SMK Bintulu wins gold for its waste oil transformer project

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SMK Bintulu students and their teachers-in-charge display the award and their WOT device.

BINTULU: The team from SMK Bintulu clinched the Chief Minister’s Award (Gold) – School Category for its waste oil transformer (WOT) project at the International Science, Technology and Engineering Expo (iSTEEx) 2017 held in Kuching recently.

The team was represented by Johnson Pau Jion Seng, Ronan Ling Jing Yik and Irene Ling Xin Hui.

The WOT is a device that converts used cooking oil into liquid soap to avoid water pollution. The prototype is mainly made up of a Tetrix base set.

The process is called ‘saponification’ – a chemical reaction between oil and an alkali solution to produce soap and glycerol. The soap produced can be used by the school community.

The main objective of iSTEEx2017 was to showcase the latest innovation and research projects by secondary school students and those from institutions of higher learning, as well as the industry.

Participants got to demonstrate their creativity and problem-solving skills using sustainable materials that are not harmful to the environment.

Hosted by Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (Unimas), the competition themed ‘Nurturing Green Innovation for the Future’ was divided into School and Open categories.