COLLEGE STATION, Texas, Nov. 6, 2009 – Mahmoud El-Halwagi, professor in the Artie McFerrin Department of Chemical Engineering at Texas A&M University, has been named recipient of the 2009 Research Excellence in Sustainable Engineering Award.
The prestigious award is presented by the Sustainable Engineering Forum (SEF) of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE) and recognizes basic or applied research results relative to the sustainability of products, processes or the environment. It is annually bestowed upon a researcher who has made significant technical contributions to the advancement of sustainable engineering in research, teaching and development activities.
Holder of the McFerrin Professorship, El-Halwagi is internationally known for his pioneering contributions in the fields of sustainable design and process integration, and he has written two widely used texts on the subject. At Texas A&M, he teaches senior-level undergraduate and graduate classes, covering the areas of sustainability, process design, simulation, economics, integration and optimization.
The SEF seeks collaborative work in programming and education objectives with other professional societies, both national and foreign. Specific focus areas of the forum include using appropriate metrics for sustainability; developing approaches for designing products and processes that can be optimized to desired metrics criteria and that incorporate environmental and societal benefit factors; and assessing impacts of resource use on environmental and social benefits of products, processes and services.
Other focus areas include designing new processes or products that are comparatively benign; responding to socioeconomic measures such as emission trading; and developing educational materials related to the field.
El-Halwagi will receive the award at an awards ceremony taking place during the 2009 AIChE Annual Meeting in Nashville.
