Frederick Egmondt

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Sustainability on engineering programmes; the need for a holistic approach

The teaching of sustainability on engineering curricula has increasingly become an essential feature. This has coincided with an increased focus on sustainability by professional institutions through stated policy positions and documents, though accreditation documentation has yet to be brought into line with these emerging positions. The creation of a sustainable society is a complex multi-disciplinary multi-stage project that will necessarily dominate mankind’s endeavour throughout the coming century. The pathway to a road towards sustainability will require a paradigm shift among society in general. Sustainability is a normative endeavour with uncertain outcomes requiring collaboration, teamwork and an ability to work with, respect and learn from other disciplines and professions as well as local communities and governments. This is largely new territory for the engineer. Moreover this approach can only be embraced by the engineer who sees value in and a rationale for pursuing it. Engineers must clearly see the contribution they can make; they need to see how many of the fundamental or threshold concepts in engineering can be employed as central and basic tenets of the evolving meta-discipline that is sometimes called sustainability science. This can only really be achieved if sustainability exists as a common threadline throughout programmes, in such a way that it is conceived as a necessary lens through which all engineering practice is filtered. Once this is achieved engineers will be well positioned to take the lead in moving towards developing a sustainable society rather than just designing the tools to move towards this goal as mere ‘paid hands’. This paper will examine some existing basic threshold concepts in engineering and show how these can be used to embed sustainability throughout curricula so as to provide the graduate engineer of the twenty-first century with the motivation, vision and tools to be the leaders in our shared quest to create a truly sustainable global society

Chemical engineering in an unsustainable world: obligations and opportunities

Human society faces a set of unprecedented challenges emanating from the unsustainable nature of the current societal model. The creation of a new sustainable societal construct is required, essentially adopting a needs based approach over one based on ever increasing consumption. Failure to achieve this will result in the widespread destruction of our increasingly stressed environment followed quickly by inevitable collapse of society as we know it, both socially and economically. Technology alone is insufficient to meet the challenges at hand; ecological, social and economic considerations must be incorporated through a multi-faceted and multi-disciplinary approach. Because chemical engineers possess a core set of threshold concepts which are central to a sustainable society, and because engineers will ultimately help design any new society, they bear a moral and ethical responsibility to play an active and indeed central role in its development. A new engineering paradigm is required therefore, whereby sustainability becomes the context of engineering practice. To achieve this, a sustainability informed ethos must prevail throughout engineering curricula. Both professional institutions and educators bear responsibility in ensuring this happens without delay. Some key threshold concepts are presented here to demonstrate how this can be advanced through the chemical engineering curriculum

Myron Goldsmith: The Development of the Diagonally Braced Tube

Myron Goldsmith (1918-96) was a unique figure in the development of tall building design. He successfully blended the roles of architect, engineer and teacher throughout his tenure at Skidmore Owings and Merrill (SOM) and in the Department of Architecture at the Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT). Indeed, many of the projects supervised by Goldsmith and his colleagues, to include the pre-eminent structural engineer Dr. Fazlur Khan (1929-82), directly influenced built work. The few published studies of Goldsmith acknowledge, but do not fully explore, the innovations that Goldsmith oversaw as thesis advisor to many graduate students at IIT in the 1960s. An essential link between the student work and the large-scale office projects at SOM were the “Saturday Sessions.” There, architects, engineers and students met for weekly reviews at IIT and then a lengthy and lively lunch at Bertucci’s restaurant in Chicago. Goldsmith encouraged the free exchange of scholarly and practical ideas during these Saturday Sessions and we argue that this was a vital part of Goldsmith’s pedagogy. This paper will focus on a fascinating network of students, architects, and engineers that led to the innovation of the diagonally braced tube tall building

Finite Element Corroboration of Buckling Phenomena Observed in Corrugated Boxes1

Conventional compression strength formulas for corrugated fiberboard boxes are limited to geometry and material that produce an elastic postbuckling failure.Inelastic postbuckling can occur in squatty boxes and trays, but a mechanistic rationale for unifying observed strength data is lacking. This study combines a finite element model with a parametric design of the geometry and material characteristics affecting the critical buckling stress of box panels to examine their postbuckling response. The finite element model enables a broad scope of simulated panels to be examined economically. Results lead to a postbuckling model fit to the predictions and a better understanding of how to unify elastic and inelastic failure data from actual experiments and form a more general box strength formula

Making programme learning outcomes explicit for students of process and chemical engineering

There is a global shift from solely content-driven teaching to learning outcomes driven engineering education which underpins much of the educational reform. In engineering education, degree programme learning outcomes are more commonplace as more and more professional accrediting bodies require fulfilment or compliance with prescribed learning outcomes. However, the students may not be presented with these learning outcomes as they are often “hidden” in application for accreditation documentation and not divulged to the students. This is the context of this thesis study. Undergraduate students (2006-2008) taking the BE degree programme in Process & Chemical Engineering at UCC were first surveyed to assess their level of knowledge of the learning outcomes concept and of the degree programme learning outcomes. The contents of two application documents for accreditation documents submitted to professional accreditation bodies along with Institution guidelines were reviewed to formulate the degree programme learning outcomes and these were presented to the students. These students were then surveyed after the presentation. The results of the questionnaire demonstrated a major improvement in the knowledge of the learning outcomes concept and the degree programme learning outcomes amongst the students. It also showed that the students found the session to be beneficial

Cycling for a sustainable future: Considerations around the development of a Masters level module on carbon capture, sequestration and utilisation

This paper envisages a masters level module, as part of an integrated masters level degree in chemical engineering (but which can also be taken by other engineers, such as energy engineers), as a suitable module for bringing together broader (societal level) considerations around the implications of contemporary carbon cycle disruption with possible interventions. These would include interventions in particular at the technological level, through the preferential capture, storage and utilisation of carbon. In this way, the module can build on standard undergraduate chemical engineering modules in unit operations, mass transfer and environmental engineering to (while by drawing on research informed expertise of the lecturer) consider specific potential technological interventions in the CCS and utilisation space. It can also however both draw on and add to prior learnings from broader contexts and domains such as in the realms of industrial ecology, ecological economics, technological indeterminism, sustainability narratives and policy, in particular through the use of an overarching context of carbon cycles. It also affords the opportunity for graduate students to develop critical thinking in relation to an ever-evolving socio-technological, economic and policy landscapes, and to help the goal of facilitating the development of fit-for-purpose engineering graduates in the wake of the consequences of ruptured carbon cycles

Sustainability in the biopharmaceutical industry: seeking a holistic perspective

Biopharmaceuticals manufacturing is a critical component of the modern healthcare system, with emerging new treatments composed of increasingly complex biomolecules offering solutions to chronic and debilitating disorders. While this sector continues to grow, it strongly exhibits “boom-to-bust” performance which threatens its long-term viability. Future trends within the industry indicate a shift towards continuous production systems using single use technologies that raises sustainability issues, yet research in this area is sparse and lacks consideration of the complex interactions between environmental, social and economic concerns. The authors outline a sustainability-focused vision and propose opportunities for research to aid the development of a more integrated approach that would enhance the sustainability of the industry