In support of our efforts to address societies grand challenges, AIChE and its Center for Energy Initiatives (CEI) has scheduled a World Cafe on the Energy Water Food Nexus during our Annual Meeting in Atlanta, GA in November.The World Cafe will focus on the global grand challenge of the Energy Water Food Nexus. The session aims to build awareness of the challenge and highlight the roles chemical engineering expertise can play in addressing the system integration challenges and technology needs resulting from the interconnected nature of global water-energy-food issues. If you're going to the meeting, the chairs would like to extend an invitation to you to participate in this session on Monday, November 17, 2014 in Atlanta. An introduction and speaker presentations will occur from 8:30 a.m. - 10:00 a.m., followed by a workshop discussion from 10:00 a.m. - 11:00 a.m. If you're not attending the meeting in person, you can still participate in the discussion on Linkedin. This session has been planned by prominent leaders of international chemical engineering organizations. AIChE and IChemE are collaborating under the auspices of the World Chemical Engineering Council to help make this session a success. We hope to help address this challenge by identifying specific projects in which IfS (Institute for Sustainability) and CEI can participate.
Speakers include:
- Joe Powell, Shell, The Shell scenarios on energy, water, food
- Olivier Dubois, UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), FAO approach and methodology to address the nexus and highlights of three case studies
- Herb Cabezas, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Approaches for analysis of complex systems such as the energy water food nexus
The session is co-chaired by Hank Kohlbrand, AIChE and Richard Darton, University of Oxford and the workshop portion will be moderated by Dale Keairns, Booz Allen Hamilton. The co-chairs and speakers at this session invite you to participate in a related discussion online on AIChE's Linkedin Group.
Here are some possible questions to kick off the discussion:
What role do you think chemical engineers can play in solving global water-energy-food issues? What are the priority projects for chemical engineers?
- Identify specific projects (e.g. specific country projects, education, system analysis methodologies)
- Collaboration projects with AIChE, IChemE and other chemical engineering societies
What limits effectiveness and how should that be addressed? Share your thoughts, suggestions and how you are led to participate on Linkedin at http://www.aiche.org/worldcafe