How can you wash hands if your tap water is disconnected? After a water shut-off, when is it safe to use the tap water? To wear a mask or not wear a mask? What mask material works best? What’s needed to clean the mask? How to keep the indoor air safe? Is SARS-CoV-2 infective in wastewater? What can wastewater tell us about its’ spread? Most public toilets don’t have lids, so how to safely flush? What food can I grow sustainably? How are sociodemographic factors affecting mortality? Those are just some of the questions discussed on social media, mainly Twitter, by the environmental engineering and science community around COVID-19 since March 2020.
The COVID-19 pandemic has also revealed highest mortality rates, and least access to healthy food and online education in black and brown communities in the US (Alkon et al. 2020, Laster Pirtle 2020). The Association of Environmental Engineering and Science Professors stated that members of the organization should be working “together toward a more healthy, just and equitable society.” Some guidance on how to do can be found in the 2019 National Academies of Sciences Engineering and Mathematics’ (NASEM) “Environmental Engineering for the 21st Century: Addressing Grand Challenges.”
The meeting committee will select speakers based on those who applied, plus those who are invited to present. Speakers will give flash talks prior to a moderated discussion to guide the session so that areas of convergence are explored.