Professor Ng How Yong from the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, has led the team from EnvironSens Pte Ltd, a NUS start-up company, to win the Prestigious Engineering Achievement Award 2020 by the Institution of Engineers, Singapore (IES) together with PUB Singapore in recognition of their outstanding engineering project, “Microbial Electrochemical Sensor (MES) for Detecting Heavy Metals and Cyanide Discharge in Used Water”.
While studying if bacteria could be used to generate electricity, the idea of developing a real-time toxicity sensor for heavy metals and cyanide for monitoring used water discharge into Singapore’s sewers was conceived. Bringing the idea from laboratory to pilot and ultimately deployment required a rigorous process of scientific testing in the laboratory, field trials of a first generation system (that was housed in a 20ft container), and eventually development of a compact system the size of a mini-fridge. A local spin-off was formed to commercialise the technology. Today the Microbial Electrochemical Sensors (MES) system has been deployed at 100 industrial sites in Singapore, as part of continuous water toxicity monitoring regime in PUB, enabling real-time surveillance with transmission of data and alerts of heavy metal discharge above the allowable limits.
Congratulations Prof Ng!
