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Students Tackle Recyling Issue at Bilkent
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Societies today are considering ways to minimize energy consumption and to make use of waste products so that coming generations will live in a better world. To that end, twelve students from the Faculty of Engineering have prepared a proposal for recycling at Bilkent as a project assigned by Prof. Dr. Haldun Özaktaþ for the 'Science, Technology, and Society' course he teaches. The students, who call themselves Group Enthalpy, have come up with concrete ideas for recycling waste products and minimizing electricity and fuel oil consumption at Bilkent University.
 The current recycling system involves the collection of paper, plastics, and cans in dormitories, cafeterias, and the libraries. During preliminary observations by Group Enthalpy, the deficiencies of the system were determined to be the inappropriate location and insufficient number of recycling bins. If the students' proposed system is adopted by the university, the original investment will be recouped in 5 years and thereafter result in considerable revenue. For example, it takes only 24 people one month to produce 39 kg of white paper and 21.6 kg of plastics. The students calculated that even if only 6% of the 3000 people living in the dormitories participated, the fixed costs of the system would be covered in only 5 years. From then on, the investment would generate approximately 1.1 billion TL of savings per year.
A second option concerns the fuel oil used for heating the dormitories. The university pays 8.5 billion TL for fuel oil over a five-month period. However, the cost of installing solar collectors would be only 3 billion TL. This investment would save 5.5 billion TL per dorm in the first year and 8.5 billion TL each subsequent year.
As part of their plan to reduce electricity consumption, the students proposed that the current dormitory lighting fixtures be replaced with the best cost/performance ratio equipment. According to market research, the initial conversion would cost about 1.1 billion TL. This amount would repaid in 162 days through savings on electricity bills. The construction department could begin to implement the system in some buildings and continue implementation in other buildings using the savings generated by the new lighting system. It is clear that recycling not only is a must for the environment, but also makes economic sense. An energetic recycling program also raises people's awareness of the waste contemporary society produces. As one of the leading universities of Turkey, Bilkent aims not only to educate people academically, but also to give them a different perspective on the environment they live in.
Feyza Barutçu (IR/II)
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