Israel Wachs at the National Research Council

Israel Wachs, professor of chemical engineering, recently took part in the National Research Council Workshop on the Environment.

The workshop recommendations, which will be presented to the National Science Foundation, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of Energy and other federal agencies, include:

• A better understanding of reactions that occur in the atmosphere (especially the reactions of naturally occurring environmental gases on the surfaces of aerosol particulates).
• A better understanding of the transport of heavy metals caused by water-mineral interactions in uderground water and soil.
• Further development of advanced real-time, in situ instruments to monitor events on a molecular level (both for fundamental understanding as well as for environmental monitoring).
• Development of novel catalysts (heterogeneous and homogeneous as well as biocatalysts) to destroy pollutants, convert them to valuable products, or develop new technologies that will not generate pollution.
• Development of computational models that can evaluate the economic and environmental impact of various technologies and model the impact of pollution on the earth.

After the NRC Workshop, Wachs gave a seminar at the University of Virginia on “The Birth of an Environmentally Benign Process for the Pulp & Paper Industry.” He also gave seminars at North Carolina State University at Ralegh on the research needed to promote the conversion of pollution to profits. North Carolina is seeking new methods to treat pollution from its pulp and paper industry and animal feed operations.