Sustainable Engineering

Bhavik R. Bakshi is the Morrow Professor of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at the Ohio State University (OSU). He also holds appointments in Civil, Environmental and Geodetic Engineering at OSU and as a Visiting Professor at the Indian Institute of Technology in Mumbai, India. He has developed and taught a course on Sustainable Engineering for twenty years at OSU, and shorter versions at institutions such as Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay, McGill University, Montreal, and South China University of Technology.

• Part I. Introduction and Motivation: 1. The basis of human well-being; 2. Status of ecosystem goods and services; 3. Sustainability: definitions and challenges; Part II. Reasons for Unsustainability: 4. Economics and the environment; 5. Business and the environment; 6. Science, engineering, and the environment; 7. Society and the environment; Part III. Sustainability Assessment: 8. Goal definition and scope; 9. Inventory analysis; 10. Mathematical framework; 11. Footprint assessment; 12. Energy and material flow analysis; 13. Exergy analysis; 14. Cumulative exergy consumption and emergy analysis; 15. Life cycle impact assessment; 16. Ecosystem services in sustainability impact assessment; Part IV. Solutions for Sustainability: 17. Designing sustainable processes and products; 18. Ecosystem ecology; 19. Industrial symbiosis and circular economy; 20. Ecosystems in engineering; 21. Economic policies; 22. Societal development.

'This book addresses such critical topics as life-cycle assessment, energy and material flows, exergy, sustainability assessment, engineering design, industrial symbiosis, and circular economy. The author utilizes various case studies/examples, such as the case of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) and the lessons from Easter Island. There are flowcharts and solved quantitative examples that make the introduced concepts less abstract. Each chapter is followed by exercises, making it easier to use for academic purpose / course assessment. I believe this text will be useful for advanced undergraduate or graduate-level college students, and that it is successful in its goal to rigorously address the role of engineering with respect to environmental sustainability, and to help engineers understand sustainability.' John W. Sutherland, Fehsenfeld Family Head of Environmental and Ecological Engineering, Purdue University