EARTH WIND & SCIENCE

ASEE Prism, Summer 2008 by Wu, Corinna

In just seven years, sustainable engineering-technology to protect the planet while raising living standards-has caught fire with students and professors across the U.S.

WHEN REGINA CLEWLOW graduated from Cornell University in 2001, she didn't take the career path one might expect of someone with a degree in computer science. She wanted to apply her technical skills toward improving the lives of the poor, and do so in an environmentally sustainable way.

Clewlow considered joining the Peace Corps, but then decided to take matters into her own hands. She continued at Cornell, pursuing a master's degree in civil engineering to reorient herself. In one of her classes, she drafted a business plan for a new organization focused on sustainable engineering. She then collaborated with Krishna Athreya, director of Minority and Women's Programs in Engineering at Cornell, to develop the framework for what would become Engineers for a Sustainable World (ESW).

The idea took off. In the spring of 2002, the first two ESW chapters formed at Cornell and at Pennsylvania State University. By December, more chapters sprang up - at Stanford and Northwestern universities, the California Institute of Technology and the University of California, Berkeley. "A lot of students around the country were thinking that they would like their careers in engineering work to go in similar directions," Clewlow says, "so the other chapters came on board pretty quickly." Today, ESW has dozens of campus chapters and holds an annual conference attended by hundreds of faculty, students and professional engineers.

Students and faculty have long been vocal about reducing pollution, conserving energy, and alleviating poverty. But there are signs of greater campus activism than a decade ago, even a revival of a previous generation's "save the world" idealism. Richard Luthy, chair of the department of civil and environmental engineering at Stanford University, says he's reminded of his own student days during the 1960s at the University of California, Berkeley.

And engineers are now finding that they have something important to contribute to this movement, given their specialized technical skills. Many feel they can help answer the core question underlying many sustainability issues: How can we raise the standard of living for present and future generations and not destroy the planet in the process?

Institutions are responding, as well. According to Clewlow, who has served as executive director of ESW since its founding and is now going back to school for a Ph.D., the opportunities for engineering students to pursue an interest in sustainability have grown tremendously in the past few years. Faculty research is focusing on sustainability, and this in turn influences changes in curriculum. Engineering schools are offering courses, and in some cases even degrees, in sustainable engineering. Universities have made commitments to go green in nearly all their operations. In sum, sustainability is becoming a fundamental part of the way engineering departments-and indeed, entire college campuses-look at education.

SPREADING INFLUENCE

IN 1987, the United Nations World Commission on Environment and Development, also known as the Brundtland Commission, published a report called Our Common Future,which proposed long-term strategies for sustainable development. "Humanity has the ability to make development sustainable to ensure that it meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs," the commission stated.

As the office of sustainability at the University of Florida defines it, sustainability "means looking at the issues and problems facing our world with a new perspective-one that focuses on three interdependent areas of concern: ecological preservation, economic viability, and social justice."

Sustainable engineering addresses these challenges by adapting existing technologies and developing new ones. Essentially, it focuses on energy, materials, chemicals and water. Design and manufacturing techniques that improve energy efficiency, make use of recycled materials or renewable resources, minimize pollution, and reduce water use are all examples of sustainable engineering. Students require not only technical knowledge but also a background in the social sciences to understand the environmental impact of their decisions.

Jeff Rayl, a sophomore majoring in electrical engineering at Pennsylvania State University and president of the ESW chapter there, thinks back to his days as a Boy Scout, when he was taught to leave a campsite cleaner than he found it. "To me, sustainability means leaving the world cleaner than you found it," he says. "Engineering gives us the tools to maintain our lives and do so in a sustainable way."

So far, most of the activity of integrating sustainability into coursework has been concentrated in civil and environmental engineering departments. "These are the engineers that help society to function," says Luthy. "The qualifier now is that they have to help society to function in more sustainable ways." Today, civil engineering students might learn about how to develop a system that both treats wastewater and reuses it for irrigation, or about principles of "green architecture" that make buildings more environmentally friendly.