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Speaker Biographies
Bridges to the Future
A Vision for Infrastructure in the 21st Century
THE SMART GRID PANELISTS
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Dr. Roger N. Anderson
Doherty Senior Scholar, Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory
Professor, Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences at Columbia University
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Roger N. Anderson is Doherty Senior Scholar at the Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory and an adjunct Professor in the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences at Columbia University. He also holds a joint appointment at the Center for Computational Learning Systems in the Fu School of Engineering and Applied Sciences.
Anderson is the principal investigator for a computer science research project called the "Edison Program." The program involves a team of scientists and graduate students who are developing machine learning software for intelligent control of the future electric grid of New York City.
At the Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory, he founded and directed the ocean drilling program Borehole Research Group, Global Basins, 4D Seismic Reservoir Simulation and Energy Research Groups.
Anderson received his Ph.D. from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California, San Diego, and his M.S. and B.S. in Geophysics from the University of Oklahoma. He is an inventor, holding 10 Patents, and has written three books and more than 200 peer-reviewed scientific papers. He has written scientific and opinion pieces for magazines such as CIO Insight, Discover, The Economist, EnergyBiz, Forbes, National Geographic, Nature, New York Times, Oil and Gas Journal, Scientific American, Wall Street Journal and Wired.
Anderson assisted in the design of the Wiess Energy Hall at the Houston Museum of Natural History. He was technical consultant for the NBC News/Discovery Channel documentary "Anatomy of a Blackout," and has been a frequent contributor to business radio and TV.
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Anjan Bose
Regents Professor
School of EECS
Washington State University
Contact information:
School of EECS,
Washington State University,
Pullman, WA 99164-2752
Phone: 509-335-1147
Email: bose@wsu.edu
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Anjan Bose is a Regents Professor and the Distinguished Professor of Electric Power Engineering at Washington State University in Pullman, Wash., where he also served as the Dean of the College of Engineering & Architecture from 1998 to 2005. He is a leading researcher on the operation and control of the electric power grid. He has worked in the electric power industry as well as academe for over 35 years.
Bose is a member of the U.S. National Academy of Engineering, a Foreign Fellow of the Indian National Academy of Engineering, a founding member of the Board of Directors of the Washington State Academy of Science, and a Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). He was the recipient of the Outstanding Power Engineering Educator Award, the Third Millennium Medal and the Herman Halperin Electric Transmission and Distribution Award from IEEE. He has been recognized by both Iowa State University and the Indian Institute of Technology with their distinguished alumnus awards.
He has served on several editorial boards and on many technical committees and conference organizations. He was appointed by the governor to the Board of Directors of the Washington Technology Center, and by the U.S. Secretary of Energy on the committee to study the 1999 and 2003 power blackouts. He has served on several committees of the U.S. National Academies, including those for Engineering Education, Cybersecurity Research and Power Grid Security. He has consulted for many electric power companies and related government agencies throughout the world.
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Arthur Kressner
Director of Research and Development
Power Supply, at the Consolidated Edison Company of New York, Inc.
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Arthur ("Artie") Kressner is the Director of Research and Development, Power Supply, at the Consolidated Edison Company (Con Edison) of New York, Inc., where he is responsible for developing and managing research and development for Con Edison and Orange and Rockland Utilities.
He manages a professional staff, developing technology for the transmission, distribution, control center operations, substations, customer operations and energy efficiency business units. This research is focused on the development and demonstration of new power delivery equipment, software models, sensors, feasibility and engineering studies.
Kressner has extensive experience in technology transfer and management of results-oriented organizations. Among his responsibilities during his career at Con Edison was Chief Chemical Engineer and Plant Manager of Arthur Kill and Ravenswood Power Generating Stations. He has been in leadership roles at local, state and national levels in areas of energy policy, energy efficiency, customer end-use and various national environmental and public health programs. He serves on several boards of directors of nonprofit organizations, and has participated in industry advisory groups, community boards and regulatory panels.
Kressner has published papers and articles in peer reviewed technical journals and industry magazines related to energy efficiency, information technology, management and computer modeling. He is a graduate engineer with a Bachelor degree from Brooklyn Polytechnic and Masters from New York University.
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Professor James A. Momoh, Ph.D.
