2011-2012 Bulletin – PDF - SEAS Bulletin - Columbia University

Engineer, and the doctorate degrees
(Ph.D., Eng.Sc.D.) in EEE.
The EEE program welcomes
Combined Plan students. An EEE minor
is offered to all Columbia engineering
students who want to enrich their
academic record by concentrating
some of their technical electives on
Earth/Environment subjects. There is
close collaboration between EEE and
the Departments of Civil Engineering
and Earth and Environmental Sciences,
including several joint appointments.
Research Centers
Associated with Earth
and Environmental
Engineering
Columbia Water Center. The Columbia
Water Center, in collaboration with
other Earth Institute units and external
partners, is leading intellectual inquiry
into an assessment, prediction, and
solution of the potentially global crisis of
freshwater scarcity. Goals are to:
• Develop multiscale predictive
capabilities (e.g., new data sets and
modeling tools) for local, regional, and
global water resource assessment,
recognizing changing climate,
demographic, and usage dynamics
• Target analyses toward public and
private investment in future water
resource development, local and
regional ecosystem services provided
by water and the essential life-support
water needs of societies
• Identify and test appropriate
technologies for the storage,
treatment, and conveyance of water
to improve reliable, cost-efficient
access
• Identify and compare locally
appropriate policy instruments that
facilitate the implementation of
selected incentives for higher-value,
higher-efficiency water use, while
promoting equity of use and life
support functions
• Test and demonstrate the applicability
of the policy and technology
developments in real-world settings,
working with local institutions and
private-sector developers or users in
an open and public process
• Develop and disseminate the
knowledge base that results from
our activities to support global water
resource development and decision
making, including the development
of a forum, the Global Roundtable
on Water (GROW), to facilitate
international policy and technical
action to improve our collective water
future.
For more information: www.water.
columbia.edu
Center for Life Cycle Analysis (LCA).
The Center for Life Cycle Analysis of
Columbia University was formed in the
spring of 2006 with the objective of
conducting comprehensive life cycle
analyses of energy systems. LCA
provides a framework for quantifying
the potential environmental impacts of
material and energy inputs and outputs
of a process or product from “cradle
to grave.” The mission of the Center
is to guide technology and energy
policy decisions with data- based, wellbalanced,
and transparent descriptions
of the environmental profiles of energy
systems. For more information: www.
clca.columbia.edu
Center for Sustainable Use of
Resources (SUR). The Center for
Sustainable Use of Resources builds
on the strengths of past research at
Columbia and North Carolina State on
recycling, composting, waste-to-energy,
and landfill engineering. Also, the Center
will clearly define the impacts of all solid
waste technologies and practices with
regard to greenhouse gas emissions and
will, on a case-by-case basis, establish
and validate protocols that account for
greenhouse gas emissions and savings
that may be easily replicated and
readily accepted. SUR will also identify
technologies that can replace some
virgin feedstock with appropriate local
waste streams. Through its publications,
meetings, and Web page, SUR will
disseminate information on the best
waste management technologies and
methods that, on a life-cycle basis, will
result in reducing the impacts of waste
management on global climate change.
An equally important objective of the
Center is to provide graduate-level
training, at the participating universities,
in the ways and means of sustainable
resource utilization to engineers and
scientists from the U.S. and around the
world, in particular from the developing
world, where the need for modern
management of wastes is most acute.
The Earth Engineering Center, in
collaboration with the Department of
Earth and Environmental Engineering,
has already been engaged in this role,
and some of our alumni are working in
various parts of the waste management
industry. There have been more than
twenty theses written on various aspects
of waste management, including
in-depth studies of implementing
advanced processes and methodologies
in Chile, China, Greece, and India. For
more information: www.surcenter.org
Earth Engineering Center. The
mission of the Earth Engineering
Center is to develop and promote
engineering methodologies that
provide essential material to humanity
in ways that maintain the overall
balance between the constantly
increasing demand for materials, the
finite resources of the Earth, and
the need for clean water, soil, and
air. The Center is dedicated to the
advancement of industrial ecology, i.e.,
the reconfiguring of industrial activities
and products with full knowledge of
the environmental consequences.
Research is being conducted on a
variety of geoenvironmental issues
with the intent to quantify, assess,
and ultimately manage adverse human
effects on the environment. Research
areas include management of water
and energy resources, hydrology and
hydrogeology, numerical modeling of
estuarine flow and transport processes,
and integrated waste management.
For more information, visit www.seas.
columbia.edu/earth/index.html.
Environmental Tracer Group (ETG).
The Environmental Tracer Group uses
natural and anthropogenic (frequently
transient) tracers, as well as deliberately
released tracers, to investigate the
physics and chemistry of transport in
environmental systems. The tracers
include natural or anthropogenically
produced isotopes (e.g., tritium or
radioactive hydrogen, helium and
oxygen isotopes, or radiocarbon), as
well as noble gases and chemical
compounds (e.g., CFCs and SF6).
The ETG analytical facilities include
four mass spectrometric systems that
can be used in the analysis of tritium
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engineering 2011–2012