World water day events at TAMK 22.3.

World Water day was held on 22nd March and TAMK also traditionally participated to it by arranging activities at Kuntokatu premises in Tampere. Theme for the World Water day in year 2011 was "Water for the cities".

Offically, the event was launched at noon when vice principle, Dr. Marja Sutela, gave a speech and opened the day by proposing a toast for water. Audience got to see Capoeira show which was full of life and music.


During the Water day school children visited TAMK and programme related to water was arranged for them by 1st year's Environmental Engineering students. Events and scientific experiments as well as lottery were also arranged to attract people along with informative broschures in the main lobby.

In the afternoon, people got to listen water related lectures given by international speakers who are visiting TAMK and being part of the international week of technology at TAMK. As a whole, event was a success and reminded once again TAMK staff and students of one of the essentials of life - water.



text: Juha Le Tortorec, Aino-Maija Kyykoski
pictures: Nicolas Bonensea

Innovative technology solutions interested audience in the opening seminar of TAMK’s new learning environment

In the roof visitors got to see the wind and solar energy systems.

TAMK’s new learning environment is ready for action. Opening seminar was held on 10th December in the main campus. Environmental friendly and unique learning environment combines energy- and environmental technology targeting to create more sustainable environment and future. Learning environment includes geothermal heat system, two different kinds of wind power systems to generate electricity, two solar collectors for heat and electric production and monitoring systems for these all. There is also Finland’s first public indoor dry toilets and water saving toilets as well as grey water purification included to the learning environment.

The aim of the learning environment is to serve students from diversified technical study programs and to provide professionals of new energy- and waste water technologies for companies and municipalities. This is now the genuine moment to study right at own school premises not only in theory, but also in practice by monitoring, trying and maintaining the different energy and environmental technology systems.

'Opi enempi' project is funded by European Regional Development Fund.

After the seminar lectures, the audience was taken into the learning environment to know more about the installed energy systems and ecological toilet solutions. In the picture, group getting to know the greenhouse.

For more information see projects webpages or contact aino-maija.kyykoski[at]tamk.fi

TAMK builds an energy efficient house into a metropolis

TAMK has taken Finnish wooden house construction knowledge into China. Last year, TAMK build a two-storey, 230 square meter single family house into the university city of Shenyang, which has 8 million inhabitants.



Finnish and Chinese students of Building Construction Engineering designed the building, which has living and meeting spaces and even a sauna, into the Shenyang university campus. The house was built as an example of energy efficiency. The house is also more durable against earthquakes than the stone or concrete buildings usually built in the area.



The wooden house project is a part of TAMK’s research and development activities. The house also provides excellent opportunities for exporting education into China. The idea is to first export more know-how, and at the same time to open up channels to export Finnish wooden house structures and fittings.


Exporting TAMK’s knowledge of wooden house construction and the Finnish wooden house products may even lead to the export of Finnish wooden house factory knowledge into China: as the country has become wealthier, a demand for wooden house regions has arisen.

TAMK and the Shenyang Jianzhu University (SJZU) which specialises in construction engineering began collaborating 15 years ago. In addition to TAMK, the Finnish participants in the wooden house construction project were Late-Rakenteet Oy, Pirkanmaan Ristikko Oy, Starkki Oy and Väärin Puutavara Ky.

UNIPOLI Aasia trip to Bangalore India

Experimental field in Doddaballapur near Bangalore

TAMK representatives, Director of education Ms. Riitta Hanhijärvi and Senior Lecturer Eeva-Liisa Viskari, spent one week in Bangalore India on a UNIPOLI Asia –network trip in late February 2010. The network is formed by the universities of Tampere under the theme “Enhancing well-being through biotechnology and environmental technology - cooperation with higher education institutions in Tampere, China, India and Korea”. The network is financed by CIMO Finland.

During the trip we visited two universities. First target was University of Agricultural Sciences Bangalore and especially the Department of Soil Science and Agricultural Chemistry, and Department of Biotechnology, which were of special interest of the project. We were introduced the research of the departments. In the department of Agricultural Sciences the research is focused on the use of anthropogenic waste as a fertilizer as well as maintaining the soil fertility, which is also one focus in TAMK R&D activities at present. The field studies were quite impressive. At the campus there is quite a wide land area reserved for experiments using cow and human urine, among other organic substances, as fertilizers and studying the crop and soil quality. The annual open-day for introducing this research to local farmers, accumulated about 100 000 interested farmers to visit the experimental sites of the UAS Bangalore. This kind of activity is in fact an excellent way of university serving the community.