Fellow of IEEE, FNSE and FNAE
Professor and Director, Center for Energy Systems and Control (CESaC)
Howard University
Contact information:
2300 6th NW, Rm. 1105, Washington, D.C. 20059
Phone: 202-806-5350 ext. 6588
Email: jmomoh@howard.edu
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James Momoh received a BSEE degree (1975) from Howard University, a MSEE degree (1976) from Carnegie Mellon University, a MS degree (1980) in Systems Engineering from the University of Pennsylvania and a Ph.D. degree (1983) in Electrical Engineering from Howard University. He was Chair of the Electrical Engineering Department at Howard University and Director of the Center for Energy Systems and Control. In 1987, Momoh received a National Science Foundation (NSF) Presidential Young Investigator Award. He was Program Director of the Power program in the Electrical and Communications Systems (ECS) Division at NSF from 2001-2004. Momoh is a Fellow at the Institute of Electronics and Electrical Engineering (IEEE) and a Distinguished Fellow at the Nigerian Society of Engineers (NSE). He was inducted as a Fellow Member of Nigerian Academy of Engineering (NAE) in 2004.
Momah's current research activities for utility firms and government agencies span several areas in systems engineering, optimization and energy systems control of terrestrial, space and naval complex and dynamic networks. These include but are not limited to the development of multi-agent, intelligent optimization technologies; next-generation optimization for the design of future intelligent power grids; computational tools and algorithms for deregulated/restructured power economies; and advanced power management strategies for stressed power systems with uncertainty, dynamics and stochasticity of parameters. He has also led research and education outreach and collaborations in information technology, environment, energy and human capacity building to involve the United States and other countries worldwide. This has led to a number of international conferences, workshops and seminar series, and research and education in engineering programs that are sponsored by NSF, Howard University and several universities and public-private agencies.
Presently, he is developing interdisciplinary research and education programs in power, economics and environmental adaptive systems. The goal is to build cross-disciplinary partnerships among engineering, economics and other related disciplines that address socioeconomic issues, environmental issues, new teaching pedagogy and curricula to prepare the workforce of the future.
Momoh's research and professional activities have led to over 225 technical papers in refereed journals, transactions, proceedings and also production of several textbooks in his areas of expertise. These papers are presented at conferences, workshops, seminars, tutorial sessions and several other IEEE events to benefit the wider community of engineers, students and policy makers. He has contributed to and is engaged in the development of specialized computational applications of classical optimization, intelligent systems and advanced optimization techniques for the new tools needed by terrestrial, naval and space power systems. In particular, he has been developing special topical contributions in the area of Dynamic Stochastic Optimal Power Flow (DSOPF) using Adaptive Dynamic Programming (ADP) methods. His activities also extend to the development of Multi-Agent Systems (MAS) for coordination and control of complex power systems. His work continues to impact the research and innovations needed in optimization for planning and operational security, efficiency, reliability and stability, and autonomous control of sustainable energy systems.
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WATER IN 2025 PANELISTS
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Marc Edwards
Charles P. Lunsford Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering (CEE)
Virginia Tech
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Marc Edwards, the Charles P. Lunsford Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering (CEE) at Virginia Tech, was named a MacArthur Fellow in 2007 by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation. MacArthur Fellows are selected for their creativity, originality and potential to make important contributions in the future.
Edwards was cited by the MacArthur Foundation for "playing a vital role in ensuring the safety of drinking water and in exposing deteriorating water-delivery infrastructure in America's largest cities. An expert in the chemistry and toxicity of urban water supplies in the United States, he has made significant advancements in a number of areas, including arsenic removal, coagulation of natural organic material, and the causes and control of copper and lead corrosion in new and aging distribution systems."
While investigating the Washington, D.C., area's water supply in 2003, Edwards and his graduate students discovered that the addition of chloramine disinfectant in tap water increased the incidence of lead leaching in residential and commercial aqueducts. This research linked several cases of lead poisoning, earlier thought to be caused by lead paint, to local tap water. The findings also revealed systemic weaknesses in the regional water testing program, prompting the Washington Area Water Authority to replace lead service lines throughout the district.
As a result of that research, Edwards was asked to testify before Congress about the corrosion problem and was interviewed on National Public Radio's "Living on Earth." In 2004, Time magazine dubbed Edwards "The Plumbing Professor," and featured him as one of the nation’s leading scientific innovators.
He is expanding his research to other cities, defining better ways to test local water and predict the risk of chemical contamination in urban infrastructure. "Through his exhaustive research efforts," according to the MacArthur Fellows biography, "Edwards is making critical contributions to the health of individuals and communities throughout the United States in an often-neglected area of domestic public safety."
Earlier in 2007, Edwards received the Virginia Outstanding Faculty Award, the Commonwealth's highest honor for faculty, from the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia.
