Graduate students in the College of Engineering will have the chance to help develop a device to create energy from natural gas as early as next semester, ENG professor Srikanth Gopalan said Wednesday.
The device a type of hydrogen energy membrane will supersede ‘state of the art’ procedures for tapping hydrogen energy because it will perform the reaction more completely and at a ‘much higher’ purity level, Gopalan said. Over the last few years, many projects across the country have focused on creating renewable energy sources.
Funding for the project will come largely from a $480,000 grant BU received from the Department of Energy last week.
‘High rating based on technical evaluation’ was the primary reason behind the university’s award, Tom Welch, a department spokesman, said Wednesday. Welch said 87 colleges and universities applied for 13 DOE grants awarded last week.
Gopalan, along with ENG professor Uday Pal, will lead the research in the membrane’s creation, which Gopalan said will begin around the end of this year and finish in 2007.
Though most of the research will be conducted out of the classroom, undergraduate students will also benefit from it, Gopalan said, because he plans to tie his research into graduate level courses that seniors within take as electives.
‘Being around this kind of research of energy is better than using gasoline energy [in research],’ said Kevin Hemmer, an ENG junior. ‘Having cutting-edge research like this will prepare me for the real world it’s an experience unique to BU students.’
Two private companies, which Gopalan said BU could not divulge because contracts are still being worked out, will aid BU in the research and funding for the membrane, something Gopalan says may have helped BU obtain the grant.
‘Very strong ideas’ and ‘two professors that have extensive, proven experience’ are both ingredients for a solid application, Gopalan said. However, ‘a history of industrial collaboration’ can provide ‘a very strong incentive’ for government funding, he added.
The companies will contribute $100,000 collectively and BU will fund between $20,000 and $25,000, but these sums and property rights over the membrane are still being negotiated, Gopalan said.
The project is part of a $12.3 million DOE initiative to explore both more efficient fossil energy sources and new energy sources, according to a press release.
Welch said all of the funds BU requested were appropriated through the grant. Georgia Tech Research Corp., the University of California and the University of Colorado were among other schools awarded grants last week.
Gopalan said he and Pal are currently working on another DOE grant project involving hydrogen storage, as well as several other projects within the ‘fuel cell arena’ with funding from BU and local companies.