Anne Dare

Ten key research issues for integrated and sustainable wastewater reuse in the Middle East

Wastewater management is not limited to the technology used to collect and treat wastewater. It begins with the early planning phase of building a society and includes considerations of how that society will grow. Therefore, history, culture, religion, and socioeconomy are important components to include in any relevant and integrated studies of wastewater management and reuse. Engineering, health, chemistry, biology, food production, cultural heritage, and the needs of people of all ages should be considered together when making management decisions regarding issues so intimately tied with humanity as water and sanitation. Other escalating challenges such as poverty, food, and water scarcity, migration and instability, flooding and catastrophes, diseases and mortality, etc. should also be considered as part of wastewater management and reuse planning. Emerging contaminants could be associated with the urbanization, modernization, and industrialization of several countries. Several arid countries have developed water security strategies where wastewater reuse is a major component. The existing wastewater treatment technologies in these countries are, in most cases, unable to remove such contaminants which may affect irrigation waters, industrial products, groundwater, etc. People would have to accept that the food on their tables could be irrigated with treated wastewater that they generated a few months ago, even if very advanced technologies were used to treat it. The purpose of this review is to highlight multidisciplinary areas of research on wastewater and to propose applicable and affordable mechanisms by which we may consider wastewater as a legitimate resource.

Farmer perceptions regarding irrigation with treated wastewater in the West Bank, Tunisia, and Qatar

ABSTRACT Heads of households, farmers, and experts in wastewater and agriculture in the West Bank, Tunisia and Qatar were engaged in consultations to understand their farming/gardening practices, perceived benefits and risks of using treated wastewater, willingness to pay for various qualities of water, safe handling practices, and knowledge of local organizations and regulatory agencies. Most view wastewater as unsafe for reuse in agriculture, and users feel local monitoring and oversight are insufficient. Improving transparency of wastewater management and providing extension about the true risks and benefits of this practice will improve the success and safety of future reuse projects.

Global Design Teams: Case Studies of Student and Community Impact

The rising globalization trends of international competition and the changing societal, professional, and global landscapes for engineering graduates, call for action towards integrated learning strategies to prepare engineers to address grand challenges. This paper describes a global service-learning experience, the Global Design Team (GDT), which provides students with high-impact, multi-disciplinary, collaborative experience. GDT provides real-world, full-cycle design experiences, that raise global awareness amongst team members, faculty, and partners. This experience strives for positive, sustainable interaction with stakeholder communities through the application of technical skills and competencies of students to address specific needs within the partner community. The goal is positive, mutual benefit with partner communities. The paper presents the GDT curricular model and assessment results of design experiences occurring in 2010 in Cameroon, Kenya, and Palestine, and preliminary results from design experiences occurring in 2011 in Cameroon, Colombia, Lebanon, Palestine, and Jordan. Results show that the Global Design Team experience positively impacts the measured attributes of global competence in engineering students, and also provides a positive impact on partner communities and organizations.

Assessment of Global Competencies within Purdue University’s College of Engineering

To develop solutions to grand challenges, engineers must be prepared to work effectively in and with the complexities of new and diverse environments, and analyze problems holistically, from various cultural frames of reference. This project determined if it is possible to measure a set of global competency-type attributes mapped from Purdue’s Engineer of 2020 Target Attributes. This information was used to evaluate whether the programs assessed address attributes of global competence, and guide the way for developing a more comprehensive model of global competence and determining appropriate methodologies to measure competence. This paper presents assessment results from primarily engineering students participating in one of the following global learning opportunities: (1) Introduction to Global Engineering, a first-year engineering seminar course, (2) short-term study abroad programs hosted and approved by the College of Engineering, and (3) Global Design Teams, an international service-learning opportunity. Preliminary results indicate that the targeted programs positively impact students’ self-assessment of most of the measured global competence attributes, however, freshmen students tend to self-assess at a higher level than upperclassmen and graduate students.

Undergraduate Students Solving Transportation and Energy Problems through Service Learning Projects in Cameroon

There is a need for students and researchers to understand, experience, and develop the skills necessary to work in the global world of agriculture. With the expanding role of agriculture into the energy sector, the reliance upon water resources to increase agricultural yields, and recognizing the complex interaction between agricultural products and technologies throughout all regions of the world, this experience and skill set is very important to our next generation of leaders in these areas. This paper describes a multi-year effort involving undergraduate students working on agricultural, transportation and energy needs in Cameroon. A partnership with the African Centre for Renewable Energy and Sustainable Technologies (ACREST) was formed in 2008 with students traveling to the partner in 2009, 2010, and 2011. Sixty-one students have participated in the design portion with thirty-one of those students electing to travel at the conclusion of their design projects. Projects have included basic utility vehicles, simple wind turbines, hydroelectric power systems, biofuels, and fuel briquettes from waste biomass. Students have found these experiences challenging yet very rewarding, both in the design phase and during travel. Designing solutions for different cultures and with vastly different resources from their own is a challenging process and students are able to learn through the experience the importance of the cultural context of the design and the challenges of simple yet effective designs.

Community capacity building: Collaborative micro-hydropower design in Cameroon

Small-scale power systems have considerable potential as sustainable and scalable sources of energy for developing countries. Recognizing this reality, a Global Design Team (GDT) from Purdue University has been working to develop a micro-hydropower solution with local technicians in Bangang, Cameroon. This paper recounts the five-year history of this team and project, including how the team was initially established and funded; how the hydropower turbine was designed, redesigned, and implemented; and how the relationship between the team, community, and other stakeholders evolved and improved over time. In addition to discussing some key technical dimensions of this project, the paper describes the GDT model, which brings together Purdue students, faculty, and staff from engineering and other fields to address pressing needs in developing communities worldwide. Particular emphasis is placed on best practices used by the GDT program to promote student learning while also helping teams work more effectively with partner communities and organizations. This teams powerful story - including their award-winning recognition in both the 2011 EPA P3 program and Clinton Global Initiative University 2014 Commitments Challenge - demonstrates how students and partner communities with the right resources, support, and passion can engineer solutions that improve quality of life for all participants.

Panel: Engineering and development: Facilitating successful project work in diverse global contexts

Over the last decade, a growing number of initiatives have emerged to provide engineering students, faculty, and professionals with opportunities to work on service-oriented projects in developing contexts. And while these courses and programs provide needed resources and services to communities in far-flung locations, they also pose unique challenges and difficulties. For example, projects of this type often require knowledge, skills, and attitudes that are not typically covered in traditional engineering courses nor possessed by many faculty. Additionally, there is growing recognition regarding the need to predict and evaluate the full range of impacts that student projects have on partner communities - both positive and negative. This panel engages these kinds of challenges by bringing together a group of individuals with extensive experience preparing engineering students for project work in developing contexts. In addition to representing programs at four institutions (Colorado School of Mines, Michigan Technological University, Purdue University, and Worcester Polytechnic Institute), the presenters are involved with a host of related national and international initiatives. Each panelist will give an overview of their efforts, with particular emphasis on observed successes and failures, conceptual hurdles faced by students and professionals, pedagogical approaches employed, and most useful resources. The primary audience for this panel includes faculty, staff, and students who lead, support, and/or study global service learning. To enable a more engaging, interactive, and productive session, ample time will be provided to allow attendees to describe their own experiences, share resources, and pose questions. The primary intent of the panel is to help university students, faculty, and staff be more effective when undertaking engineering work in developing contexts. including by promoting scholarly community and collaboration, sharing resources, and seeding new research initiatives.