About the Seminar

With population growth, urbanization, and rapidly changing environments, challenges to meeting basic human and societal needs are becoming increasingly complex. In many cases, the 20th century model of technologies and infrastructure systems – often characterized by robust but inflexible components that are energy- and chemical-intensive – is no longer viable. Moving beyond maximizing efficiencies and minimizing cost, industries are seeking technological solutions that will meet societal needs in a way that is financially viable while supporting the pursuit of broader goals for sustainability (e.g., carbon neutrality, resource circularity, equity). This transition has become a catalyst for research and ovations has been the expansive landscape nology development pathways and the lack of a transparent and consistent framework to target investment.

This presentation will introduce a standardized process – Quantitative Sustainable Design (QSD) to identify, prioritize, and pursue opportunities for innovation to advance novel technologies and infrastructure systems. Leveraging examples from resource recovery sanitation (nutrient and energy recovery) and biomanufacturing, I will walk through the QSD process, including (i) establishing the simulation space, (ii) modeling the construction, operation, and maintenance of technologies under uncertainty, and (iii) tracking progress toward sustainability goals across multiple dimensions of sustainability (e.g., economic, environmental, social, health). I will then demonstrate how the outcomes from this analysis can be used to prioritize research, development, and deployment of emerging technologies. Ultimately, the results of QSD performance gaps, evaluate tradeoffs and e across alternatives, and assess context-specific implications of technology advancement and deployment.

About the Speaker

Dr. Jeremy Guest is an Associate Professor and the David C. Crawford Faculty Scholar in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC). His research focuses on the development of technologies that support a circular bioeconomy through sustainable water, sanitation, biofuels and bioproducts with applications in both high-income and underserved communities.

Professor Guest currently serves as the Associate Director for Research for the Institute for Sustainability, Energy, and Environment at UIUC, as the Sustainable Design Lead for the Center for Advanced Bioenergy and Bioproducts Innovation (a $262.5M center funded by the U.S. Department of Energy, DOE), and as the Illinois Thrust Lead for Sustainability for the IBM-Illinois Discovery Accelerator Institute (a $200M venture launched in 2021).

He is the recipient of a National Science Foundation (NSF) CAREER Award, the 2016 recipient of the Paul L. Busch Award for innovation in applied water quality research from the Water Research Foundation, and the 2021 James J. Morgan Environmental Science & Technology Early Career Award for creativity and leadership in his field.

His research has been sponsored by a number of agencies including the NSF, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the U.S. DOE, the U.S. Agency for International Development, and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Professor Guest’s formal training includes a B.S. and M.S. in civil engineering from Bucknell University and Virginia Tech, respectively, and a Ph.D. in environmental engineering from the University of Michigan.