In February 2008 Charles Vest, the president of the US National Academy of Engineering (and, eh hem, former president of MIT), unveiled the Academy's Grand Challenges in Engineering. 14 challenges facing society that require an engineering solution (at least in part).
The purpose of listing the challenges was to highlight the importance of engineering in improving societal well-being, as well as inspire a new generation of engineers to meet the challenges. Indeed, this kind of thing was exactly why I took the engineering/applied route myself. (I had also considered a double in physics and biochem.)
One of the fourteen was directly related to water: provision of clean water. But elements of three others were also water-related: managing the nitrogen cycle, improving urban infrastructure, and carbon sequestration.
Okay, so water is not a dominant factor in these latter three, but it is certainly unavoidable in dealing with both the nitrogen cycle and urban infrastructure.
Stay tuned, and I'll elaborate.
Saturday, May 2, 2009
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1 comments:
I believe construction of such projects requires knowledge of engineering and management principles and business procedures, economics, and human behavior.
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