InSites is a quarterly newsletter that highlights the personalities and projects of the Waste Management Research and Education Institute (WMREI) of The University of Tennessee. WMREI is an affiliate of the EERC.
WMREI was created in 1985 as a state-funded Center of Excellence. Research areas include solid-, hazardous-, and nuclear-waste management; waste minimization; and pollution prevention.
Biotechnology is the focal point of the institute's technical research, while issues involving public attitudes and federal/state policies related to waste-management issues are the primary concerns of the institute's policy research.
For additional information about InSites, or to be added to our mailing list, please write InSites, WMREI, The University of Tennessee, 311 Conference Building, Knoxville, TN 37996-4134, call 865-974-1156, or fax 865-974-1838. Or, if you prefer, e-mail Constance Griffith cbgriffith@utk.edu.
Table of Contents
The Drive for Data By
Elise LeQuire The
Road more Traveled Color
Us Green: EERC Launches Two New Publications Sowing
Seeds By David Brill Rolling
Out the Green Carpet Carpet Diem
Staff
Citings
The Drive for Data
The race to produce high-performance, fuel-efficient vehicles may allow drivers to have their SUVs and drive them too.
By Elise LeQuire
The recent spike in oil prices has caused some to wonder if the current rage for gas-guzzling SUVs is coming to an end. The University of Tennessee’s (UT) Center for Clean Products and Clean Technologies (CCPCT), meanwhile, has been taking a longer view of the overall impact of vehicles on the environment.
CCPCT researchers have spent five years collecting and analyzing data for a complete lifecycle assessment (LCA)—from the extraction of raw materials to final disposal—of a typical American sedan, Saturn’s SL2. The raw data were then fed into the interactive Life-Cycle Design Toolkit CCPCT researchers designed specifically for this project. (See “Life-Cycle Design: An Update,” InSites, Summer 2000). The Toolkit software organizes the information according to the processes: for example, extraction of raw materials, petroleum refining, painting the car parts, and dismantling the vehicle, says Mary Swanson, CCPCT research scientist. The Toolkit displays the LCA visually like a flow chart.
CCPCT researchers worked with Saturn representatives to select the types of human health and environmental impacts to include in the Toolkit. Potential human health effects include impacts on workers, the general population living near the manufacturing plant, and the consumer who drives the car. Environmental impacts range from global warming to toxic waste disposal. Ecotoxicity, or effects on aquatic organisms and wildlife, was also evaluated, Swanson says.
The Dirt on Driving
Ideally, Saturn Corporation, and other auto manufacturers with an interest in developing environmentally responsible products, will use LCA data to factor environmental considerations into their decision-making process. Increasingly, doing business on a global scale means honoring a commitment to meeting the ISO 14001 standard, which incorporates environmental standards into production processes. In addition, a green image can often be a boost to the bottom line.
CCPCT researchers evaluated a broad range of potential environmental impacts of the overall life cycle of the Saturn sedan. They also analyzed certain components and processes in depth. They found that manufacturing accounts for most of the solid waste, hazardous waste, use of renewable resources, and potential worker exposure to toxic substances. The use stage, however, stacks up a formidable environmental debt in the remaining categories: odors, acid deposition, greenhouse gasses, ozone depletion, smog, particulates, energy use, use of nonrenewable resources—primarily petroleum products—and release of toxic chemicals.
The CCPCT team’s report reveals
that—as a percentage of the total life cycle of the vehicle—the driving,
use, and maintenance phase of a typical Saturn sedan that logs 12,000 miles a
year over a 10-year period accounts for more than 90 percent of carbon dioxide
emissions, 82 percent of oxygen depletion from surface water releases, and 93
percent of depletion of nonrenewable resources. The report has been reviewed by
Saturn and General Motors (GM) and is currently being reviewed by the
Environmental Protection Agency. The Toolkit will eventually be released for use
by other manufacturers.
Hybrid Vigor
While automakers can use the Life-Cycle Design Toolkit to make bottom-line as well as environmental decisions in the manufacturing process, it’s ultimately the consumer who decides what type of vehicle to drive, and U.S. consumers aren’t likely to give up their love affair with big, powerful vehicles any time soon.