In 2003, Edwards received the Walter L. Huber Civil Engineering Research Prize from the American Society of Civil Engineers, and in 2004, he was appointed to the Lunsford Professorship at Virginia Tech. His research has been published extensively in professional journals and conference publications, and a number of CEE graduate and undergraduate students have won national research awards under his guidance.
Edwards came to Virginia Tech in 1997 from the University of Colorado at Boulder, where, in 1996, the National Science Foundation (NSF) selected him as one of only 20 young engineering faculty in the nation to receive a Presidential Faculty Fellowship. He completed his master's degree and Ph.D. in environmental engineering at the University of Washington, and earned his bachelor's degree in bio-physics from the State University of New York at Buffalo.
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Professor Mark H. Houck
Department of Civil, Environmental and Infrastructure Engineering
George Mason University
Contact information:
4400 University Drive, MS 6C1,
Fairfax, VA 22030-4444
Phone: 703-993-1737
Email: mhouck@gmu.edu
Web site: http://mason.gmu.edu/~mhouck/
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Since 1992, Mark H. Houck has been a Professor of Civil, Environmental and Infrastructure Engineering at George Mason University. His research and teaching interests include water and environmental systems engineering. His most recent research work has been in the area of water and wastewater infrastructure security.
Prior to coming to George Mason, Dr. Houck held faculty appointments in Civil Engineering at the University of Washington at Seattle (1976-78), and Purdue University (1978-91). He has also held visiting faculty appointments at the Johns Hopkins University (1989-90), and Heriot-Watt University in Scotland (2003). In the private sector, he has served as an officer of two engineering firms specializing in water resources engineering.
Houck is a Fellow of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), a Diplomate of the American Academy of Water Resources Engineers, Board Certified by the American Academy of Environmental Engineers, and recipient of a Huber Research Prize from ASCE. He is a registered Professional Engineer and Professional Hydrologist. Houck attended Johns Hopkins University and earned a bachelor's degree in engineering science (BES, 1972) and a Ph.D. in environmental engineering (1976).
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Pat Mulroy oversees the operations of the Las Vegas Valley Water District, which serves more than 300,000 customers, and the Southern Nevada Water Authority, which is responsible for acquiring, treating and delivering water to local agencies that collectively serve 1.8 million residents and nearly 40 million annual visitors. Mulroy joined the District more than 20 years ago and began serving as its general manager in 1989. She was a principal architect of the Authority, which has served as a model for other Western water agencies since its creation 15 years ago.
As general manager of one of the country's most progressive water agencies, Mulroy is exceptionally active in regional and national water issues. She currently serves on the Board of Directors of the Association of Metropolitan Water Agencies and the National Water Resources Association, and is a member of the American Water Works Association. Additionally, she was the original chairperson of the Western Urban Water Coalition and served on the Colorado River Water Users Association's board of directors.
A resident of Southern Nevada for more than three decades, Mulroy is equally active in the community. She currently chairs the University of Nevada, Las Vegas College of Sciences Advisory Board, and has served on the Nevada Public Radio board of directors. Mulroy is also actively involved with the Diocese of Las Vegas and Bishop Gorman High School. Her honors include National Jewish Medical and Research Center's Humanitarian Award and the University and Community College System of Nevada Board of Regents' Distinguished Nevadan Award.
Mulroy served as special assistant to the Clark County Manager and as Clark County Justice Court Administrator before joining the district. She and her husband, Robert, have two children. Mulroy's recreational interests include skiing and reading.
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Jerald L. Schnoor, Ph.D., P.E., DEE
Allen S. Henry Chair in Engineering; Professor, Civil and Environmental Engineering; Professor, Occupational and Environmental Health; and Co-Director, Center for Global and Regional Environmental Research
The University of Iowa
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Jerry Schnoor is a member of the National Academy of Engineering (elected in 1999) for his pioneering work using mathematical models in science policy decisions. He has testified several times before Congress on the environmental effects of acid deposition and the Clean Air Act. In 2002, he testified before the House Environment Committee on the importance of protecting water quality in the upper Mississippi River.
He serves as Editor-in-Chief of Environmental Science and Technology (ES&T), helping guide the leading journal in the world in his field. ES&T garners the top number of global citations in both environmental engineering (40 percent of total citations) and environmental sciences (15 percent of total citations). His editorial writings on environmental policy and research have been widely accessed by the international community. Schnoor has published as author, co-author or editor, a total of six books and over 150 research articles in archival journals, in addition to serving as lead editor of a series of texts and monographs for John Wiley & Sons (Wiley Interscience on Environmental Science and Technology).
