Dr. Greg Naterer receives $125,000 in research support
Sep 29, 2008 - 10:11 AM
By Crystal Crimi
DURHAM -- The hydrogen research occurring at the University of Ontario Institute of Technology brought two Ontario cabinet ministers to campus Thursday.
They were at the Oshawa campus to announce $125,000 to support UOIT's Dr. Greg Naterer's work on creating clean, energy-efficient power sources, namely hydrogen. The funding is part of the government's $5 million to support projects in the clean tech sector.
"We believe in you," said John Wilkinson, Minister of Research and Innovation, to Dr. Naterer and the 260 other researchers receiving support from the Province.
"Tackling climate change is the challenge of this generation," said John Gerretsen, Minister of the Environment. It's an issue that needs to be dealt with immediately if we want our civilization to survive, he said. "The work you're doing is absolutely necessary," Mr. Gerretsen said. "It's time to wean ourselves off fossil fuels if we want to survive."
Dr. Naterer's work involves turning nuclear heat waste into hydrogen.
"Hydrogen is a major solution to the problem we all face, which is climate change," Dr. Naterer said.
Although clean to use, hydrogen is dirty to produce, but his approach would allow clean, low-cost production, making it better for the environment and more economical than fossil fuels.
"It's absorbing heat that would otherwise be going into the environment," he said.
Within a couple of years, Dr. Naterer plans to have a lab-scale demonstration to produce five kilograms of hydrogen a day. He's also advocating to build the world's first pilot plant to produce 500 kilograms of hydrogen a day.
With high oil prices and the low American economy, we need a plan for the times, Mr. Wilkinson said, and added we need to change our dependence on fossil fuels.
"It's expensive and it's costing us a lot," Mr. Wilkinson said.
Humans are the only species on earth that don't know how to live sustainably, he said.
Mr. Wilkinson encouraged youth to dream big and to turn those dreams and ideas into jobs. Green tech is a big sector for the economy, he added.
"Greg is exploring new technology so advanced that even their names sound complicated," Mr. Wilkinson said.
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