Meanwhile, with EPA proposing stricter vehicle emissions guidelines for trucks to be phased in over the next decade, American automakers are working on new technologies to reduce tailpipe emissions. To that end, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), GM, and Ford Motor Company have launched a four-year competition, called FutureTruck Challenge, to improve fuel economy and lower tailpipe emissions of SUVs. The automakers are helping teams of student researchers find new, cleaner technologies by donating conventional models of their SUVs and sponsoring road competitions of the modified vehicles.
This year, GM donated 2000-model Chevy Suburbans to research teams at 15 universities, including UT’s Mechanical Aeronautic Engineering and Engineering Science Department (MAES). UT’s team used a hybrid-electric approach, replacing the Suburban’s standard V-8 gasoline engine with a much smaller, 2.4 liter Alfa-Romeo turbo-diesel modified to operate in parallel with a battery-powered electric motor. “Our hybrid is parallel assist. The engine output is connected to the electric motor that goes to the transmission,” says Jeff Freeman, team co-advisor and MAES associate professor. “Take a Saturn. You can run it on the highway with less than a 20 horsepower engine. But you can’t accelerate with that horsepower.” The electric motor makes up for the extra horsepower to provide passing capabilities and towing capacity, one requirement of the competition. “When the engine is creating excess power, you use it to charge the battery. We basically tap power from the engine to put back into the battery,” he says.
Soybean Power
The point of this year’s competition, which was held in June in Mesa, Arizona, was to reduce emissions by a third and to triple fuel economy, Freeman says.
While nobody came close to reaching that goal, UT’s team came in second in one category: reduction of greenhouse-gas emissions. Their Suburban used a fuel mix called biodiesel, or B-20. “Twenty percent of the fuel mix is made from soybeans,” Freeman says. B-20 reduces the sulfur level in diesel, reduces particulate emissions, and requires no modification to the engine. Overall, UT’s SUV reduced greenhouse-gas emissions—especially carbon dioxide and methanes—by 24 percent.
But UT’s prototype uses a traditional lead-acid battery, says CCPCT research associate Jonathan Overly, and that’s an obstacle to achieving the light weight and power that will make an alternative vehicle feasible. Overly has recently met with representatives of Ovonic Battery Company, Inc. in Troy, Michigan. He hopes in the future that Ovonic might provide UT’s FutureTruck team with that company’s patented nickel metal-hydride (NiMH) battery technology. “The nickel metal-hydride battery uses a combination of metals less toxic than the lead found in current vehicle batteries. It also increases overall vehicle energy efficiency and weighs less,” Overly says. Ovonic is a subsidiary of Energy Conversion Devices.
Consumers, of course, don’t want to give up the acceleration, speed, and range they’ve learned to love in the typical American gas-guzzler, and companies that want to market more-efficient vehicles have to look at cost, safety, overall performance, and environmental performance, Overly says. The NiMH battery may help them reach those goals.
For now, the NiMH battery, which is already used in cell-phones and computers, is available as an option in the first fully electric car—General Motors’ EV1, launched by Saturn in January 2000—only in southern California. Hybrid vehicles using a combination of batteries and internal combustion are already on the market across the nation, however. In fact, principal investigator on the LCA team, Gary Davis, CCPCT’s director, recently purchased a hybrid that gets over 50 miles per gallon and uses NiMH batteries.
So what can the average car-buyer do to reduce her environmental footprint? Swanson says to choose a more fuel-efficient car and plan your trips so you drive less. EPA and DOE maintain a Web site that allows the consumer to compare the fuel-economy ratings and greenhouse-gas emissions of cars http://www.fueleconomy.gov. You’ll be relieved to know that among the least-efficient small cars are three models in the hare family: three Ferraris, two Porsches, and a Lamborghini. Weighing in on the more-efficient turtle side are various models of Honda, Toyota, Saturn, and Volkswagen.
Keep that in mind next time you go car shopping. In the meantime, it may be a few years before the dream of a fuel-efficient SUV comes true. •
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For More Information contact Gary Davis, EERC, the University of Tennessee, 311 Conference Center Building, Knoxville, TN 37996-4134, or call 865-974-4251.
Traffic
snarls in the Smokies are creating headaches for management staff and
compromising the quality of park visits.