We also visited Doddaballapur, about 40 km from Bangalore, to see an experimental site, where one farmer is cultivating his crops, in this case millet, with anthropogenic fertilizers. This kind of implementation is also a good way to take the scientific research into practice in a very demonstrative way. In addition to these agricultural research activities the university has also Departments of Forestry and Department of Biotechnology which both might be interesting as cooperation partners also from TAMK point of view.

The second institution in our programme was a private university in Bangalore, Dayananda Sagar Institutions (DSI). All Finnish universities of applied sciences have undersigned a MOU with DSI, thus allowing also us a good start in the bilateral cooperation between TAMK and DSI. DSI is a multidisciplinary university. The fields of education include for example: Technology and architecture (civil, mechanical, electrical, computer and chemical engineering, IT, dental sciences, pharmacy, nursing, biotechnology, business, education, natural sciences and arts. Thus there are many similarities between DSI and TAMK. There are about 12 thousand students at DSI. During our visit at DSI we had very fruitful discussion with the Senior Executive Vice President, Mr. Janardhan. We also met the representatives of the Department of Biotechnology.

We invited representatives from both universities to visit TAMK. Hopefully after these visit we can get into action of student and teacher’s exchange between our institutions and you would hear more about this cooperation with Indian universities a lot more in the future.

For more information please see:
http://www.dayanandasagar.edu/
http://www.uasbangalore.edu.in/

Text and photo: Senior lecturer Eeva-Liisa Viskari, Environmental Engineering

Visitors from Hokkaido University

Professor Naoyuki Funamizu is giving a lecture at TAMK about composting toilet studies.

On March 15 TAMK got special visitors from Hokkaido University. Professor Naoyuki Funamizu representing the School of Engineering, Division of Build Environment and there Water System Research Group and Professor Kozo Yoshikawa, who is responsible of the International Affairs in the School of Engineering and especially developing international engineering education.

The day started with a guest lecture by Professor Funamizu. His research group is focusing on sanitation issues. The audience consisted mostly on Environmental Engineering students and staff heard most interesting lecture about Composting toilets and sanitation research in Hokkaido University.

Hokkaido University is located in Sapporo, a city known to us Finns from the Winter Olympics. The university was founded in 1876 and at that time it was called Sapporo Agricultural College. It was Japan’s first university to award bachelor's degrees. Today the university is one of the leading academic centers in Japan. The visit was not the first one for either of the guests. Professor Naoyuki Funamizu has visited Tampere several times and participating all three Dry Toilet conferences. Professor Yoshikawa in turn has been at TAMK two years ago discussing TAMK-Hokkaido University cooperation.

In the afternoon we had discussions about cooperation between TAMK and Hokkaido University. Vice President Marja Sutela considered the work in developing the internship program of the university most interesting. Based on the afternoon discussions it was obvious that the cooperation between TAMK and Hokkaido University will be expanded from Environmental Engineering to all fields of Engineering. The idea is to start both student exchange for studying and doing practical training periods. So hopefully there will be new exchange opportunities for our students in the future.

For more information about Hokkaido University please see: http://www.hokudai.ac.jp/en

Text and photo: Senior lecturer Eeva-Liisa Viskari, Environmental Engineering

Welcome to the 1st meeting for TAMK's own ecological school garden -project

The day is set, the time is set, now it is time for you to set your minds for a

FIRST MEETING FOR OUR OWN ECOLOGICAL SCHOOL GARDEN,

Wednesday, 25th of November, at 17.00 in TAMK at B6-33


Absolutely everyone is welcome, you can also bring friends with you if you want, this is going to be fun!

What we are going to do is to plan a school garden where we students, especially the ENVEs but I don't see a reason why others cannot join, will have the chance to grow our very own, ecologically correct food, where we can spend some time outside, where we can try out everything we want (first ideas are rainwater harvesting system, own ecological fertilizer, permaculture, garden on the roof...), where we can relax and follow our roots and dig in the mud.

The end of the ready packed carrots and salads has come! No imported food anymore, no unknown chemicals in our meals!

This first meeting will be for gathering ideas, sharing knowledge, and setting up a first timeplan and a strategy. I am more than willing to put lots of energy into this project, but I cannot do this by myself, so I need every single one of you!

The planning period will be during the winter so that we can start in springtime to get into action.

So put your rubberboots on and get ready for next Wednesday!

I cannot wait to hear what ideas you all have!

post by Magdalena, student at TAMK, IENVE08

pictures: Aino-Maija Kyykoski
picture above from organic apple farm Hostetin, Czech
picture below from permaculture and organic farm, Taranaki Environment centre, New Zealand

Ecoday arranged by students of Environmental Engineering

With the fund received from the city of Tampere's climate campaign "ILMANKOS", TAMK's Environmental Engineering students' Association G.L.O.B.E. arranged an “Ecoday in Ritakatu”. The day and event was aimed especially at foreign students studying in TAMK and PIRAMK and living in the IOT student housing in Ritakatu, Ruotula.

