Sustainability and Innovation

Salah M. El-Haggar

Description

Protecting the environment and conserving natural resources by using materials in cyclic loops
One of the most urgent problems facing the world today is environmental sustainability. Current practices of pollution control, waste treatment, and environmental protection are not only hugely expensive and a burden on development but also unsustainable in the long run for their steady depletion of the world's natural resources. Any solutions must have proven economic benefits, be technologically viable, and meet prevailing environmental and social perspectives.
The main objective of this new set of studies is to describe methods that help to protect the environment and conserve natural resources. This can be achieved by applying the 'cradle-to-cradle' concept, which aims to use materials in closed cyclic loops without generating any type of waste or pollution. The authors provide the reader with an introduction to basic concepts of sustainable development, describe the mechanisms and benefits of related technologies, and suggest potential uses on a practical level by examining innovations developed in the mechanical engineering laboratories of the American University in Cairo. Particular focus is placed on innovation as a vital means of attaining sustainability.
A timely contribution to the debate on environmentally sustainable practices, this book will be indispensable to environmentalists, scientists, economists, engineers, development specialists, and policy-makers, as well as being of interest to the lay reader.
1. Sustainability and the Green Economy
Salah M. El-Haggar
2. Cradle to Cradle and Innovation
Hussein ElKersh and Salah M. El-Haggar
3. The Next Industrial Revolution
Salah M. El-Haggar
4. Innovation in Plastic Industry: Upcycle of Plastic Waste 1: Plastic Rejects
Salah M. El-Haggar
5. Innovation in Plastic Industry: Upcycle of Plastic Waste 2: Natural Fiber Reinforced Plastics
Irene Fahim and Salah M. El-Haggar
6. Innovation in Glass Industry: Upcycle of Glass Waste: Foam Glass
Dina Abdel Alim and Salah M. El-Haggar
7. Innovation in Plastic Industry: Upcycle of Plastic Waste 3: Natural Fiber Plastic Composites
Mokhtar Kamel and Salah M. El-Haggar
8. Innovation in Marble and Granite Industry: Upcycle of Marble and Granite Wastes
Rania Hamza and Salah M. El-Haggar
9. Beyond Sustainability for the Production of Fuel, Food, and Feed
Dalia Nakhla and Salah M. El-Haggar
10. Science and Technology Parks for Sustainable Development
Salah M. El-Haggar

Sujets

• Energie & environnement
• Engineering
• Technology
• Sciences et techniques
• Environmental

Informations

• Publié par: The American University in Cairo Press
• Date de parution: 04 mai 2016
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781617976933
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 2 Mo

