The Grainger College of Engineering
Electrical & Computer Engineering

Students win Shell360 international competition (VIDEO)

6/28/2016 Claire Hettinger, ECE ILLINOIS

Three ILLINOIS students, including two ECE undergraduates, won the grand finale of the Shell Ideas360 competition in London on July 1. They were the only team from the United States in the finals of the international competition.

Written by Claire Hettinger, ECE ILLINOIS

Three ILLINOIS students won the international Shell Ideas360 competition for innovation. They received the Judges Choice Global Innovation Award.

Winners: Sean Ebihara, Somak Ghosh, and Antonio Woods.
Winners: Sean Ebihara, Somak Ghosh, and Antonio Woods.

In addition to taking home the Shell Ideas360 trophy, their prize includes a National Geographic adventure of a lifetime. The Illinois team was one of five teams and the only team from the United States to travel to London to compete in the final round of competition. 

Somak Ghosh and Antonio Woods, both ECE undergraduate students, and Chemistry student Sean Ebihara won for their idea titled “Graphene Coated Condensers for a Greener Future.” It looks at the Graphene coating process to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and the footprint of power plants. 

The competition hoped to inspire innovation surrounding the world’s water supply, food and energy issues. The students received real-life experiences that make an impact on the world. 

“There has been a distinct lack of innovation in power plants, with the last one built in the United States in the late 1970s,” Ghosh said on the Shell360 website. "Crucially our idea is also technologically and financially sound and it’s awesome that our idea has been recognized (sic) through the Shell Ideas360 competition – it’s a validation of all the hard work we’ve put into it."

For Stage III of the competition, the finalists showcased their ideas and gave a presentation as part of Make The Future London, a festival of ideas and innovation. 

As the team explained in their pitch video, 'Because graphene (shown on the left half of the image) is ultra-thin and intrinsically condensation-phobic, it experiences dropwise mode condensation...This type of condensation allows for heat transfer, up to an order of magnitude better than uncoated pipe, thus making the condenser and power plant operate more efficiently.'
As the team explained in their pitch video, 'Because graphene (shown on the left half of the image) is ultra-thin and intrinsically condensation-phobic, it experiences dropwise mode condensation...This type of condensation allows for heat transfer, up to an order of magnitude better than uncoated pipe, thus making the condenser and power plant operate more efficiently.'
The other finalists included The SeaShrooms Project from the Singapore Management University, Team REPiphany from the Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, Tri-gen from the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom, and GrowSmart from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur in India. 

The competition began with 982 teams. From there, only 74 teams moved on to Stage II from where the final five teams were chosen. The final five teams then turned their ideas into in-depth proposals. They also received three days of intensive coaching before presenting to Shell executives, innovators and industry leaders.

Help us congratulate the team on Facebook and Twitter by using #Shell360Ideas and #ILLINOIS.

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This story was published June 28, 2016.