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Published Friday, May 8, 2020
Tico
students win first place ina design contest in the U.S. By the A.M. Costa Rica staff Nine students from the Technology University of Costa Rica, TEC, won first place in the Midwest Student Design Competition, organized by the Central State Water Environment Association, CSWEA, in Wisconsin, United States. The competition was scheduled to take place on April 6, at the Monona Terrace in Madison, Wisconsin. However, due to the pandemic caused by covid-19, the presentation of the project was made through a 20-minute video, which was sent to the judges, the university said in its statement. The nine winners are Antony Torres- Solano, Sharon Castillo- Rodríguez, María Jesús Peralta -Brenes, Deilin Ureña -Portuguez, Lidia Rodríguez -Vega and Nicolás Morales -Miranda, all students of the Environmental Engineering School. Along with them, another group of Costa Rican students placed, Jafet Castro - Sandoval from the Construction Engineering School, Raúl Garita -Durán from Industrial Maintenance School, and Alejandro Morales - Quirós from Architecture and Urbanism School. The contest required all participating teams to elaborate on a design of a sewage system and wastewater treatment plant to be applied in practice. The students focused and developed their project for the La Fortuna district, San Carlos, in Alajuela Province. The project promotes learning in a real environment and emphasizes how to design centralized wastewater collection and treatment systems, the University said in its statement. In this edition, Costa Rican students competed against students from five U.S. universities: the University of Wisconsin-Platteville, University of St. Thomas, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Marquette University and Milwaukee School of Engineering. According to the TEC, students chose La Fortuna district because there is a need to improve sanitation, protect water resources and public services without affecting local tourism development and adapting to the increasing population density. The youth students' proposal focused on nature-based solutions applied to technologies in Latin America and the economy as axes of sustainability and low energy demand, said the University. "The youth-design of a wastewater treatment plant not only removes pollutants from wastewater also used the treatment of sludge and generates biogas, for energy production," said TEC in its statement. “According to the students, "the goal of the design of the plant is to represent a tropical architecture that adapts to the climatic conditions of the area, with the use of large roofs and double heights, among other elements." Thanks to this award, the nine winning students will participate in the same project, but in another competition organized by the Water Environment Federation, WEF, to be held in New Orleans, U.S.A. in October. ------------------------ How else should companies and organizations support young people with their projects aimed at protecting the environment? We would like to know your thoughts on this story. Send your comments to news@amcostarica.com |