By Lisa Byerley Gary
We’ve all been there, sitting in a bumper-to-bumper tie-up on a road where traffic once flowed freely.
It happens all too often in urban and suburban settings, but road rage is also on the rise in Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Rangers are settling fistfights among drivers in tranquil settings like Cades Cove, says park official Shawn Benge. Fight reports have risen 300 percent in the cove, a scenic 11-mile loop, during the past five years. Traffic problems are a major headache for the nation’s most visited national park.
In August, the University of Tennessee’s Joint Institute for Energy and Environment, an affiliate of UT’s Waste Management Research and Education Institute, sponsored a regional workshop, Improved Transportation Options for the Smokies Region, in Knoxville to discuss transportation issues facing the Smokies area. Panels representing government and grass roots organizations from Tennessee and North Carolina shared ideas for the region, including Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Topics ranged from alternative fuels and green power to electric vehicles and mass-transit systems.
Population Boom
It’s not hard to see where traffic problems come from. Population in some East Tennessee counties—Anderson, Blount, Cocke, Grainger, Jefferson, Knox, Loudon, Roane, Sevier, and Union—has exploded. In 1970, 565,000 people called the area home. Today more than 805,000 do. Population could number more than a million in another 30 years. Sevier County alone grew by 128 percent between 1970 and 1998, from 28,000 to 65,000 residents.
About a quarter of the workers in the area drive to a different county to work each day, and highways have grown to keep up with the demand. In contrast, workers have fewer options for getting to work than ever. Major companies like Alcoa in Blount County no longer provide bus service to employees.
Windshield Tourists
And then there are the tourists. Some 6.8 million visitors toured the Smokies in 1970. Today the guest list exceeds 10 million each year, and most of them arrive via some 4.5 million cars. That means, among other things, that visitors expecting a relaxing drive may instead find themselves in traffic jams. On the Cades Cove loop alone, traffic has increased from 185,000 cars annually to some 700,000 during the last 30 years.
Cades Cove is the most-visited area in the Smokies, says Benge, who is assistant chief of facility management for the park. If the cove itself were a national park, it would rank among the top 10 most-visited in the country. The narrow, two-lane loop just can’t accommodate such congestion.
“Engineers measure congestion on a scale called Level of Service, or LOS,” Benge explains, “which ranges from A to F. The LOS for Cades Cove during peak visitation is usually at E or F. I like to think of it like a school report card. If A is the best you can do, then F means mandatory summer school. ”
Park traffic problems aren’t limited to the cove by any means. Gamblers going over the mountains to and from the casino in Cherokee, North Carolina, have not only added to the total volume of vehicles moving through the Smokies, Benge says, they’ve shifted traffic patterns as well. Casino traffic moves through the park at all hours.
“We didn’t used to see traffic at night,” Benge says. “Now it is significant.”
Congestion affects the park and its visitors on three fronts, he said, visitor experience, management capacity, and natural resources.
Stressed-out Vacationers
Gridlocked traffic isn’t most people’s idea of getting away from it all. “At what point do we get so congested that visitors don’t come?” Benge asks. “And if they do find themselves sitting in line in Cades Cove, is that the kind of educational experience we want them to have? And what is the message about the park that we want visitors to take home?”
More people and cars mean more management issues for park personnel, too, Benge says. “We have a finite amount of dollars in our budget. We don’t get more funding just because we have more visitors. That affects our ability to deal with both day-to-day needs and emergencies.
More people mean more restrooms are used, says Benge. More flushes mean increased maintenance needs. More people mean that law enforcement becomes an issue. With that many people in the park, medical emergencies and crime increase. Rangers have to respond.
“You can imagine how difficult it is for them to even respond to a call when the roads are crowded,” Benge says. Natural resources are also affected by traffic congestion. The more vehicles through the Smokies, the more exhaust fumes and the poorer the air quality, Benge says.
Team Effort
The park is working with the Knoxville Urban Area Metropolitan Planning Organization and the Regional Transportation Alternatives Plan for East Tennessee, two local groups that are collaborating to examine alternative transportation for Cades Cove and the entire park region.
While it’s too soon to talk about specifics, ideas tossed out in planning meetings have included busses, trolleys, and a light-rail line around the loop. But would the visiting public accept that type of transportation? It’s possible, Benge says.
