Award for their project titled, “A sustainable approach to the treatment of NORM in produced waters associated with oil and gas production.” The team’s solution is to treat the water in a cost effective way using electrocoagulation to avoid the contamination of naturally occurring radioactive materials in the pipe systems while handling produced water. The team members consisted of Brenna Ferko, Melissa Kottke, Samantha Hutcheson and Kelly Doble. 

WERC’s Environmental Design Contest is a unique event that brings together industry, government and academia in the search for improved environmental solutions. The event challenges students to solve technical problems ranging from validation of water treatment technology to improving product stewardship. For the contest, students present and demonstrate their research and design solutions. The proposed solutions provide opportunities to address concerns about water, energy, and the environment. 

The team is advised by Environmental Engineering Department Head, Dr. Kumar Ganesan.