In case you missed it, this past Sunday (August 10th) was International Biodiesel day, in honour of this momentous occasion I thought I would dive into the pros and cons of this alternative fuel source. Fossil fuels (such as natural gas, coal and petroleum) are pouches of organic matter which have been pressurized and decomposed over long periods of time. In contrast, biofuels are made from live organic matter (ranging from canola, maize, sunflowers, animal fats and soy). Thus they provide a more sustainable alternative to the material depletion associated with traditional fossil fuels while performing in many of the same ways. As the cost for fossil fuels continue to rise, part of the appeal of alternative fuels sources is their potentially low production cost. We should also consider the environmental impact of growing crops for fuels, CO2 (of of the greenhouse gases released through the combustion of fuel) is taken up by the crops. In other words, biofuels can provide a carbo...

A little while ago I was working at an information table for sustainability and so I had to gather information about the cool research we do here on campus. I asked a whole lot of uOttawa professors about their research regarding sustainable development, and I thought that the coolest out of all of them was that of Professor Robert Delatolla’s. What is so incredibly neat about Professor Delatolla’s research is that he uses miniature spaceships. Sold yet? These honeycomb pasta like plastic thingies are mini-houses for bacteria that clean waste water. MBBRs (Moving Bed Biofilm Reactors – BUT FEAR NOT: you won’t need to remember this) are little bits of plastic that are designed to allow bacteria to grow in a community called a biofilm. These biofilms, or bacterial communities, filter the sludge in water by removing ammonia and nitrates. There are a couple of reasons why I think this particular project is brilliant. We are using what bacteria use against us against them – muahah...