Advanced Biofuels USA Executive Director's Lecture Tour of Three Pennsylvania Universities; Includes Video and Educational Materials

by Joanne Ivancic* (Advanced Biofuels USA) As executive director of Advanced Biofuels USA, I've given presentations about renewable fuels around the world--via Zoom and in-person. Often my favorite part is the Q&A where I gain valuable insights from the perspectives and comments from the audience.

This month I was fortunate to have the opportunity to visit three universities in Pennsylvania in person, to have time to visit labs, to hear about innovative research, to meet students and to get thoughtful and valuable responses to my request for suggestions as to how we can improve our educational and communications efforts.

The tour started with an invitation from Professor Maria Cohen at East Stroudsburg University. She and a number of her students participated in the 2026 Energypath (3 days of hands-on workshops and a day-long professional conference) put on in July by the Regenerative Energy Initiative. Advanced Biofuels USA had an information table at the conference and I did a short presentation. Later, Professor Cohen invited me to present about renewable fuels for Physics students at ESU. I happily agreed was also pleased to arrange presentations at two other Pennsylvania universities the same week.

The first stop was at Villanova. I had visited this lovely Augustinian campus to give a presentation and to tour their biodiesel production project in 2014, so I contacted Dr. Charles Coe of the Chemical and Biological Engineering Department to invite myself back. He graciously accepted my offer.

I had the priviledge to present to science and engineering students, many who mentioned a particular interest in sustainable engineering, and to visit Dr. Coe's lab, and others, and to learn from him and his team of student researchers about their carbon capture/biohydrogen production projects. I also had the opportunity to talk with department chair Dr. Chris Kitchens about his work with hydrothermal carbonization and pyrolysis of brewers spent grains. Thanks to them for making a video of my presentation which is available here (starts at 2:30).

If you watch that video, it becomes apparent that we are still working on getting the glitches out of our updated presentation. As part of our Earth Month activities, we posted a Beta version recording of this presentation and asked for suggestions for improvements.

My next stop was at Thomas Jefferson University located in the heart of Philadelphia. About 10 years ago, Dr. Scott E. Gygax, Biotechnology Program Director at Thomas Jefferson, invited me to present online to graduate microbiology students about the role of microbiology in the world of biofuels. We continued these presentations every few years since then with Professor Sean Chadwick's students.

Since we have had a friendly working relationship for a few years, I asked if the Thomas Jefferson students could look at the Beta recording before class, then I would just do a 15 minute summary presentation to be followed by a candid discussion from the students about what they thought of that Beta version and how we might improve that. And, I asked for suggestions for how we could better communicate information about renewable fuels.

Thankfully, they took the invitation to be a focus group for us seriously and came up with a lot of good, practical, insightful and thoughtful suggestions that we will be working on incorporating into our educational materials immediately. As you watch the Villanova video or Beta recording, you are also welcome to send your suggestions to us at info@advancedbiofuelsusa.org.

Finally, I got to the beautiful Pocono Mountains and East Stroudsburg University to visit with both Marie Cohen and Dr. Robert Cohen, former chair of their Physics Department about their work and particular interest in teaching science, -- teaching science teachers to teach science. Just the type of specialized expertise I was gathering on this trip.

People ask about the purpose of our recorded "Renewable Fuels: How? What? Why?" presentation and related materials. We have observed that hardly any students learn anything about renewable fuels in science classes from K-12 or in college. We want to provide materials that teachers, faculty, students and civic, faith and other community groups can use to inform themselves of the basics, to provide basic foundational information about fuels that can be used to replace fossil petroleum and fossil natural gas--and about the related chemicals in the bioeconomy and circular economy related to this. I urged Dr. Cohen to try out our materials in his classes for science teachers and to let me know if they are useful--or not.

In addition to getting a tour of the new science and technology building, I spoke in a classroom with a history going back to before white boards and projectors permanently installed on the ceiling. It was fun to watch students scrawl on the blackboard debating paths to answering a recent Physics exam question.

It was also valuable to talk with a Physics audience as I am usually invited to speak with biology, microbiology, engineering and environmental groups. They had valuable questions and observations that will also influence how we proceed with developing educational materials.

I hope you find these materials useful for your own use and as resources for classrooms, civic and faith organizations, and environmental groups. And, for anyone around the world interested in learning more about renewable fuels as an immediate energy security, economic development, military strategic flexibilty, pollution control and climate change mitigation solution--not just for mobility, but also for cooking, heating, and industrial purposes.