The idea for the Ecoday came from the fact that some environmental students concerned about waste management and other environmental issues were especially concerned of the situation in IOT buildings in Ritakatu. Lot of information that existed on the site about waste management was in Finnish only and most foreign students, especially exchange students, are only capable of understanding English.

So us Env.Eng. students, in G.L.O.B.E., felt that we could do something. The project arranged aimed towards protecting the environment, reducing greenhouse gas emissions and for a saving in the general costs of waste management for all parties involved.

Students who participated in the planning and executing the Ecoday event were altogether 11 and from all over the world, such places as Tanzania, Vietnam, China, UK, Algeria, South-Africa...


Few of the participants comments captured to describe the event better:

“We walked toward the buildings where we were going from a door to another, introducing briefly ourselves to the inhabitants, why we are here and what we were expecting from them. We distributed the material that we had such as: Brochures, Biodegradable waste bags for biowaste sorting, energy-saving lamps, and giving them an opportunity to get rid of hazardous waste if they had any and then disposed it properly to one of the waste handling sites in Tampere.”


“Indeed, separating waste is simple and important but not all the people know how to do it correctly. So I hope more similar activities will be organized in the coming future.”

"Information sharing and little help of material to get started with and students were one step more motivated to recycle more and think about their energy consumption".

Internship at the PRI in Australia

Before leaving it was a tough job to briefly explain the nature of my internship to those asking what I was going to do in Australia. Well, I'm going to work for the Permaculture Research Institute. Hmm. The blank look in many people's eyes implied a further explanation could be in place. Permaculture comes from words 'permanent agriculture' and it could be classified in many ways. Quoting the PRI website Permaculture "is the conscious design and maintenance of agriculturally productive ecosystems which have the diversity, stability, and resilience of natural ecosystems. It is the harmonious integration of landscape and people providing their food, energy, shelter, and other material and non-material needs in a sustainable way". The concept was formulated by Bill Mollison and David Holmgren in the late 1970s and is now hitting the mainstream all over the world.

I came across the term for the first time when somewhere in Youtube I bumped into maybe the most famous five minutes of permaculture, "Greening the Desert" video clip, where a badly salted desert was brought back to life, growing fruit trees and even mushrooms only with the rainfall that landed on the area naturally. It was in the same time when we had an ongoing course at TAMK about water and environmental issues in developing countries. The video was almost too good to be true, and I decided if that's possible by using permaculture, I want to learn permaculture too!

PRI is an educational center and a demonstration site for sustainable ways to provide for our living. It's a farm like setup with teaching facilities, own solar power and drinking water systems, reed bed for gray water treatment, composting toilet, vegetable garden, cows, ducks, chicken and food forests all cycling together supporting the functions of each other as well as the needs of the staff and interns on site.

What I've learned here puts my environmental engineering degree into a whole new context. Hearing people talk about sustainable use of natural resources these days usually makes it sound like the glass will be half empty in any case, that the consumers now have less at their disposal. That doesn't sound too appealing to many people, and often I've heard someone say "we can't go backwards". However the truth is if we don't change directions now, we will soon end up where we're going. The evidence is out there, these days it's in the news every day. We don't need any more of it do we, it's time to move on and switch on the repair mode. And it is possible, to take a new approach, a new direction and overcome the challenges that careless exploitation of resources has caused. Australia is a good example of this, having suffered from drought for ten years now. The permaculture projects that I have visited or worked for are now moving towards repairing the dry and exhausted country, bringing flowing water back to the creeks, planting trees and building soil meanwhile the neighboring farmers continue spraying, plowing and grazing their land and getting less and less returns for more and more inputs every year.

In my opinion the difference and excellence of permaculture is that instead of going to a battle against the problem, whether it is the so called weeds, lack of water, erosion or running out of oil, we can start living the solution by designing our lives according to principles and patterns of nature. This way we can create the systems that provide for our needs (for example food production or drinking water) and in the same time contribute to the well-being of the system itself (building soil instead of eroding it, recharging creeks and aquifers) and thereby make them become better and more abundant for the next generation.

In more practical terms permaculture just arranges what was always there in a different way, so that it works to conserve energy (or water, or soil) or produces more than it consumes. The main framework for permaculture is operating within the three main ethics; care for the earth, care for the people, share fairly and return the surplus to the system.

