Worcester Polytechnic Institute Researchers Working to Turn Toxic Sewage Sludge into Renewable Energy Share Article Research Receives $2M from DOE to Make Wastewater Treatment Energy Neutral and Keep Billions of Pounds of Sludge Out of Landfills Worcester Polytechnic Institute PhD candidate Heather LeClerc (foreground) and WPI PhD student David Kenney work together to seal and prepare the reactor used to produce bio-oil from toxic sludge. “We’re taking something that is a huge energy consumer and turning it into an energy producer."-Michael TimkoAssociate professor of chemical engineering at WPI WORCESTER, Mass. (PRWEB) May 03, 2021 A team of researchers at Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) received a nearly $2 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) to create renewable fuel from sewage sludge, a byproduct of wastewater treatment that creates greenhouse gases and water pollution when dumped into landfills. With the U.S. EPA reporting that Americans alone are putting more than 2 billion pounds of sewage sludge into landfills every year, researchers see an opportunity to keep much of that sludge out of landfills and use it to create energy, power the wastewater treatment process, and potentially supplement municipalities’ power grids.