A visitor-use study completed in the mid-1990s asked visitors about issues of concern. Congestion was one of the most frequently mentioned problems. Ridership is high for a trolley service from Gatlinburg to the park, Benge says, even though it travels a limited route. Trolleys travel to the Sugarland Visitors’ Center, the Laurel Falls Trailhead (the park’s most popular trail), and the Elkmont Campground. “The service is very popular,” Benge says, “and that suggests interest.”
And though scientific studies still need to be conducted, park personnel have noticed a distinct increase in private tour busses traveling through the Smokies.
Environmentally friendly transportation in the region as a whole, not just in the Smokies, was a major topic of discussion at the UT workshop.
Search for Role Models
Several cities that might be considered peers of Knoxville, including Nashville; Hartford, Connecticut; and Rochester, New York, have installed some sort of commuter rail system in the past few years, says Jeff Welch of the Knoxville Urban Area Metropolitan Planning Organization, with good public support in terms of ridership.
The process is time-consuming and expensive, Welch cautions. It takes planners a good 10 years just to get to the construction phase if no rail or right-of-way is in place already. Planning such a system means looking ahead 30 years or so to needs of the future. Right now, Knoxville is a little lower in both population and population density than most of the peer cities his group has studied.
Taking into account all the environmental, economic, and logistical concerns of East Tennessee is the Regional Transportation Alternatives Committee (RTAC), a group formed in 1996. Chaired by former State Senator Bud Gilbert, RTAC is developing a long-range plan with strategies to integrate highway and alternative transportation modes.
“Economic and employment factors demand a regional approach to transportation,” RTAC’s Web site says, “one which integrates and connects a variety of transportation modes and services to serve an interrelated, larger geographic area.” A feasibility report for the 10-county region should be completed by July.
“Where transportation is concerned, our region needs to plan and cooperate as one,” said Bud Gilbert, RTAC chairman, “or we will be forced to endure gridlocked roads, slower economic growth, and a reduced quality of life.” •
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For more information visit http://www.knoxtrans.org/rtap for area transportation plans or http://www.nps.gov/grsm/ for the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.
Color
Us Green: EERC Launches Two New Publications
The communications group of the University of Tennessee’s Energy, Environment and Resources Center has created two new publications—GreenLine and Sightline—that present information on environmental themes.
GreenLine is a semi-annual publication of the UT’s Environment and Natural Resources (ENR) program. According to its mission statement, the ENR program was created “to develop and disseminate new knowledge critical to understanding the structure and function of the natural environment.”
Says Gary Sayler, chairman of the ENR Interdisciplinary Council: “GreenLine will showcase research being conducted at UT whose benefits extend far beyond the walls of the university and offer potential for addressing critical environmental problems and nurturing sustainable development and resource exploitation.”
Sayler, a UT professor of microbiology and ecology, serves as director of UT’s Center for Environmental Biotechnology and the Waste Management Research and Education Institute.
ENR represents more than 250 faculty members across the university and the Institute for Agriculture. (See “Sowing Seeds” in this issue of InSites for information on seed grants awarded by the ENR program to UT researchers.)
The ENR Interdisciplinary Council is composed of 10 of UT’s ENR faculty serving staggered terms up to three years. The current Council includes Sayler, Mary Rogge (social work), Jon Coddington (architecture and design), Jack Barkenbus (Energy, Environment and Resources Center), D. Raj Raman (agriculture and biosystems engineering), Terry Schultz (animal science and veterinary medicine), Robert Auge (ornamental horticulture and landscape design), Steven Driese (geology), Greg Reed (civil and environmental engineering), and Spiro Alexandratos (chemistry).
ENR, says Sayler, is a functional model of how excellence in the education mission of a university can meet scholarly and teaching goals while providing information and technology leadership necessary for informed decision making by the public.
In shaping GreenLine’s story mix, the editors will explore fields as wide-ranging as agriculture, engineering, architecture, computer science, geology, geography, biology and biotechnology, ecology, education, and social sciences and will highlight research initiatives, funding awards, and key findings. The publication targets UT faculty and staff, elected officials, academic department heads, public- and private-sector researchers, and concerned citizens in Tennessee. The publication also targets environmental researchers in other private and public organizations, including universities, outside the state.
