UMass Lowell Students Among $15K Winners In EPA Sustainable Technologies Contest

BOSTON (AP) — Teams from three New England colleges have won approximately $15,000 each in a student competition to design sustainable technologies that help protect public health and the environment.

The technologies also aim to promote economic development.

Teams from Dartmouth College in Hanover, N.H., University of Massachusetts in Lowell and the College of the Atlantic in Bar Harbor, Maine, were among 45 teams nationwide to win awards in the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's annual competition.

Dartmouth designed a hydropower generation and distribution system to bring electricity to rural areas of Rwanda.

College of the Atlantic students designed a process to pre-treat food waste to produce liquid fuel and biogas.

At UMass-Lowell, students are designing a new class of non-toxic wetting agents used in soap and other items.

Copyright 2012 The Associated Press.