Grand Challenges and Opportunities in Environmental Engineering and Science for the Twenty-first Century

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1643182JohnsonThe Water Science and Technology Board of The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine is undertaking a study to identify high priority challenges for the broad fields of environmental engineering and science. The committee will identify grand challenges for environmental engineering and science for the next several decades. These should be significant societal challenges that will require the expertise of environmental engineering and science to resolve or manage. The report will shape the growth of university departments, inspire the next generation of engineers and scientists to address the most pressing global environmental challenges, and improve the training of environmental engineers and scientists to better meet these challenges. The committee will hold a minimum of three meetings to receive briefings, gather information, deliberate critical issues, and write its report. The study should produce a visionary document and result in a subsequent 18-month intensive dissemination/outreach effort of value to environmental engineering and science programs throughout the United States and worldwide. Events like droughts, oil spills, and increasing food prices, illustrative of the "food-energy-water nexus", make it clear that the United States can no longer view environmental systems in isolation. Integrative solutions to these pressing challenges necessitate new educational approaches and research strategies for environmental engineering and sciences and partnerships with a wide array of engineers, scientists, and social scientists. A 2014 NRC report, "Convergence: Facilitating Transdisciplinary Integration of Life Sciences, Physical Sciences, Engineering, and Beyond", illustrates how these new problems require new thought modalities and approaches. Thus, this study will also examine ways to integrate interdisciplinary and systems approaches into environmental engineering and sciences. These are essential steps to facilitate innovative solutions to these global grand challenges for environmental engineering.