UTAR continues to expand its collaborative effort with the industry-leader, Camfil Malaysia Sdn Bhd, through the memorandum of understanding (MoU) and memorandum of agreement (MoA) that came in effect on 1 January 2021.

The agreement will last for the coming five years and shall provide both parties an exhilarating opportunity to collaborate in research and development (R&D), as well as to jointly organise short courses, seminars, talks, conferences, and workshops that will allow knowledge acquisition and expansion of networks. Other collaborative efforts include collaborative projects, industry advisory ventures, industry visits, curriculum development, trainings, and consultancy. It will also facilitate industrial placement and final year project of UTAR students.

Meanwhile, this agreement will also include the setting-up of an international standard molecular gas testing facility for research and development. The facility will facilitate postgraduate research and development, and undergraduate teaching and learning activities related to air pollution, pollutants control, and remediation. With this facility, UTAR will be one of the pioneers in Malaysia to have such a modern testing facility for research and development in the field of gases pollutants.

UTAR President Ir Prof Dr Ewe Hong Tat expressed his delight, and said, “The agreement will create a platform for both parties to start a series of new meaningful projects ranging from collaborative research to sharing expertise as well as other up-skilling initiatives for UTAR students. UTAR Faculty of Engineering and Green Technology (FEGT) and Camfil Malaysia will begin the strategic partnership to integrate the latest requirements from the industry in our course curriculum and research areas. This, in turn, will ensure UTAR students acquire the pertinent qualifications, acknowledgement and the industry gets suitably competent and qualified graduates as employees.” Prof Ewe also visited Camfil Malaysia last year, in September, to discuss further on potential collaborations.

The facility will also be used for the research in gas pollutant removal, which is a research currently conducted by Prof Dr Sumathi Sethupathi, the Deputy Director of Institute of Postgraduate Studies & Research (Kampar Campus). She is actively working on research work-related control and remediation of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide and other industrial stack gases such as sulfur dioxide, hydrogen sulfide, etc. using adsorbents prepared from waste materials.

Prof Sumathi said, “The adsorbed gases will also be converted to value-added products such as methane, sulfur, and others. The facility developed by Camfil Malaysia will be helpful to further enhance my research products. The newly developed materials/adsorbents from my research output can be tested for its capability using the industrial-scale facilities. Furthermore, this new facility allows me to test my newly developed materials/adsorbents for a new type of pollutant gas i.e. chlorine gas. The facility shall be useful for my postgraduate students to advance the knowledge in gas pollution and remediation techniques. In the future, I can use this facility to test different types of toxic gases and solve many other industrial gas emission problems.”

She also mentioned, “We are keen to test other new materials developed by Camfil and UTAR researchers for the same purpose. Camfil's sponsorship to build a facility at UTAR will give new wings to testing where the performance of the materials developed for industrial-scale can be measured,” she explained. Renovations are currently in progress and the facility is expected to be completed in March 2021.

Camfil is a world leader in air filters and clean air solutions
For more than half a century, Camfil has been helping people breathe cleaner air. Camfil provides commercial and industrial systems for air filtration and air pollution control that improve worker and equipment productivity, minimise energy use, and benefit human health and the environment. We firmly believe that the best solutions for our customers are the best solutions for our planet, too. That’s why every step of the way – from design to delivery and across the product life cycle – we consider the impact of what we do on people and the world around us.

The Camfil Group is headquartered in Stockholm, Sweden, and has 30 manufacturing sites, six R&D centres, local sales offices in 30 economies, and 4,800 employees and growing. The Camfil Group proudly serve and support customers in a wide variety of industries and communities across the world. To discover how Camfil can help you to protect people, processes, and the environment, visit www.camfil.com