Plastic bricks, banana peels and solar cells were all elements of the innovative winning projects at the Grøn Dyst (Green Challenge) student conference. Minister praised the students’ ability to generate good ideas.
Resourcefulness, sustainability and serious and dedicated efforts were celebrated when 276 engineering students signed up for the DTU Grøn Dyst (Green Challenge) student conference on 27 June with a total of 124 projects.
Grøn Dyst was kicked off at DTU Library with a welcome and speeches by the Minister for Higher Education and Science, Sofie Carsten Nielsen (Social Liberal Party), among others. She put Grøn Dyst into a global perspective:
"We need innovative engineers, we need your ability to find solutions and your willingness to make a difference."
Minister for Higher Education and Science, Sofie Carsten Nielsen
“We are facing many challenges with a world population that will grow from the current seven billion to nine billion by 2050. It will be a challenge to ensure enough food, water and energy for all of us. It is crystal clear that these challenges require new and innovative thinking. We need to be more productive without increasing the level of pollution, and that is exactly why we need people like you. We need innovative engineers, we need your ability to find solutions and your willingness to make a difference,” said the minister and ended her speech by thanking DTU for using Grøn Dyst to focus on sustainability and innovation in engineering programmes:
“Thank you, DTU, this is a fantastic event and a huge challenge. Keep on thinking big, thinking new ideas and thinking green.”
The winners were selected by panels of judges made up of business professionals, academics and politicians, who assessed the projects according to criteria such as realizability, technological application, positive environmental or energy impact, innovation, creativity and communication.
While the judges were deliberating, the participants were entertained by hip-hop artist Per Vers who had spent the day exploring the projects and then incorporated them into a lengthy hip-hop song. He also had a rhyme for the judges:
“The judges are a bunch of tough lads: ‘Does it work in real life or just on your iPads?” as Per Vers eloquently put it.
The prizes were presented by Peter Mogensen, director of the Fonden Kraka think tank. He was extremely pleased after witnessing the many ideas produced by the participating engineering students.
“Seeing your projects makes me believe in the future again. I haven’t been so excited in long time,” said Peter Mogensen immediately before the award ceremony.
The first Grøn Dyst event was kicked off in 2010 and has since been held every other year. In future, the challenge will be an annual event designed to inspire engineering students to think sustainability into their projects, regardless which study programme they are following.