NBN Sustainability Award 2024

The NBN Sustainability Award: something for you?

Making your life better, safer and easier is what standards are for. And that's what the NBN is all about. Thanks to standards, products and services are developed that meet the latest requirements - also in terms of sustainability. To encourage students in this, the NBN established the NBN Sustainability Award.
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What is it?

Part of the Flemish Thesis Award, the NBN Sustainability Award highlights theses that address the issue of sustainability. All courses can be entered, as long as the subject of the thesis deals with sustainability.

Each participant receives his or her own page in the Flemish Thesis Bank: a brilliant calling card for your future career.

For the winner, there is the recognition and attention within the NBN network of experts. He or she also goes home with a prize worth 1,500 euros.

The remaining three nominees will have the opportunity to explain their thesis at the annual NBN event. They will each receive and check for 500 euros.
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What should your thesis meet?

There are three conditions attached to the award:

• Your thesis provides new insights or innovative applications around sustainability.

• Your article clearly indicates the potential impact of your research: how can the result be used or valorized?

• You take care of the editorial quality of the article in terms of clarity, style and structure. It must be accessible to a wide audience.

These theses won awards this year

Four students received awards and were honored to receive awards from the NBN.  

The winner:

Gentiel Acar received the first-ever NBN Sustainability Award for his thesis on the reuse of mineral wool insulation. His pioneering research on the recovery of insulation material won out over the three other nominees due to its social impact, closing the material loop and practical feasibility in the current economic climate.

The nominees:

Adeline De Clercq impressed the jury with the clear exposition of her research into the legal aspects of pfos pollution. And especially what we can learn from the approach to pfos pollution in the United States.

Casper Van Herzele won the cash prize for his invention of Nanto Secure: a digital passport for clothing that takes into account the European Commission's Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation. A breakthrough on the road to circular fashion.

Emma Gouwy fell in the awards thanks to her promising research on golden kelp. Specifically, how bacteria can save these large brown algae - so important to our ecosystem - from extinction.
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