Sightline focuses on the environmental health of Great Smoky Mountains National Park. The park, which comprises more than 800 square miles along the border between Tennessee and North Carolina, remains the most popular and most used park in the National Park System. It is internationally known for its plant and animal life as well as its remnants of past human cultures.
In spite of its wealth of natural and cultural resources, the park faces numerous threats both within and outside its boundaries. For instance, the park logs more than 8.5 million visits per year. And the flood of visitors is increasing pressure on the park’s resources. Airborne pollutants originating outside the park have significantly reduced views and harmed streams, soils, and vegetation. Hundreds of species of exotic pests, too, have invaded the park and are disrupting its ecosystems. And the impacts of development beyond the park’s fringes—including construction of second homes—will be felt inside the park for generations to come.
“Sightline deals with these and other critical environmental issues facing the Smokies, and it targets park users, elected officials, local business leaders, scientists, and others who are concerned about conditions in the park,” says David Brill, Sightline editor and director of EERC’s communications group.
The premier 20-page issue of Sightline includes articles on dogwood blight, visible haze, search and rescue, ginseng, elk reintroduction, and water quality. The publication is sponsored by Friends of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park and Great Smoky Mountains Natural History Association. •
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If you know of someone who might like to receive Sightline or GreenLine, please write to Constance Griffith, EERC, The University of Tennessee, 311 Conference Center Building, Knoxville, TN 37996-4134; call her at 865-974-1156; or email her at cbgriffith@utk.edu. We also invite you to visit the ENR Web site at http://web.utk.edu/~enr/.
UT’s
Environment and Natural Resources Program has identified six proposals that
promise environmental benefits and may reward the university with both prestige
and external funding.
By David Brill
The University of Tennessee’s (UT) Environment and Natural Resources program has awarded more than $188,000 in seed money to six research projects that relate to sustainable development and resource use.
These awards will fund development of more elaborate proposals that seek funding from sources external to UT, says ENR Interdisciplinary Council chairman Gary Sayler. Sayler is a UT microbiology professor and director of the university’s Center for Environmental Biotechnology and the Waste Management Research and Education Institute. The research and proposal development will be completed by June 2001, and the proposals will target such organizations as National Science Foundation, the U.S. Department of Education, and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
The proposed projects focus on the following themes:
•Improved Cleanup of Contaminated Ground Water. Under the leadership of UT chemistry professor Spiro Alexandratos, this project will target in-situ techniques for remediating mixed wastes—including toxic metals, radionuclides, organic solvents, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), and anions and organic chelating agents—at Department of Energy facilities and other Superfund sites. In particular, the research team will focus on development of polymer beads that will separate radioactive and chemical wastes from water. The project will also focus on developing new approaches for monitoring the presence and movement of contaminants in soil and water as well as the effectiveness of remediation techniques.
•Clean Product Design. The proposed National Center for Clean Product Design will be a joint venture among UT’s Center for Clean Products and Clean Technologies, UT’s College of Architecture and Design, and Oak Ridge National Laboratory. The Center, once operational, will “combine the deep understanding of product impacts on the environment and expertise in the use of cleaner product design tools found at UT and ORNL,” according to Jon Coddington, the project’s principal investigator and head of UT’s graduate program in the School of Architecture. The Center will focus initially on developing cleaner buildings, automobiles, and advanced products.
•Study of Toxic Algal Blooms. Algal blooms negatively affect human health, damage potable water sources, and harm the tourism and seafood industries. The cyanobacterium Microcystis produces potent toxins known as microcystins, which cause liver damage in organisms and can be lethal in relatively low doses. This project, under the leadership of Steve Wilhelm, a UT ecology professor, will seek to gain a greater understanding of the genetics of Microcystis toxin regulation through creation of a genomic DNA library on the bacterium. Wilhelm will collaborate on the project with microbiology professor Gary Stacey. This information will provide scientists the opportunity to examine the regulation of toxin production as well as other genetic factors. Increased understanding of the organism’s toxin regulation could lead to methods for controlling dangerous algal blooms or reducing their impacts.
