06/07/2007

Graduate leads an award-winning try

Project aims to reduce petroleum-based products

By ERIN CROWELL

Special to the Record-Eagle

Donahue

MUSKEGON — The Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory's Ship Operations Group will receive the Closing-the-Circle Award in the "Green Purchasing” category at the White House on June 12.

The Ship Operations Group project consists of a fleet of research vessels that have been converted from petroleum-based to bio-based fuel operations. As a branch of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the Ship Operations Group project is led by Dennis Donahue, a Great Lakes Maritime Academy graduate and chief operations manager of the Muskegon Field Facilities and Ship Services Branch.

"It's been my project from the get-go,” Donahue said. "We have a number of ships rather old and we wanted to do something unique and groundbreaking.”

The GLERL did just that, converting petroleum-based ships in the range of 30 to 50 years old into 100 percent alternative fuel-based vessels. Over the past several years, Donahue has worked on over 50 ships located from Alaska to the Gulf of Mexico.

"Once we proved that you could use B100 (soybean oil) for your fuel source, then we looked at all petroleum-based products used on ships,” said Donahue.

"Over the past four years, we've replaced things like hydraulic oils, transmission oils, even the motor oil.”

Operators who have taken up the practice are primarily concerned with environmental issues, or they deal directly with the public — such as ferry boat services, said Donahue.

"Taking everything into account, we've seen an overall 17 percent cost reduction,” he said.

The Closing-the-Circle Award has helped catapult the project into the limelight and generated greater public interest, said Donahue.

Originally from Grosse Pointe Woods, Donahue has had a lifelong interest in the Great Lakes and maritime heritage. Shortly after graduating from the Great Lakes Maritime Academy in 1981, he worked in the automotive industry for eight years. But the water called him back.

"That's where my interest always was,” he said.