UL - With universities preparing to tighten their budgets and to make cuts where they can, one research center at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette is moving toward self-sustainability.

In recent months, the UL Center of Ecology and Environmental Technology has begun generating solar energy and collecting rain water to operate its pair of half-acre greenhouses that store faculty research.

And soon, the center will begin making its own diesel fuel from recycled vegetable oil from the ULL cafeteria.

“The energy cost of running this facility is a couple of thousand dollars a month,” said Susan Mopper, a professor of biology and the center’s director. “We can take some of the economic burden off the state by using renewable resources.”

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By MARSHA SILLS
Advocate Acadiana bureau