Sustainability news

Sustainability programs and research at U of T Engineering are at the forefront of alternative technologies that can mitigate the impact of climate change.

Supermileage Team co-captains Melissa Fung (Year 3 MechE + PEY, at far left) and Callum Bartlett (Year 3 MechE, far right) and their teammates examine the interior of their hyper-efficient prototype vehicle, called Shadow. The team is hopeful that their vehicle improvements will earn them a spot at the podium at this year’s Shell Eco-Marathon Americas race. (Credit: Roberta Baker).

Racers, start your (fuel efficient) engines…

April 13, 2018

U of T Supermileage Team unveils redesigned vehicle ahead of 2018 Shell Eco-Marathon Americas competition in California

U of T Engineering’s CERT team, led by Alex Ip (ECE PhD 1T5, second from left) is one of just five teams from academia and industry to advance to the finals of the international NRG COSIA Carbon XPRIZE competition, where they hope to bring home the $7.5-million grand prize for their carbon-capture and conversion technology. (Credit: Laura Pedersen).

CERT team advances to finals of Carbon XPRIZE

April 9, 2018

Multidisciplinary group led by Professors Ted Sargent and David Sinton among five vying for $7.5-million grand prize for capturing and recycling carbon dioxide

Phil De Luna (MSE PhD candidate) is first author on an analysis of how researchers could capture and recycle the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide. "If we continue to work at this, it’s a matter of time before we have power plants where CO2 is emitted, captured, and converted,” says De Luna. (Credit: Tyler Irving)

U of T Engineering researchers propose how we could use climate-warming CO2 for good

March 29, 2018

Multidisciplinary team led by Professor Ted Sargent proposes vision for future of carbon capture and recycling

A streetcar stops on King Street in Toronto. A section of the busy east-west street travelling through downtown Toronto has restricted car traffic, and U of T Engineering researchers are collaborating with the City of Toronto and the Toronto Transit Commission to study the pilot project’s effects. (Credit: Billy Cabic via Flickr under creative commons license)

Crunching the numbers on Toronto’s King Street transit pilot

January 9, 2018

Multidisciplinary research team unites experts in air and noise pollution, transportation and public health from both U of T and Ryerson universities

Professor Reza Iravani (ECE) and members of his research group (from left, Mr. Xiaolin Wang, Professor Reza Iravani, Dr. Ali Nabavi and Dr. Milan Graovac) are helping to reduce range anxiety for electric vehicle drivers (Photo: Jessica MacInnis)

Reducing ‘range anxiety’ for electric vehicles by speeding up charging time

December 19, 2017

Large-scale, utility level battery systems will reduce the charging time for electric vehicles from hours to minutes

From left: Daniela Galatro (MIE PhD candidate), Zhe Gong (ECE MASc candidate), Carlos Da Silva (MIE PhD 1T6), Kshitij Gupta (MIE MASc candidate) are members of a multidisciplinary team improving battery technology for electric vehicles. (Credit: Liz Do).

U of T Engineering researchers developing next generation of battery technology for electric vehicles

December 14, 2017

An MIE team led by Dean Cristina Amon, in collaboration with ECE researchers, aims to improve efficiency and reliability of lithium batteries

Professors Brenda McCabe, Daman Panesar, Shoshanna Saxe, Heather MacLean and Daniel Posen (all CivE) are collaborating with companies in construction, building services and engineering consulting to reduce the greenhouse gas impacts of future infrastructure projects. (Photo: Tyler Irving)

Green infrastructure: New tool to help construction industry reduce carbon footprint

December 8, 2017

U of T Engineering partnership with Ellis-Don, BASF and WSP will focus on life-cycle analysis of buildings, bridges and more

Phil De Luna (MSE PhD candidate) is one of the lead authors of a new paper published in Nature Chemistry that reports a low-cost, highly efficient catalyst for chemical conversion of water into oxygen. The catalyst is part of an artificial photosynthesis system being developed at U of T Engineering. (Photo: Tyler Irving)

Artificial photosynthesis gets big boost from new catalyst

November 20, 2017

U of T Engineering system takes inspiration from plants to convert electrical energy to chemical energy at 64 per cent efficiency, the highest yet reported for renewable carbon fuels

Professor David Sinton has been elected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). (Photo: NSERC)

David Sinton elected fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science

November 20, 2017

Award recognizes Sinton’s application of microfluidics to challenges in sustainable energy

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