Courses
This course provides knowledge of environmental elements with insight into quantitative analysis and design where applicable. Topics include an introduction to environmental engineering and design process, professional associations, engineering licensure, engineering ethics, and environmental justice; dimensional analysis, mass and energy transfer and balances; environmental chemistry; mathematics of growth and decay; risk assessment and management; surface water pollutants, biological and chemical oxygen demands; eutrophication; water supply systems and drinking water standards; wastewater treatment systems and effluent standards; groundwater flow, contaminant transport, and remediation technologies; remedial and corrective actions at contaminated sites; air pollution sources, control technologies, and atmospheric stability; ambient air quality standards and indoor air quality; global temperature, greenhouse effect and warming potential; global energy balance, carbon emission, and stratospheric ozone depletion; hazardous and solid waste management, landfill disposal, combustion, composting, and recycling; medical waste. Overviews of pertinent environmental laws and regulations will be presented where applicable. The course encompasses conceptual design projects for environmental systems and infrastructures. Course Note(s): This is a required course for all students in the Environmental Engineering, Science, and Management Programs who do not possess an undergraduate degree in Environmental Engineering.
Water quality objectives and the chemical, physical, and biological processes necessary for designing and managing modern drinking water and wastewater treatment plants are described in the course. The principles of coagulation, flocculation, sedimentation, filtration, biological treatment, solids handling, disinfection, and advanced treatment processes are presented. The course serves as a basis for the more advanced courses: EN.575.745 Physical and Chemical Processes for Water and Wastewater Treatment, EN.575.706 Biological Processes for Water and Wastewater Treatment, and EN.575.746 Water and Wastewater Treatment Plant Design.
Prerequisite(s): EN.575.601 Fluid Mechanics or an equivalent course in fluid flow or hydraulics; two semesters of undergraduate chemistry.
This course covers the fundamental but practical issues of water distribution systems and wastewater/stormwater collection systems. Specific topics of interest in water supply include water supply master planning; design of water storage facilities, water mains, and pumping stations; distribution-system water quality; and service connection issues. Topics covered under wastewater/stormwater collection include hydrology and hydraulics of stormwater/wastewater conveyance systems; design of stormwater detention and retention facilities; and collection system control technologies including green infrastructure. Also covered are regulations governing sanitary sewer overflows (SSOs) and combined sewer overflows (CSOs); public health, environmental, and economic impacts of SSOs and CSOs; sewer system evaluation and rehabilitation methods; stormwater best management practices; and the benefits and challenges of water reuse. Through research papers and discussion forums, students examine case studies that illustrate diverse practical situations and stimulate creative ideas for solving real-life design problems.
Prerequisite(s): EN.575.601 Fluid Mechanics or an equivalent course in fluid flow or hydraulics.
This course covers fundamental aspects of radioactive substances in the environment; remediation processes for these substances; and their eventual storage, processing, and disposal. It provides a basic understanding of radioactivity and its effect on humans and their environment, as well as the techniques for their remediation and disposal. Topics include radioactivity, the nucleoids, interaction of radiation with matter, shielding, dosimetry, biological effects, protection standards, sources of environmental radiation, risk evaluation, fate and transport analysis, cleanup standards, legal requirements, cleanup technologies, waste disposal, and case studies.
This course covers engineering and scientific concepts and principles applied to the management of municipal solid waste (MSW) to protect human health and the environment and the conservation of limited resources through resource recovery and recycling of waste material. Topics include regulatory aspects and hierarchy of integrated solid waste management; characterization and properties of MSW; municipal wastewater sludge utilization; hazardous waste found in MSW; collection, transfer, and transport of solid waste; separation, processing, combustion, composting, and recycling of waste material; and the landfill method of solid waste disposal, which encompasses guidelines for design, construction, operation, siting, monitoring, remedial actions, and closure of landfills. Permitting and public participation processes, current issues, and innovative approaches are also addressed.
This course presents the pollution prevention and waste minimization concepts, terminologies, life cycle impacts, and management strategies. The course introduces available remediation techniques for industrial pollution control and prevention and examines specific applications to industries including biological, chemical, physical, and thermal techniques. Topics include current state of knowledge of pollution prevention approaches to encourage pollution prevention strategies, highlights of selected clean technologies and clean products, technical and economic issues, incentives and barriers to pollution prevention, and the role of different sectors in promoting pollution prevention. Pollution prevention and waste minimization techniques such as waste reduction, chemical substitution, production process modification, and reuse and recycling will be addressed with regard to selected industries.
