Tuesday, May 13, 2008

University of Waterloo Team Creates Hydrogen Car

The University of Waterloo in Toronto, Ontario, Canada has recently been in the news for making a hydrogen-powered car. The team consisted of students, they created the car as part of the final year of the Challenge X. Challenge X is a competition that lasts for three years that challenged seventeen teams to re-engineer a GMC Equinox, the most recent challenge ended in 2007.

The team at the University of Waterloo is known as the Alternative fuels team. The group of students showcased their re-engineered car at Direct Energy Center at Exhibition Place in Toronto. The team was the first to create this alternative fuel car and it is all due to their cutting edge technology. The car basically runs on water and emits no fumes; in fact the end result is water. This makes the car very environmentally friendly, and by using water to power it's engine high gas prices my soon be a thing of the past.

The University of Waterloo is the only University that was chosen outside of the United States. During the designing process the team won eight out of ten of the award categories which in the end put them in first place. Since the teams win they have been trying to interrogate this engine into a Chevrolet Equinox. The Dean of Engineering states that the school and even the entire country is very proud to have the engineering team that they do. His exact words were "This exciting project developed by our students will help keep Canada at the forefront of the automotive industry" and "We are proud of these students' remarkable accomplishments and wish the team well at the Challenge X competition."

There are a few major sponsors of the team at the University of Waterloo. The sponsors are General Motors, Natural Resources of Canada, the Government of Ontario, Marathon Technical Services, Hydrogenics, Air Liquide and The U.S. Department of Energy. The team will soon be traveling to a few cities around the United States to show case their car with the rest of the competitors in the Challenge X competition. This is a two-week event that will mark then end of the competition. The teams will compete in many events and are required to give oral presentations about their projects.

Because of the Challenge X competition the next generation of engineers will be able to have superior knowledge for the automotive technologies of the twenty-first century. It will also ensure that the United States and Canada will be able to stay in the competition that is going on around the world. The competition will also highlight the essentialness of using and driving vehicles that are not as harmful to the environment as a traditional vehicle. Not to mention they are helping to find a solution to one of the world's major problem, its dependency on oil for just about everything.

Many people do not realize it but humans are the cause of all the global warming warnings and the depletion of the Ozone layer. If they do realize it they just do not seem to care. If everyone would go out and buy or lease a hybrid and get rid of all the traditional vehicles, we may be able to push the destruction of the world back a couple decades if not more. Once the hydrogen run vehicles hit the market, the environment may just be able to repair itself and stop the fear of global warming all together. Just being a little more environmentally conscious could give us all a little more time with this wonderful planet.

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