To learn more, there's an interesting documentary "Farm for the future" by BBC was recently released and can be found online at
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=2750012006939737230


Mari, Environmental Engineering student at TAMK


picture by Tashi

TAMK goes green

TAMK goes Green this spring! Are you?

x

We warmly welcomed hundreds of visitors to our Go Green event which was held on the 23^rd of April at the Teiskontie campus. Our exhibition was filled with fifteen tables in which numerous sponsors came to talk to student, display their products and participate in our event.

The participating companies were; UPM, Pirkanmaan Porakaivo, Pirkanmaan Jätehuolto, Suntrica, Vegaaniliitto and Runsaudensarvi, DODO, the Green Party and the Ikimono Creative Agency. The areas of expertise were; organic goods, recycled fashion, solar energy and thermal heating and much more.

We had three lecture hours, the first was ‘Material and Energy saving through Engineering Mechanics’ presented by Gerd Mühlenbeck from Germany, Sanna Huikuri of DODO, Helsinki and a series of mini-lectures; ‘Aspects of Change’ focusing on and presented by, the Green Party, the Carrot Mob, Solar Technology and Ethical Business/Customer Decisions.

We had two documentaries shown; one being ‘Garbage: the Revolution Begins at Home’ and ‘Recipes for Disaster’. Both documentary screenings were accompanied by free popcorn and soda.

Our fair item was an organic cotton shopping bag which we sold for one euro at the event. TAMK was very satisfied with the success of this environmental fair and we are looking forward to doing it again next year.

TAMK Goes Green on Thursday

Students, teachers and staff are warmly welcomed to discover ways to work and live green.

'Go Green' examines the future of green business and research; in addition to introducing ways to get involved in green actions both locally and globally. 'Go Green' presents lectures and challenging films to spark dialog.

Schedule on Thursday April 23

09.30 Material and energy saving through Engineering Mechanics, Dr. Gerd Mühlenbeck (Room D1-02)
10.30 Aspects of Change, mini-lecture series (Room D1-02)
11.30 Lunch break
12.00 Garbage: The Revolution Begins At Home, Documentary Film (Auditorium D1-04)
13.30 Green in Everyday, Sanna Huikuri (Room D1-02)
14.30 Recipes for Disaster, Documentary Film (Auditorium D1-04)

10.00-15.30 Exhibition area open for all

All lectures and films will be presented in English.
Free popcorn for movie-goers!

Lectures

Material and energy saving through Engineering Mechanics, Gerd Mühlenbeck (45 min)

Dr. Mühlenbeck demonstrates what we can achieve by using engineering mechanics to save material and energy in addition to explosion protection in accordance with European Standards such as ATEX.

Being Green Everyday, Sanna Huikuri (45 min)

Sanna Huikuri (Dodo ry) is an Environmental Engineer (Tamk '03), Master's student in Environmental Sciences/Renewable energy and active in environmental organizations. Huikuri will discuss daily green questions and decisions affecting us all. Huikuri emphasizes how meaningful everyday decisions are to the big picture of environmental issues. Choosing green is a modern responsible lifestyle for everyone, not the marginal actions of environmental groups. Huikuri brings new points of views to what changes in our environment affects, not only climate change but it also causes other issues such as poverty.

Aspects of Change, mini-lecture series (50 min)

• The Green Party (Tampereen Vihreät nuoret- Virnu ry) will discuss how environmental issues can be approached and affected from a political point of view.
• The Carrot Mob (Porkkanamafia) will introduce the activities of The Carrot Mob and the successes they have achieved in environmental areas.
• Elle Yli-Ojanperä, Creative Producer - Ethical business and customer decisions.
• Suntrica - Solar charging goes personal. Suntrica will spark a conversation about utilizing green technology and business practices.

Films

Go Green will be presenting two must-see feature length documentary films which will challenge the viewer to rethink the disposable lifestyle that is draining our environment.

Recipes for Disaster (FIN, 85 min)
This is a film about climate change. About catastrophe. And it's funny, painfully funny. We love to blame the corporations and industries for what's going wrong with the planet, but we are mistaken. It's us, baby. You and me. We're the real bad guys.

This film shows that at the core of the impending climate catastrophe are those little failures that we as individuals make every day, and which are so much a part of human nature. All the everyday stuff that we don't do, or that we can't help doing, that eventually lead to destruction. The film shows thirteen of these little recipes for disaster.
A documentary film, a comedy of errors, about a subject too serious to ignore.
-John Webster, Director and Writer

Garbage! The Revolution Starts at Home (CAN, 76 min)
Garbage! The Revolution Starts at Home is a feature documentary about how the family household has become one of the most ferocious environmental predators of our time.