Schnoor is currently a member of the Science Advisory Board for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and he chaired the Board of Scientific Counselors, Office of Research and Development, from 2000-2004. Recently, he became one of three co-directors for the National Science Foundation Project Office on a Collaborative Large-scale Engineering Analysis Network for Environmental Research (CLEANER) and The Water and Environmental Research Systems Network (WATERS Network), a $300 million proposal to construct a national environmental observatory network for the sensing, modeling and forecasting of environmental contaminants, beginning in 2012.
Schnoor and his students pioneered phytoremediation--the use of plants to help clean the environment. Their efforts were rewarded in 2003-2004 with the establishment of the W.M. Keck Foundation Phytotechnologies Laboratory at the University of Iowa. Research there involves discovering novel pathways for the uptake, sequestration and degradation of toxic organic chemicals at waste sites. They have been instrumental in the full-scale clean-up and demonstration of phytoremediation systems at petrochemical sites, explosives-contaminated bases and other industrial locations. Schnoor's publications cover a wide range of environmental problems including toxic chemical fate and transport, surface and groundwater quality modeling, phytoremediation and carbon sequestration for mitigation of greenhouse gases. In 2005, he won the Paper of the Year Award from the journal Human and Ecological Risk Assessment for his commentary, "Global Warming: A Consequence of Human Activities Rivaling Earth's Biogeochemical Processes." Over the past three years, Schnoor has developed a novel course on sustainable environmental systems, and he works closely with students in Engineers for a Sustainable World (ESW) and chairs the Energy Conservation Advisory Council at the University of Iowa.
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Daniel P. Sheer, Ph.D., P.E., President
HydroLogics
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Daniel Sheer has over 32 years of experience in integrated management of reservoir systems, systems operations and modeling water supply operations, especially using optimization-based simulation models. He has been a pioneer in the field of computer-aided conflict resolution, and has used computer-aided dispute resolution to assist in the development of the Cooperative Operations Section of the Potomac River Commission, the Las Vegas Valley Water Authority, the Kansas River Water Assurance District and in a wide variety of other disputes in the United States and abroad. Sheer is co-developer of OASIS, a multi-objective optimization-based simulation package designed to support computer-aided dispute resolution in water resources. OASIS is used to help manage river basins and water supply systems that serve a substantial portion of the United States population.
Sheer earned a Ph.D. with Distinction in Environmental Engineering (1974) from the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Md., and a BS in Natural Sciences (1971) from the same institution. He is a Professional Engineer, State of Maryland. Among other honors, he was a founding member of the National Research Council Water Science and Technology Board.
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STANDING STRONG PANELISTS
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Linda Figg
President/CEO and Director
Bridge Art for Figg Bridge Engineers (FIGG)
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Linda Figg is President/CEO and Director of Bridge Art for Figg Bridge Engineers (FIGG), a company that specializes in creating world-class bridges by blending state-of-the-art engineering with timeless artistry. Her firm is designing the new I-35 West St. Anthony Falls Bridge in Minneapolis, Minn., and she serves as the bridge's Visual Quality Manager. Among the bridges designed by Figg Bridge Engineers are two that serve the D.C. Metro Branch Avenue station. The bridges won the Florida Institute of Consulting Engineers Grand Award for Engineering Excellence (2001). Bridges designed by FIGG have received over 280 design awards for innovation and beauty, including three Presidential Awards through the National Endowment for the Arts. These aesthetically pleasing bridges have graced the covers of over 200 national and international publications, been featured on five History Channel "Modern Marvels" programs in the past seven years, and have appeared in books on the world's most famous bridges and marvels of the modern world. FIGG pioneered new technologies in bridges that are important to the long-term viability of our nation's infrastructure.
Linda serves on the board of directors in the Construction Industry Round Table, an advocacy group comprised of 100 CEOs of America's leading engineering, architecture and construction companies, and the board of directors of the American Road & Transportation Builders Association.
Figg's passion for aesthetics, sustainability and responsible construction of our nation's infrastructure has led her to focus on improving the quality of life in bridging communities.
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Antonio Nanni is a structural engineer interested in construction materials, their structural performance and field application. His interests are in the field of civil infrastructure sustainability and renewal. In the past 23 years, he has obtained experience in concrete and advanced composites based systems as the principal investigator of projects sponsored by federal and state agencies and private industry. He has advised more than 50 graduate students pursuing MS and Ph.D. degrees. Nanni has maintained a balance between academic and practical experience. He is a registered Professional Engineer in Italy, Florida, Pennsylvania, Missouri and Oklahoma.