•Human Health Effects of Air Pollution. This project, under the leadership of Susan Smith, a professor in health and safety sciences, seeks to initiate a comprehensive environmental health research program to study pulmonary function and related human health effects of exposure to ozone and sulfur particulates in Great Smoky Mountains National Park. The project will focus primarily on people working or recreating in the park. In 1999, the park logged more than 50 days that exceeded the EPA’s recommended eight-hour standard for ozone, and sulphur particulate concentrations monitored in the park increased by 25 percent between 1984 and 1996.
• Designation of UT as National Environmental Observatory. UT has been invited by major regional universities to serve as a proposed core site for the National Environmental Observatories Network (NEON), a program of the National Science Foundation (NSF). NSF will sponsor 10 observatories nationwide. Susan Riechert, a professor in the ecology and evolutionary biology department, is directing proposal development for the project. The core of the observatory will be associated with Great Smoky Mountains National Park, an area renowned for its biodiversity. The core sites and outlying field stations will conduct research on the area’s ecology.
•Interdisciplinary Course Development. This initiative, being guided by Jon Coddington, will seek $200,000 from the Fund for the Improvement of Post-secondary Education, a program administered by the U.S. Department of Education, to fund development of undergraduate courses in fields related to the environment and natural resources. “The nation’s top 25 research institutions have recognized the correlation between accomplished undergraduate programs and strong research and graduate programs,” Coddington says. “This project seeks to link environment and natural resources to undergraduate education through creation of an ENR curriculum.” •
For more information contact Gary Sayler, CEB, The University of Tennessee, 676 Dabney Hall, Knoxville, TN 37996-1605, or call 865-974-8080.
A
UT researcher is working with an industry-led coalition determined to get old
carpet out from underfoot in ways that keep it out of your local landfill.
By Lisa Byerley Gary
The Midwestern Workgroup on Carpet Recycling, which includes both carpet industry and nonindustry representatives, has endorsed a plan in which an independent, industry-funded organization will look for ways to recycle and reuse old carpet.
Catherine Wilt, senior research associate with the University of Tennessee’s Energy, Environment and Resources Center, says the national plan benefits consumers by keeping carpet, traditionally made of petroleum-based fibers, out of landfills and incinerators, both of which contribute to environmental pollution. Some 2.3 million tons of carpet and rugs were disposed of in 1996 alone, according to figures from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
But consumers and the environment aren’t the only ones who will benefit, says Werner Braun, president of the Carpet and Rug Institute. By taking a proactive approach, the carpet industry gains the flexibility to plan its own strategies for meeting government standards—a move that will help companies maintain their competitive edge. “This is the next logical step for our carpet manufacturing, which has been viewed as a model industry in terms of environmental stewardship,” Braun says.
The idea of a third-party group sponsored by manufacturers isn’t new. The Rechargeable Battery Recycling Corporation, for instance, was organized in 1994 by the rechargeable power industry to keep batteries out of landfills. Today the group has the support of more than 300 battery manufacturers and retailers.
Though spearheaded in the Midwest, the Midwestern Workgroup on Carpet Recycling has become national in scope, encompassing some 40 representatives including state and local government groups, nongovernment environmental groups, carpet and fiber manufacturers, and carpet installers. Primary supporters are the governments of Iowa, Minnesota, and Wisconsin, and the EPA. The initiative has the support of more than 15 state governments, and participants met six times between February and November of 2000 to iron out proposals.
“This is a unique opportunity for states to move away from heavy-handed regulation,” says Sherry Enzler, director of the Minnesota Office of Environmental Assessment. “Instead they can focus on working in a mutually beneficial partnership with industry and environmental groups.”
But for those members of industry who aren’t interested in reducing waste, incentive might come in the form of government procurement contracts. Those might stipulate that bids are awarded only to those manufacturers who support the independent recycling group.
“When an industry becomes part of the solution, that is good product stewardship,” says UT’s Wilt, a project workgroup facilitator and former president of the National Recycling Coalition. “By going through this decision-making process with stakeholders, we are providing incentives for products to be manufactured and managed in an environmentally conscious way, creating a win-win situation for consumers, government, and the industry itself.” •
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For more information contact Catherine Wilt, EERC, The University of Tennessee, 311 Conference Center Building, Knoxville, TN 37996-4134, or call 865-974-1915.
Finding a new home for big bulky roles of used carpet isn’t a simple task. Yet more than half (55 percent) of the $13.1 billion of carpet sold each year (1.5 billion square yards is produced) goes to recarpet existing homes and businesses.
