Located at 1 Hazelwood Drive, a few blocks from Kirby Avenue and tucked away from the rest of campus, the Illinois Sustainable Technology Center (ISTC) is bursting with activity for such a quiet location.

The ISTC is one of five survey groups that form the Institute of Natural Resource Sustainability (INRS). The Institute has existed in Illinois for over a century and the ISTC is one of its newest survey groups.

“The agency was founded to help industry,” said Dr. John Marlin, acting director of the center.

In order to do this, Marlin said the main goal of the ISTC is to help industry become more efficient in their practices by producing less waste.

“Waste is result of a defective product or process,” Marlin said. “If you can prevent (wasteful processes), you can prevent it from becoming waste.”

Marlin also said most waste issues can be solved by addressing one of two main problems: leakages and contamination. In order to best combat these problems, the ISTC is split into various sectors.

Dr. Tim Lindsey, Associate Director for technical assistance at the center, leads a group focusing on research in bio-based lubricants in particular.

“We’ve found out over the years that we can use vegetable oil lubricants (in certain vehicles) instead of traditional hydraulic fluids to reduce damage if there’s a spill,” Lindsey said.

Fossil fuels take a long time to degrade, while vegetable oil is biodegradable, Lindsey said. In the case of vegetable oil, when it spills, it will be eaten by microorganisms, as opposed to staying around for awhile and harming the environment.

A few companies are interested in using bio-lubricants, while some already do, Lindsey said. Caterpillar, a company that builds tractors, bulldozers and other industry motor-vehicles, is interested in using a bio-lubricant instead of oil. The company that built the elevators for the Statue of Liberty also currently uses it.

“Big places that use it are in sensitive areas, like a watershed or national parks,” Lindsey said.

Another important sector of the ISTC is led by Dr. Kishore Rajagopalan, Associate Director for Applied Research of the center. His group focuses on the relationship between water and energy.

“To produce electricity (energy), you need a lot of water,” Kishore said.

Because of this, a lot of his research involves finding ways to use salt water instead of fresh water to produce energy. At the ISTC, Kishore is developing a desalination process that uses a method called forward osmosis to remove salt from salt water.

“Forward osmosis is advantageous for three main reasons: it is a low pressure process, it uses waste heat to run and it can be done on a small or large scale,” Kishore said.

Water from this process can then be used to produce electricity and other forms of energy without using up more of our small freshwater supply.

Kishore is also working on extracting oil from various renewable resources. Jatropha seeds, in particular, are a unique source of oil, he said. Among its benefits, Jatropha seeds have a 40 percent oil content, and are cheap to produce. His group even used this seed in relief efforts in Haiti because the process is so cost efficient and the seed is native to Haiti.

“The only problem is the by-product that’s left behind is a toxic compound,” Kishore said. “We’re working on converting it to be a consumable protein for animals, and even people later,” he said.