Update: Sustainability Seminar Series—Sustainability, all or nothing?

Thursday, March 12, 2020
1:00 – 2:00 p.m.
Live streaming on Facebook

Students for Sustainability (S²) are pleased to create a platform for raising scientific engagement on the complexity of global sustainability issues. We are hosting the first in a series of seminars open to the entire KAUST Community.

Please join us for the first sustainability seminar this Thursday live at www.facebook.com/StudentsforSustainabilityatKAUST. 

Abstract:

The origins of sustainable design and development can be traced back to the late 20th century.  Yet nearly four decades later, sustainability is a term frequently used for promotional or marketing purposes.  We see sustainability is used to promote an environmental, economic, or social agenda individually, without appropriately recognizing that sustainability, as originally defined, aims to balance all these facets.  In this seminar, we will delve further into the metrics and engineering based tools available to evaluate the sustainability of human activities.  The role of sustainable thinking in the choices we make as consumers and designers of technology will also be discussed.  Finally, several drawbacks in the traditional, and oft-practiced, sustainability framework will be highlighted to help identify better approaches for minimizing the impact of human activity.

About the speaker:

Dr. Mani Sarathy is an Associate Professor of Chemical Engineering and Associate Director of the Clean Combustion Research Center (CCRC) at KAUST. Dr. Sarathy was previously a Postdoctoral Researcher in the Combustion Chemistry group at the U.S. Department of Energy Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. He received his PhD and M.A.Sc. degrees in Environmental and Chemical Engineering at the University of Toronto and his B.A.Sc. in Environmental Engineering Chemical Specialization from the University of Waterloo. His research interest is in developing sustainable energy technologies with decreased net environmental impact. A major thrust of his research is using chemical kinetic simulations to design fuels, engines, and reactors.