But industry leaders are busy finding new uses for all that old carpeting. Options include direct reuse, refurbishment, recycling into new carpet face fiber, recycling fiber into other plastic products, recycling old carpet backing into new carpet backing, or producing a recycled-content backing from old carpet. All major fiber manufacturers have or are planning programs to collect and recycle post-consumer carpet.
• DuPont, the company that invented nylon, was first to develop a nationwide system to collect commercial carpet for recycling. The program, begun in 1990, melts every type of carpet into materials used in making car parts, flooring, soundproofing material, soil enhancers, and padding. Installers can drop used carpet at any of 80 sites across the nation at a cost similar to landfill fees.
• Solutia, formerly Monsanto, developed a patented method to recycle nylon carpet into thermoplastic pellets that can be used for a variety of industrial applications as well as for refuse-derived fuel.
• Honeywell, working with Evergreen Nylon Recycling, has patented a chemical process to capture nylon from carpet and turn it into a product called Infinity—”an infinitely renewable nylon resin”—made of 80 percent post-consumer carpet and 20 percent industrial waste.
• BASF collects and recycles carpet through its “6ix Again” initiative (named for nylon 6, a common carpet component). BASF collects its own used carpet, as well as other types of old carpet being replaced with BASF products, then shaves off—and recycles—the face fiber.
Other carpet manufacturers are coming up with ways to reuse
products they’ve made or to make them from other recycled materials such as
plastic soda bottles. These initiatives include programs to “lease” carpet
to commercial users; design compostable carpet of biodegradable materials such
as sugar cane and corn; and clean and recondition old carpeting, which can then
be reused (with a 10-year guarantee) at a cost 40- to 45-percent less than new
carpet.
—Lisa Byerley Gary
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•PROJECTS. Jack Ranney, a senior research scientist with UT’s Energy, Environment and Resources Center (EERC), served as project administrator for a recent WMREI-sponsored study. Department of Urban and Regional Planning collaborators on the project included John Peine, adjunct professor; and graduate students William Coleman, Leon Christion Jr., and Rachel Beaty. The team studied land- and water-management practices on private lands adjacent to Great Smoky Mountains National Park and analyzed policies governing land use. Their final report will provide resource managers and stakeholder groups information on water quality and land-use change and how existing policies can be modified to improve sustainability.
Research Associate David Durfee of EERC’s Systems
Development Institute served as project manager for a study that involved
Maytag’s new front-loading washing machine. Durfee’s team assessed
data from Boston-area residents who tested the new Neptune washer. Durfee
says the five-month, 50-family study confirmed a 44-percent water savings and a
50-percent energy savings. Mark Ginsberg, deputy assistant secretary for
the U.S. Department of Energy announced the team’s findings at a concert
featuring Kenny Chesney, Sara Evans, and Jennifer Day at
Boston’s Symphony Hall.
•INTERNATIONAL NEWS. Rosalyn McKeown, director
of EERC’s Center for Geography and Environmental Education, recently addressed
the International Seminar on 21st-Century Citizen Environmental Education and
Environmental Science Development at Northeast Normal University in
Changchun, China. McKeown’s message on environmental literacy was
sponsored by the Center for Environmental Education and Communications, a
division of the State Environmental Protection Administration of the People’s
Republic of China. McKeown, who is currently serving a one-year
appointment as visiting professor on the faculty of education at York
University, has also been invited to serve on the National Science
Foundation’s Advisory Committee for Environmental Research and Education. In
August, Research Leader Mary English presented a paper at the Forum on
Stakeholder Confidence in Paris. The conference was sponsored by the Nuclear
Energy Agency of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.
•AWARDS. In October, Tim Gangaware, Associate Director of EERC’s Water Resources Research Center, and Senior Research Assistant Ruth Anne Hanahan received awards from Knox County Soil Conservation District for “Outstanding Support of Water Quality and Conservation Measures.”
Catherine Wilt, a senior research associate with EERC, received the Tennessee Recycling Coalition’s Individual Recycler of the Year award. Wilt, a former president of the National Recycling Coalition, was recognized for her efforts spanning more than ten years to reduce waste and promote recycling.
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