Pollution Control and Wastewater Management
PCWM students received Student Recognition Awards from BC Water & Waste Assocation at the 2005 BCWWA Conference (from
left: Farah Chowdhury, Wayne Wong, Alessandro Monti)
program overview
The success of the PCWM group over the last three decades
or so can be traced to a number of factors. These include: continuing
excellence in teaching and research; the breath of research being undertaken
(e.g. water treatment, wastewater treatment, residuals management, water
quality issues, solid and hazardous waste management, groundwater contamination,
site remediation, leachate management, nutrient removal and recovery,
agricultural waste management, and hydrology, aquatic processes, wetlands
disposal, stormwater management and others); excellent research and lab
facilities, along with strong technical backup; access to pilot plant
research facilities in waste and water treatment; a strong and active
alumni program; strong ties to government and private industry support,
including numerous adjunct faculty; excellent success in procurement
of research grants and contracts; and last, but not least, on-going success
in attracting very bright, hard-working and intellectually curious graduate
research students to the program. Since the PCWM program is based in
both environmental engineering and science, students from the engineering
disciplines (e.g. civil, chemical, geological) and biological sciences
(e.g. microbiology, biochemistry) are attracted to this program, in about
equal numbers. These are also about equal numbers of male and female
graduate students in the PCWM group.
One of the strongest aspects to this program
is the interdisciplinary nature of both the teaching and research undertaken
in the PCWM group. This is deliberate, by design, and reflects the thinking
by this group that training in environmental engineering and science
requires schooling and understanding of many sub-disciplines, for our
graduates to be successful upon leaving the program. This philosophy
has been in place for almost two decades and has been very instrumental
in, not only attracting some of the brightest graduate students to our
program, but in helping to propel the PCWM group at UBC to its status
as one of the most highly-regarded environmental program in North America.
MASc and PhD programs are available.
Note: Admission to the PCWM graduate program is usually restricted
to the academic term beginning in September.
Research Activities
The research interests of the faculty members cover most
aspects of liquid and solid waste production, treatment and disposal. Ongoing
research is conducted at laboratory, pilot scale and full-scale. Currently,
research is being carried out on topics such as agricultural waste management,
leaching from sanitary landfills and leachate treatment, the removal and
recovery of trace contaminants and nutrients from wastewaters, sludge and
solid waste/toxic waste management, forest products waste management, pulp
and paper mill pollution prevention, water treatment technology and disinfection
by product control.
Wastewater Management
- Biological nitrogen and phosphorus removal
- Fermentation processes for biological phosphorus removal
- Membrane enhanced biological phosphorus removal
- Phosphorus recovery through struvite formation
- Nitrification and denitrification
- Membrane bioreactor for anaerobic treatment of municipal wastewater (UBC Membrane Research Group)
- Modeling of activated sludge and secondary clarifiers
- Landfill leachate treatment
- Forest products waste management
- Membrane bioreactor for pulp and paper effluents (UBC Membrane Research Group)
- Constructed wetlands for woodwaste leachate
- Removal of trace contaminants
Water Quality
1) Non-point source contaminants from run-off
- Research on urban and agricultural storm water run-off
- Characterization of contaminants in run-off
- Evaluation of bioavailability of contaminants in stream sediments
and water column
- Contaminant removal using sediment traps
- Best Management Practices
2) Limnology
- Limnological studies on eutrophic, meromictic, and coastal oligotrophic
lakes
- Nutrient budget studies for lakes and rivers
- Impacts of nutrient imbalances (especially N:P ratios) on lake
ecosystems
- Lake restoration studies using aeration and fertilization techniques
- Chemical, physical and (micro-) biological processes in meromictic
lakes
- Impacts of log handling and storage activities on a lake ecosystem
in central B.C.
3) Monitoring
- Monitoring of water quality and of receiving environments
- Use of in situ bioassays using freshwater leeches to monitor the
availability of contaminants from pulp mills
- Early-warning indicators and real-time monitoring using fluorescent
light
- Use of blue mussels for marine receiving environment monitoring
for municipal effluents
Solid Waste Management
- Incineration ash characterization
- Solid Waste management strategies
- Municipal solid waste using landfills
Drinking Water
- Corrosion of iron and cupper distribution pipes
- Membrane application in drinking water treatment (UBC Membrane Research Group)
- Advanced oxidation processes (e.g. Ozone, UV)
- Disinfection by-products formation
Sludge Digestion
- Thermophilic aerobic digestion (TAD)
- Auto thermophilic aerobic digestion (ATAD)
- Volatile fatty acids (VFAs) production from primary sludge
- Anaerobic sludge digestion
For more information, please visit Pollution
Control and Wastewater Management
website.
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Facilities
Research in Pollution Control and Waste Management is supported by well-equipped
research laboratories and modern analytical instrumentation, including
atomic absorption and gas chromatography. Also available for pilot scale
research on wastewater treatment and sludge management are two fully
instrumented 16 meter trailers. Membrane reactor systems ozone and UV
technology are also available for drinking water research topics.
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Pollution Control and Wastewater Management Faculty
| James
W. Atwater |
Solid wastes, toxic and hazardous waste management,
water quality, groundwater pollution, landfill and leachate management. Pollution
Control & Waste Management and Geo-Environmental Engineering |
| Pierre
R. Bérubé |
Removal of trace organic contaminants (disinfection-by-product
precursors, endocrine disruptors, pharmaceutical residuals) from raw
drinking water sources, membrane technologies advanced oxidation processes
(ozone-UV). Pollution Control & Waste Management. |
| Sietan
Chieng |
Agricultural waste management, irrigation waste management,
water reuse in agriculture, agricultural hydrology. Pollution Control & Waste
Management |
| Eric
R. Hall |
Forest porducts waste management, pulp and paper wastewater
treatment, toxic contaminants, pollution prevention, sludge treatment,
membrane treatment technology, nutrient removal. Pollution Control & Waste
Management |
| Victor
Lo |
Agricultural waste menagement, animal waste treatment,
sludge management, nutrient removal and recovery. Pollution Control & Wast
Management |
| Donald
S. Mavinic |
Biotreatment processes, water quality improvement, unit
operations, cold-termperature waste treatment, leachate treatment,
nutrient removal and recovery water treatment. Pollution Control & Waste
Management |
Active Emeritus Faculty
| Kenneth J. F. Hall |
Toxic materials in acquatic environments, cycling or
organics, water chemistry, trace organic analysis, eutrophication. Aquatic
Processes. |
| William K. Oldham |
Nutrient removal technology and advanced treatment. Pollution
Control and Waste Management. |
Adjunct Faculty
| Ken Ashley |
Stream and lake improvement, river water quality, stream
restoration, fisheries habitat improvement and aeration technology. |
| Dave Forgie |
Wastewater treatment, plant design, waste residuals
mangement. Pollution Control & Waste Management. |
| Harlan G. Kelly |
Wastewater treatment plant design, waste residuals management. Pollution
Control & Waste Management. |
| Barry Rabinowitz |
Wastewater treatment, biological nutrient removal processes. Pollution
Control & Waste Management. |
| Robert Simm |
Wastewater treatment, biological nutrient removal processes. Pollution
Control & Waste Management. |
| Troy Vassos |
Wastewater treatment, small-scale liquid waste management,
modelling and optimization. Pollution Control & Waste Management. |
| Reidar Zapf-Gilje |
Risk assessment, contaminated sites management. Pollution
Control & Waste Management. |
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