This course examines current applications of biotechnology to environmental quality evaluation, monitoring, remediation, and mitigation of contaminated environments. The scale of technology ranges from the molecular to macrobiotic. Relevant topics of microbiology and plant biology are presented. These provide a foundation for following discussions of microbial removal and degradation of organics, phytoremediation of soil and water contaminated with toxic metals and radionuclides, wetlands as treatment processes, biofilms/biofilters for vapor-phase wastes, and composting in alignment with sustainable development goals considering climate change. Emphasis is placed on modeling and design. Advantages and disadvantages of each application are compared. Case studies are presented in the areas of biosensors in environmental analysis, molecular biology applications in environmental engineering, and genetic engineering of organisms for bioremediation. Prerequisites: Prior coursework in environmental microbiology, molecular Biology, or biochemical engineering is recommended but not required.
This course develops the fundamentals and applications of aerobic and anaerobic biological unit processes for the treatment of municipal and industrial wastewater. The principles of activated sludge, aeration and clarifier design, fixed film reactors, anaerobic treatment, solids handling and treatment, land treatment, and nutrient removal are presented. This course uses concepts from microbiology and the basic principles of stoichiometry, energetics, and microbial kinetics are used to support the design of biological unit processes.
Prerequisite(s): EN.575.605 Principles of Water and Wastewater Treatment.
This course will provide an overview of the basic foundations of pollutant transport and dispersion phenomena in the environment including surface water, atmosphere, and groundwater media. The emphasis of the course will be on mathematical formulation of transport equations, analytical solutions, physical insights, methods of analysis of tracer breakthrough curves, spatial and temporal moments analysis. Although numerical modeling is not the primary objective of the course, the students will be provided with the knowledge to build a modest computational toolbox using random-walk particle tracking to visualize and quantify transport processes. Computation of analytical solutions presented in the course will require some knowledge of scientific programming. However, the students will gain such competency during the course.Prerequisites: Undergraduate fluid mechanics (570.351 or equivalent) and differential equations.
This is a multidisciplinary course that involves the applications of chemistry, thermodynamics, and fluid mechanics in the selection and design of air pollution control equipment. Topics include the estimation of potential pollutants, chemical characterization of gas streams to be controlled, theory and practice of air pollution control, and design and costing of control technologies. The course emphasizes the design of systems to reduce particulate matter emissions, volatile organic compound (VOC) emissions, nitrogen oxide emissions, and sulfur dioxide emissions.
Prerequisite(s): EN.575.601 Fluid Mechanics or an equivalent course in fluid flow; an undergraduate course in thermodynamics.
This class will provide engineers and scientists an understanding of the principles of air quality and climate modeling and practical experience coding, configuring and running models to provide insight into a variety of air quality scenarios. Air pollutant physical and chemical properties, coupled with an understanding of atmospheric motion, will provide a basis to understand model fundamentals. An air quality modeling framework will be utilized that consists of meteorological, emissions, and air quality models such as dispersion and photochemical models, types of each which will be investigated. Lagrangian and Eulerian frameworks will form the bases of regional and global scale modeling applications. Additional air quality models such as receptor models and systems dynamics models will be introduced and their application presented in context. Students will build simple models from first principles as well as learn how to run a complex dispersion model and apply it to a real-world timely and relevant air quality issue. An emphasis will be placed on using air quality models as tools in air resources management decision making.
This course covers the science, engineering, and operation of energy technologies - on a stand-alone and systems basis - that will reduce carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, and lower air pollution, with quantitative analysis where applicable. On the supply side, students will learn about solar radiation and its use for solar photovoltaic (PV) technologies (at a cell, module, and system-level) and concentrated solar power (CSP) with thermal storage, and other renewable energy technologies that use wind, water, and biomass, as well as the use of carbon capture and sequestration (CCS). Energy storage technologies covered to support variable renewable energy (VRE) integration include lithium-ion and other types of batteries, pumped hydro, compressed air energy storage (CAES), and longer-term energy storage from the production of hydrogen, using electrolysis and other low carbon methods. End-use energy technologies covered will include battery electric vehicles (BEV), plug-in hybrid (PHEV) and fuel cell electric vehicles (FCEV), and some examples of the use of low carbon heat sources or feedstocks for industrial processes and combined heat and power (CHP).
This course covers fundamentals of membrane filtration technology and application in municipal and industrial water and wastewater treatment. Topics include membrane classification, mechanism of separation/filtration, principle of operation, performance monitoring, maintenance, pilot scale testing, residual disposal, emerging and developing membrane separation technologies, and regulations governing treatment objectives and residual disposal in membrane filtrations systems. This course provides students with in-depth knowledge of the theory, application, and design of membrane filtration systems by engaging them in group assignments and design projects.
