UNITEN ICE STUDENT CHAPTER

ICE Exhibition 2011 REPORT

Can environment conservation and development go hand in hand? This was one of the questions posed by civil engineering students of Universiti Tenaga Nasional (UNITEN) from the Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE) Student Chapter at their ICE Exhibition 2011 which was held on the 12th and 13th of January 2011. Under the guidance of the UNITEN ICE Student Chapter advisor, Dr Chua Kok Hua, the exhibition was held for the third time since its inaugural exhibition in 2008 at the College of Engineering, UNITEN with the collaboration of Green Quirks, a club consists of UNITEN pre-university students that passion about the environment. In conjunction with the theme of Sustainable Development, the main goal of this two-day event was to create environmental awareness among students and lecturers by focusing on the occurrences and effects of global warming. The opening ceremony of the exhibition was attended by the ICE representative of Malaysia, Dr. Ooi Teik Aun; Deputy Vice Chancellor of UNITEN, Prof. Ir. Dr. Kamal Nasharuddin Mustapha; Dr Chua Kok Hua the advisor and lecturers and students from UNITEN. Prof. Dr. Kamal In his welcoming speech, announced that UNITEN management is launching a Free of Polystyrene Day, FOPD campaign beginning 28th January. It is an apt announcement as it ties up with this year exhibition theme of green awareness. 16 exhibition booths were set up with accompanying posters, 3-D models and video presentation. Preparations for the booths had been made by civil engineering students taking the subject of Environmental Engineering weeks before the exhibition. Each booth presented different topics tackling a wide range of issues including Sustainable Development, Eco-living, Effects of Global Warming, Floods In Malaysia, Heatwave and Bushfires, Green Building Index Concept and Green Construction Materials. Lecturers and students could be seen engaging in an interactive session of Q&A throughout the event. The mascot of this year exhibition is a turtle made of recycled materials to signify the conservation of environment and ecosystem. Waste was portrayed as a beautiful art through an art piece entitled Trash Shadow Art. A sculpture in a form of a tree made from recycled materials was projected as shadow to a screen. It was unique and creative. A forum entitled Inculcating the love for our environment was conducted in the evening. Few video clips were shown to generate the discussion on environmental concerns. A building competition named The World Buildings was held concurrently with the exhibition. For this competition, 11 miniatures of famous landmarks from around the world were constructed using recyclable materials such as plastic bottles, aluminum cans and newspapers. It encourages the students to be creative in promoting green awareness while learning the construction of world landmark structures. The objective of the competition was to promote the idea of green awareness and cutting down the wastage of raw materials. The miniatures, which included the Beijing National Stadium in China, Tokyo Tower in Japan, Pyramid of Giza in Egypt, The Pentagon and White House in America, Taj Mahal in India, Taipei 101 in Taiwan, Eiffel Tower in Paris and Coliseum in Rome had been in the works since December of last year and were judged by students and lecturers throughout the event based on creativity and similarity to the actual structure. At the end of the exhibition, Tokyo Tower emerged as champion.

Apart from the exhibition and competition, various games and activities were held as well. Students and lecturers could make a pledge to be more environmental-friendly in a pledge book. There was also a banner where they could stamp their palm prints on to show their support for mother earth. On another corner, information on the usage of electricity and water by the university was made available to students so that they would be aware of the utility consumption and start making conscious effort to reduce unnecessary electricity and water usage. Even the students are taught how to prepare environmental friendly detergent using fruit enzyme. The ICE Exhibition was a fun-filled event and had been praised as a very good way of instilling green awareness. The exhibition made everyone realize the importance of sustainable development and that mother earth was not given to us by our parents but was loaned to us by our children. It is only through conscious and collective effort by everyone we are able to make the world a better place or us to live in and for generations to come.

Figure 1: The Organizing Committee

Figure 2: The ICE Sculpture.

Figure 3: Opening Ceremony by Ir. Dr. Ooi Teik Aun, ICE Representative of Malaysia.

Figure 4: The audiences.

Figure 5: Handprint Campaign by Prof. Ir. Dr. Kamal Nasharuddin Mustapha, Deputy Vice Chancellor (Student Affairs, Alumni & Management) of UNITEN

Figure 6: The World Buildings miniatures.

Figure 7 & 8: The guests judging the World Buildings competition made from recycled materials.

Figure 9 & 10: The exhibitors.

Figure 11 & 12: The Hand painting session.

Figure 13: The Mascot, Recycled Material Turtle

Figure 14: The Trash Shadow Art

Figure 15: The winning group of the exhibition