FAMU-FSU Engineering
Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering
January 2021 CEE Newsletter
|
|
Greetings from the Chair
|
Looking Forward to 2021
Happy New Year! As we close the door on 2020 and reflect on so many negative stories that the year brought, it is hard not to imagine a brighter future in 2021. At FAMU-FSU Engineering, we are looking forward to a return to normalcy, as we slowly increase the number of face-to-face classes this spring (with social distancing in place), or returning to a pre-pandemic schedule in the summer or fall. Only time will tell whether that goal can be achieved...if 2020 has taught us anything, it is that predicting the future can be a challenge!
This issue of our newsletter focuses on our work in environmental sustainability. You’ll find articles about Civil and Environmental Engineering students, faculty, and alumni who are making significant contributions to the health of our soils, water, and air, by developing new techniques to monitor and treat agricultural and manufacturing waste products. These are but a few of the newsworthy stories drawing national recognition to our college. I encourage you to check out our website eng.famu.fsu.edu for more articles. And if you want to see more uplifting stories on your social media feed, like us on Facebook, and follow us on Instagram and Twitter.
If you are looking for a worthy cause to donate to this year, I hope that you will consider the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering. Funds donated to the department help to finance building projects, such as our Senior Design lab renovation and upcoming laboratory safety upgrades; student scholarship programs, such as the Latin-American Caribbean scholarship and the Graduate Student Excellence award; and other academic enhancement activities. Donate through FAMU or FSU. Be sure to choose Civil and Environmental Engineering (account code F02707 at FSU, or CEE at FAMU) so that your donation goes directly to the department.
In closing, we wish you a safe, happy, and productive new year!
|
|
CEE Students & Alums in the News |
|
|
CEE Student Spotlight:
Brian Coogan
Adult student Brian Coogan is anything but traditional. He has always forged his own path in life. “I did things a little out of order,” Coogan says. “But I would not change a thing, because the path I took, made me who I am today.”
Coogan graduated high school and was not sure where to go in life. “I was a lifeguard as a teenager, and it bored me. I tried college and it was not the right time. Then I got an opportunity to go on the road for work,” the FAMU senior explains. Coogan traveled the country as a professional mover for the summer. He enjoyed the physicality of it, and seeing new places excited him. “I made a career of it, became a foreman, attained a commercial driver’s license and burned rubber for the next 13 years,” Coogan says.
Coogan had some unfinished business though. He always wanted to get his degree and finally knew what he should study. “I needed a challenge. I’m great at troubleshooting and I love math,” Coogan explains. “So, I quit my job and moved to Tallahassee to get a civil engineering degree.”
|
|
Alumni in the News:
Charlie Martin
Charlie L. Martin is a husband, father and civil engineer in the Florida Panhandle city of Graceville. In 2015, Martin walked across the stage of Florida A&M University’s Al Lawson Center to receive his Ph.D. in civil engineering from the FAMU-FSU College of Engineering. The alum has focused his career in the municipal water and wastewater utility field and has been active since 1992.
Martin has been Graceville’s water/wastewater director since 2000. He also lectures at the University of Florida Training, Research and Education for Environmental Occupations center (UF TREEO), teaching courses relative to water quality for over 12 years. For the past 16 years, Martin has also served as a member of the operator certification committee for the Florida Department of Environmental Protection (FDEP).
|
|
Undergrad in the Lab:
Cleaning Water with Beneficial Bacteria
Concerns over social distancing during the pandemic limited many undergraduates’ ability to work in research labs this fall. To introduce students to their research and encourage them to get involved when their labs safely reopen to undergraduates, several CEE faculty members participated in the Undergrad in the Lab video lecture series. Join Dr. Youneng Tang as he explains how his research group using beneficial microorganisms to remove contaminants from water.
|
|
Faculty In The News
A team of FAMU-FSU researchers studying new methods to remove toxic heavy metals from biosolids — the solid waste left over after sewage treatment — found the key is a brief spin through a microwave.
The method removed three times the amount of lead from biosolids compared to conventional means and could reduce the total cost of processing by more than 60 percent, making it a possible engineering solution to help produce fertilizer and allow more people to live with clean soil and water. The research is published in the Journal of Cleaner Production.
“Biosolids are a valuable resource, but heavy metals prevent their use,” said Gang Chen, a professor of Civil & Environmental Engineering at the FAMU-FSU College of Engineering.
As the human population of the planet grows and more people move to cities, sewage treatment plants around the world are producing more biosolids. Those byproducts are often disposed of in landfills or incinerators, but there are drawbacks to those solutions, such as high costs or secondary pollution from the treatment process itself.
|
|
How Landfill Gas Measurement Techniques Work
With the ongoing push to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, researchers and the solid waste industry are spending time and money developing methods to measure landfill methane emissions—not only to be able to quantify landfills’ contributions to greenhouse gases, but to have a way to assess whether technologies and processes for emission reduction are working, and to quantify progress.
Waste360 talked with Tarek Abichou, a professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at FAMU-FSU, who has been at the forefront of a considerable amount of the research and resulting innovations. He explains some of the gas emission techniques; how they work in what scenarios; and he talks about techniques that show future promise.
|
|
New RIDER Center launches website
The FAMU-FSU Center for Resilient Infrastructure and Disaster Response (RIDER) is excited to launch a new website. The site can be accessed through rider.eng.famu.fsu.edu or rider.engineer, and includes highlights of recent research and information about upcoming events. RIDER promotes all-inclusive and equitable disaster resilience and probes the underlying causes of disaster vulnerability in communities, with a focus on rural and underserved populations.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