The course addresses traditional and innovative technologies, concepts, and principles applied to the management of hazardous waste and contaminated sites to protect human health and the environment. Topics include regulatory requirements; hazardous waste generators and transporters; permitting and enforcement of hazardous waste facilities; closure and financial assurance requirements; RCRA Corrective Action and CERCLA/Superfund/Brownfields site remediation processes; groundwater flow and fate and transport of contaminants; physical, chemical, and biological treatment; land disposal restrictions; guidelines for design, construction and closure of hazardous waste landfills; environmental monitoring systems; management of medical waste and treatment options; management of underground and aboveground storage tanks; toxicology and risk assessment; and pollution prevention and waste minimization.
In this course, mass and momentum transport, aquatic chemistry, and chemical reaction engineering are applied to physical and chemical processes used for water and wastewater treatment. Students also learn the theory and practice of various unit processes including disinfection, oxidation, coagulation, sedimentation, filtration, adsorption, gas transfer, and membrane filtration. The goal is to provide a theoretical understanding of various chemical and physical unit operations, with direct application of these operations to the design and operation of water and wastewater treatment systems. Students will use the concepts learned in this class to better understand the design and operation of engineered and natural aquatic systems.
Prerequisite(s): EN.575.605 Principles of Water and Wastewater Treatment.
This course familiarizes students with appropriate design criteria and the design process for water and wastewater treatment plants. This includes design of treatment processes, cost estimates, and a working design team under project managers. Additional course requirements include oral presentations and writing engineering reports.
Prerequisite(s): EN.575.605 Principles of Water and Wastewater Treatment and either EN.575.706 Biological Processes for Water and Wastewater Treatment or EN.575.745 Physical and Chemical Processes for Water and Wastewater Treatment.and Wastewater Treatment)
Topics in chemical, biological, and hydrological science necessary to understand water quality parameters and processes are reviewed. Mathematical models of fundamental processes that transport diffuse water pollutants and disperse them in the natural environment are presented in detail. Physical, chemical, and biological processes involved in water quality improvement technologies are covered and applied at the watershed scale to introduce green stormwater infrastructure technologies. Components of the Environmental Protection Agency’s Storm Water Management Model (SWMM) model are presented along with theories and mathematical models of the underlying processes. Then, models are generated for nine of the primary green stormwater infrastructure technologies that are currently being installed in urban environments, and the model components within SWMM that implement these technologies are exercised. The course includes a “Green Infrastructure Watershed Implementation Project,” to be conducted by individual students or small groups, that involves modeling and optimizing benefits and costs of a green infrastructure implementation program in an actual watershed chosen by the students.
Sustainably managing aquatic environments for ecosystem and public health in a changing climate requires us to understand the combined effect of multiple physical, chemical, and biological processes. This class will equip students to apply their understanding of environmental engineering principles to real-world water quality issues using computer simulation models. The approaches covered are widely used in the US for TMDL studies and NPDES permitting under the clean water act. Emphasis will be placed on gaining insight by understanding fundamental assumptions and equations, and application to classical problems of oxygen demand and eutrophication. Advanced topics including pathogen and toxin dynamics will also be introduced.Prerequisites: Differential equations
In this course, students will be provided with the knowledge to critically investigate practical, theoretical, mathematical, philosophical, sociological, and legal aspects of measurement and pseudo-measurement in environmental science and related disciplines. Students will explore the theoretical and mathematical bases for quantification and trace the relationship between these bases and the expanding role of quantification and pseudo-quantification in environmental research, policy, and decision making. Three theories of measurement (traditional, representational, and operational) will be presented from historical, technical, and philosophical perspectives. Claims to quantification arising in a number of environmental contexts (such as river systems and hydrology) will be closely examined in light of these divergent measurement paradigms.
This course will present a subset of the mathematical techniques often use to gain an understanding of the response of complex systems to acute events and compound threats. Examples of complex systems include: installations, organizations, communities, etc. With the understanding of resilience as ability to withstand and ‘bounce back’ from major disruptive events, the course will consider resilience as an emergent attribute, and investigate some pre- and post-event approaches to resilience enhancement. The focus of the mathematical modeling techniques presented in this course will be on nonlinear dynamics. We will also discuss relevant variational optimization techniques that can be used to guide measures taken to enhance resilience. The course will include selected applications as case studies; examples include: savanna ecosystems, large installations, communities facing infectious diseases, preparation for and response to coastal storms, etc. Prerequisite(s): Differential Equations.