Over $500K in DOE funding given to address environmental and public health challenges

In Washington, D.C., the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced $594,424 in funding for eight undergraduate and graduate student teams from colleges and universities across the country through EPA’s People, Prosperity and the Planet (P3) grant program, including research on developing a more sustainable concrete made from hemp pulp and controlling algal blooms.

The P3 program is a two-phase research grant program that challenges student teams to research, develop, and design innovative projects addressing environmental and public health challenges. The winning teams are building upon their successes in Phase I where they each received up to $15,000. With today’s announcement of Phase II funding of up to $75,000 per team, the teams will now further develop those projects and designs to ensure they can be sustainably implemented in the field.

The P3 Phase II recipients include:

• Brown University, Providence, R.I., to develop a renewable treatment system using naturally occurring proteins found in bacteria to remove trace levels of arsenic from drinking water.
• Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y., to design a vertical-flow, waste-free water pump that returns drinking water to communities while reducing electricity costs associated with conventional pumps used in water treatment plants.
• Miami University, Oxford, Ohio, to develop a prototype of UV LED fuel vapor emissions control devices for use in cars.
• New Jersey Institute of Technology, Newark, N.J., to develop a chemical process that can help control harmful algal blooms and remove cyanotoxins without leaving disinfection by-products.
• Southern Illinois University, Carbondale, Ill., to develop a cost-effective and environmentally friendly method to remove PFAS from wastewater effluent for reuse in agriculture.
• University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, Ala., to build a data-based model to characterize the discharge of untreated wastewater into the ground in rural Alabama where conditions for conventional septic systems are unsuitable.
• University of California, Riverside, Riverside, Calif., to use a new approach to produce high quality, cellulose-rich hemp pulp that improves the strength and insulating properties of hempcrete building materials.
• University of Central Florida, Orlando, Fla., to develop an electrochemical modified carbon screen-printed sensor that can determine trace levels of lead at the terminal plumbing source (i.e. household faucets).