Gadjah Mada University’s (UGM) Smart Car MCS team took home wins at the Shell Ideas 360 Awards in London earlier this month, beating four other finalists in a global competition organized for students to develop game-changing ideas to tackle energy, food and water issues.

The team, comprising four students from the university’s chemical engineering department, won the competition’s judges choice and audience choice awards for their idea of developing a smart car capable of turning plastic waste into fuel that emits low levels of carbon dioxide.

he team had to compete in stages with over 1,000 teams from 140 participating countries. Five finalists, including the UGM Smart Car MCS team, were selected to further pitch their ideas to the judges.

The other four finalists were from the American University of Sharjah, University of Texas at Austin (United States) University of Bordeaux (France) and University of Melbourne (Australia).

UGM’s winning idea involved the use of the heat from car exhaust fumes to break down plastic waste and turn it into liquid fuel, thus helping turning a waste product into clean energy.

With the idea and supervision of their supervising lecturers Hanifrahmawan Sudibyo and Yano Surya Pradana, the team engineered a car capable of processing plastic waste into raw liquid fuel that could be further processed into fuel ready to be used as alternative energy.

“The idea also involves the use of microalgae cultivation support [MCS] technology to reduce CO2 emissions of the respective car,” Herman said.

Secretary of UGM’s chemical engineering department, Aswati Mindaryani, said more work needed to be done for the idea to be applied on the field.

“But the idea really makes us proud,” she said.

(Source: The Jakarta Post)