Nanni is an active member in the technical committees of ACI (Fellow), ASCE (Fellow), ASTM and TMS. In 2004, he was elected Founding Fellow of the International Institute for FRP in Construction (IIFC). He was the founding Chairman of ACI Committee 440--FRP Reinforcement and Chairman of ACI Committee 437--Strength Evaluation. Nanni has served in the Executive Committee of ASCE Materials Division and is the Editor-in-Chief of the ASCE Journal of Materials in Civil Engineering. He was the editor of a book on the subject of fibre-reinforced polymer reinforcement for concrete and co-edited the proceedings of several international symposia and workshops on the same subject. He has authored over 150 refereed journal papers. He has been the recipient or co-recipient of several awards. Nanni was recognized with the Engineering News-Record Award of Excellence for 1997, (Top 25 Newsmakers in Construction). In May 2005, he received the President's Award for Research and Creativity of the University of Missouri System.
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Dr. Matthew J. Realff
Associate Professor
School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering
Georgia Institute of Technology
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Matthew J. Realff is an associate professor in the School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology. He received a bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering (1986) from Imperial College, University of London, England, and a Ph.D. in chemical engineering (1992) from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Realff joined Georgia Tech in 1993.
While on leave from Georgia Tech, Realff served as a Program Officer in the Design and Manufacturing Innovation Division at the National Science Foundation. Later, after the merger of the Civil and Mechanical Systems (CMS) and Design and Manufacturing Innovation (DMI) Divisions, Realff served in the newly-formed Division of Civil, Mechanical and Manufacturing Innovation (CMMI) from 2005-2007, where he was director of the service enterprise engineering program, and was involved in efforts in environmentally benign design and manufacturing and resilient and sustainable infrastructure. His field of research is process systems engineering, focusing on design and operation decision modeling for recycling and biofuel systems.
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W. M. Kim Roddis
Chair, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
The George Washington University
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Professor W. M. Kim Roddis is Chair of Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at George Washington University. A registered Professional Engineer, Roddis has experience in heavy industrial and general commercial building design, as well as in bridge design. She is a structural engineer with varied teaching and research interests, including design, fabrication and construction processes; structural applications of artificial intelligence and computer-aided design; Web-enhanced teaching; fatigue and fracture in bridges; frame stability and seismic steel connections. She is recognized nationally as an expert in distortion-induced fatigue of steel highway bridges, and internationally as an expert on the application of artificial intelligence and advanced computing methods to civil engineering problem solving.
Roddis currently serves as the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) representative on the Board of Directors of the International Society of Computing in Civil and Structural Engineering. She is a Fellow of ASCE and is active at the national level in ASCE, the American Institute of Steel Construction and the Transportation Research Board.
Roddis joined the George Washington University faculty on Aug. 1, 2004. Previously, she was a member of the faculty of the Structural Engineering Group of the Civil, Environmental and Architectural Engineering Department at the University of Kansas (KU). She was the first woman ever to earn tenure at KU's School of Engineering, as well as the first woman to earn the rank of full professor on KU's engineering faculty. She earned each of her academic degrees (BS, MS and Ph.D.) from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where she was a John and Fannie Hertz Fellow.
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Yang Wang
Assistant Professor
School of Civil and Environmental Engineering
Georgia Institute of Technology
Contact information:
790 Atlantic Dr NW, Atlanta, GA 30332-0355
Phone: 404-894-1851
Fax: 404-894-2278
Email: yang.wang@ce.gatech.edu
Web site: http://www.ce.gatech.edu/~ywang
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Yang Wang is an assistant professor in the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology. He obtained his B.S. and M.S. degrees in 1998 and 2001, respectively, from the Department of Civil Engineering at Tsinghua University, China. At Stanford University, Wang completed his Ph.D. degree in Civil Engineering in 2007, as well as an M.S. degree in Electrical Engineering. His primary research interests include structural health monitoring and damage detection, optimal decentralized structural control, smart materials and structures, application of wireless sensor networks, structural dynamics and earthquake engineering.
Wang has published one book chapter and more than 30 articles in peer-reviewed journals and conference proceedings. He received the 2006 Nondestructive Evaluation Best Student Paper Award at the SPIE 11th International Symposium on Nondestructive Evaluation for Health Monitoring and Diagnostics for a paper he co-authored, "Wireless Feedback Structural Control With Embedded Computing." Wang has served as journal and conference paper reviewer for Earthquake Engineering and Structural Dynamics, ASCE Journal of Structural Engineering and American Control Conference. He is currently a member of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) and is a member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). He also serves on the two ASCE/SEI (Structural Engineering Institute) technical committees: Structural Control and Structural Identification of Constructed Systems.
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