Participants in NMC’s AquaHacking challenge. (Photo: Jacqueline Southby, courtesy of NMC)
This coverage is made possible through a partnership between IPR and Grist, a nonprofit environmental media organization.
A business competition to tackle environmental and infrastructure issues in the Great Lakes kicked off last week.
Water quality, microplastics, PFAS and marine infrastructure are among the things people could grapple with in this year’s Great Lakes Blue Tech Challenge.
Northwestern Michigan College is leading the program.
“The idea is to sort of generate new businesses, new ideas that are focused on technologies that support the Great Lakes, or the issues facing the Great Lakes,” said Ed Bailey, NMC’s director of portfolio and program development.
The majority of funding for this initiative comes from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration as part of the Great Lakes Innovation Accelerator program.
Bailey said the Blue Tech challenge is basically a pitch competition for those working on environmental and infrastructure issues facing the region, and it’s part of trying to get more people involved with things like NMC’s planned Freshwater Research and Innovation Center.
Construction on the center is set to begin this fall at Discovery Pier along West Grand Traverse Bay.
“We feel that it’s really important that we run these innovation challenges, because they are an economic pipeline for the region, and actually tenants for the new facility,” he said. “This gives us the opportunities for businesses to develop and mature and then move into that center and grow.”
This is the third time NMC has led such a challenge, Bailey said, which is open to anyone with a viable business solution in the United States or Canada. Among the prizes, first place winners receive $35,000.
In a similar event last year, a team from Philadelphia won first place for designing a filter to catch microplastics in washing machines.