Concerned for the future of his new baby boy Sebastian, writer and director Andrew Nisker takes an average urban family, the McDonalds, and asks them to keep every scrap of garbage that they create for three months. He then takes them on a journey to find out where it all goes and what it's doing to the world. The McDonalds discover that for every action there is a reaction that affects them and the entire planet.

Everyday life under a microscope has never been so revealing. By the end of this trashy odyssey, you are truly inspired to revolutionize your lifestyle for the sake of future generations.

Exhibition

The Exhibition area will be open 10-15.30, with a selection of green companies, projects and organizations. A variety of tables will be set up around the info café lobby, presenting a variety of goods, ranging from; organic, recycled, fashion, solar energy, thermal heating, etc. Tampere local brand Trad. will be presenting the idea of social design and recycled materials with a gallery of fashion pieces.

Go Green is organized by TAMK Consulting Academy with the support of the Research & Development Department and International Business Programme of TAMK. TAMK Consulting Academy is a group of International Business students working on a variety of projects throughout Finland as well as internationally. The event is produced in cooperation with students from the Finnish Media Degree Programme of TAMK.

Go Green

Environmental Engineering students’ Association receives funding from Tampere city

The climate campaign ILMANKOS hosted by the City of Tampere has distributed a small amount of funding to associations in Tampere to encourage climate friendly actions within, and by, these societies. Some good examples of cases are "action to prevent climate change" planned by, or within, even the smallest of societies and associations were taken into special consideration when deciding who to award funding to.

TAMK’s Environmental Engineering students’ Association, G.L.O.B.E., was considered to be very sufficient and thus received funding to fulfil their plans to create an action day aimed towards foreign and exchange students studying in Tampere and in TAMK. "Ecoday by G.L.O.B.E." is being arranged now and will include Environmental Engineering students going from door to door in a local student apartment block and distributing information and leaflets about sorting out household waste and energy saving. Students will also give to tenants energy saving lamps, change them and share biobags and teaching how to "build your own biobag from newspapers!" They will also be arranging to collect, and dispose of correctly, any unwanted electrical or otherwise hazardous waste!

ILMANKOS campaign arranges workshop open for all on Thursday 16.4.2009 at 3.30 pm in vanha kirjastotalo, 1st floor at keskustori in Tampere where one of the speakers is the chairman of G.L.O.B.E., presenting the project plan.

Transition towns and peak oil to Enve students

The Environmental Engineering student Association G.L.O.B.E. arranged an event for students to hear more about PEAK OIL and TRANSITION TOWNS. The speaker we had an opportunity to hear was Jupiter Cormier, the founder of Transition Network branch in Finland.

What was all this about then? Well, to quote the transition towns’ webpage:

“It all starts off when a small collection of motivated individuals within a community come together with a shared concern: how can our community respond to the challenges, and opportunities, of Peak Oil and Climate Change?”

Jupiter, a graduate with a masters degree in International Studies and Diplomacy from SOAS, University of London explains to us: “we will never run out of oil, but the time of cheap and plentiful oil is over”. “Oil is everywhere, usually we do not even understand in how many things in our lives it plays such a big role” he continues.


According to Jupiter there is a need for huge socio-economic restructuring. Today’s global economic system is not working for the majority of people in world, including most people in developed countries as can be seen in the current collapse of the global financial markets. This combined with climate change and soon to rise energy prices creates a necessity to decentralize and localize. Jupiter also said that we can talk about nuclear and hydrogen as resources and alternatives to oil, but in reality, we can measure and estimate that they are not even close in meeting the current demands of energy and cannot help us to carry on the lifestyle we are living at the moment in western countries.

“We have to realize that we are consuming more than the Earth has to offer and at the moment 2/3 of natural resources are depleted already” Jupiter explains. The triple challenge of climate change, peak oil and an economic recession, according to him, offers the possibility for change. It is therefore a challenge that can be turned into an opportunity. As we might have learned from research results, the happiness in many western countries has not increased since the 1980’s which means that more consumerism and economic growth does not necessarily bring more happiness. Jupiter’s solution to create sustainability, resilience and happiness is to use the transition town model with the idea of local production, permaculture and sustainable living to transcend our oil dependent society into a more sane and fulfilling way of living.

Jupiter will continue to open up minds in Finland and to speak about peak oil and the transition that is needed now. He offers practical steps to people and has started his transition town in his hometown Hämeenkyrö already. Jupiter offered the students also a possibility to join and the interested audience seemed to grab the opportunity and joined first of all to the mailing list in Finland.

To learn more about transition towns visit at the website: www.transitiontowns.org or contact Jupiter: Jupiter.cormier AT gmail.com.