Extrait

Sustainability and Innovation
Sustainability and Innovation
The Next Global Industrial Revolution
Salah M. El-Haggar
with contributions by
Dina Abdel Alim
Mohamed Abu Khatwa
Hussein ElKersh
Irene Fahim
Rania Hamza
Lama El Hatow
Yasser Ibrahim
Mokhtar Kamel
Dalia A. Nakhla
The American University in Cairo Press Cairo • New York
This electronic edition published in 2015 by
The American University in Cairo Press
113 Sharia Kasr el Aini, Cairo, Egypt
420 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10018
www.aucpress.com
Copyright © 2015 by Salah El-Haggar
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
ISBN 978 977 416 647 1
eISBN 9781 61797 693 3
Version 1
Contents
Foreword
Acknowledgments
Contributors
1. Sustainability and the Green Economy Salah M. El-Haggar
2. Cradle-to-Cradle and Innovation Hussein ElKersh and Salah M. El-Haggar
3. The Next Industrial Revolution Salah M. El-Haggar
4. Innovation in the Plastic Industry 1: Upcycle of Plastic Waste: Plastic Rejects Salah M. El-Haggar, Lama El Hatow, Yasser Ibrahim, and Mohamed Abu Khatwa
5. Innovation in the Plastic Industry 2: Upcycle of Plastic Waste: Natural Fiber Reinforced Plastics Irene Fahim and Salah M. El-Haggar
6. Innovation in the Glass Industry: Upcycle of Glass Waste: Foam Glass Dina Abdel Alim and Salah M. El-Haggar
7. Innovation in the Plastic Industry 3: Upcycle of Plastic Waste: Natural Fiber Plastic Composites Mokhtar Kamel and Salah M. El-Haggar
8. Innovation in the Marble and Granite Industry: Upcycle of Marble and Granite Wastes Rania Hamza and Salah M. El-Haggar
9. Beyond Sustainability for the Production of Fuel, Food, and Feed Dalia Nakhla and Salah M. El-Haggar
10. Science and Technology Parks for Sustainable Development Salah M. El-Haggar
Foreword
U niversities are society’s stewards of the world’s collective knowledge and wisdom, gathered, preserved, and enriched for future generations. Today, as we learn more about the role of human activity in irreversible change in our natural world, fulfilling our responsibility to the children and grandchildren of today’s students only grows more critical.
The American University in Cairo’s commitment to research, teaching, and outreach in sustainable development began even before the idea gained the global currency it has today. Since the creation of the Desert Development Center (now the Research Institute for Sustainable Environments, RISE) more than three decades ago, AUC has championed enhancing livelihoods through responsible innovation in agriculture, energy and water use, building design, and many other domains. Our new purpose-built campus in New Cairo was designed to be environmentally sensitive, from its orientation to the prevailing winds to its use of local stone and other building materials. Shortly after the establishment of its Office of Sustainability in September 2011, AUC published the first Carbon Footprint Report by a university in the Middle East and North Africa; the third edition was released in 2015.
Just as we challenge ourselves as an institution to measure our impact on our environment and manage it responsibly, we promote scientific research, public debate, and policy advocacy on sustainable development. In 2013, AUC launched Master of Science and professional diploma programs in sustainable development; both are the first of their kind in the region, and they are made possible by the strength and scope of our faculty research in sustainability.
Among the most distinguished of those faculty is the chair of our department of mechanical engineering, Dr. Salah El-Haggar, only a sampling of whose work is showcased in this volume. Long before it was widely recognized as the pressing issue that it is, Dr. El-Haggar was working on recycling and preservation of natural resources, closing the loop of production in domains as varied as plastics, consumer glass, and marble processing. Indeed, as he argues here, we need to look beyond sustainability as simply preservation; the solid wastes, effluents, and emissions we merely manage today will be the inputs—the not-so-raw materials—of the new industrial processes and products of tomorrow.
From building materials to fertilizers, from consumer products to cosmetics and nutritionally valuable foodstuffs, there are opportunities for innovation in industrial uses of recycled plastics, glass, stone, algae, and other apparently low-value by-products of human activity in the modern world. There are novel ways to manage recycling, replacing purchases of durable goods like cars, refrigerators, or computers with long-term leases, thereby ensuring retrieval and reuse of the component parts and materials. There are, in other words, ample supplies of clever, cost-effective, and creative ways to integrate the three vital pillars of sustainability—social justice, environmental responsibility, and economic viability—into the way we live so as to ensure that we fulfill our obligations to future generations.
With this volume, Salah El-Haggar challenges all of us to take up this assignment with his customary energy, wit, and inventiveness. We at AUC are very grateful for this challenge and intend to do our part, and we hope that many others are similarly inspired by this work.
Lisa Anderson
President
The American University in Cairo
Acknowledgments
I would like to thank everyone at the American University in Cairo Press who was involved in the publication of this book. Without their help, devotion, and dedicated efforts, this book would not have come to fruition. I would also like to thank Nigel Fletcher-Jones, the director of the AUC Press, for encouraging me to publish this book, for his rigorous stewardship, and for his valuable contributions. I would also like to acknowledge Johanna Baboukis and Noha Mohammed for their valuable comments during the editing process.
My sincere appreciation goes to all my students at the American University in Cairo, who have always been an integral part of my research projects and who provided substantial assistance in the preparation of this book. Special thanks go to Dina Abdel Alim, Mokhtar Kamel, Dalia Nakhla, Irene Fahim, Rania Hamza, Hussein ElKersh, Lama El-Hatow, Yasser Ibrahim, Mohamed Abu Khatwa, Mahmoud El Haggar, Mohamed Allam, Ossama Manaa, Islam Ramzy, Amr El Shafei, Mohamed El-Haggar, Mohamed Serag, and many other students.
Finally, I would like to thank my wife, Sadika, for her trusted advice over the past thirty-five years. Our shared dream of creating a more peaceful and sustainable world has been the inspiration that guided me to this journey toward sustainability.
Contributors
Dina Abdel Alim holds a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering with a concentration in industrial and design engineering, and a master’s degree in materials and environmental sciences, both from the American University in Cairo. She has worked in the field of enterprise resources planning as a junior supply chain and manufacturing consultant.
Mohamed Abou Khatwa is a research scientist with the Illinois Applied Research Institute. He earned his PhD in materials engineering from McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada in 2009. His thesis examined recrystallization kinetics in AA6111 aluminum alloys. He earned his BSc in 1999 and his MSc in 2003 in mechanical engineering from the American University in Cairo.
Hussein ElKersh holds a master’s degree in mechanical engineering from the American University in Cairo and a bachelor’s degree in mechanical power and energy from Minia University. He received a graduate merit fellowship award in 2012 and a certificate of academic honor for outstanding academic achievement in the mechanical engineering graduate program in 2013. His thesis research concentrated on recycling lead crystal glass sludge to produce foam glass with a wide range of properties. He is currently working as a directional drilling engineer with Schlumberger.
Irene Fahim is an adjunct faculty member in the Department of Mechanical Engineering, American University in Cairo. Her PhD thesis project is developing novel polymer composite membranes for industrial applications. She earned her Masters of Material Science degree in mechanical engineering at AUC. Her thesis project was developing natural fiber (rice straw) reinforced composites. Fahim has experience in specialized software including Design Expert for optimization of experiment parameters, Minitab for statistics, Image J analysis software for image analysis, and Abacus for finite elements analysis.
Rania Hamza has been a PhD student in the Department of Civil Engineering at the University of Calgary (Canada) since 2014. Before starting her PhD studies, she worked as an engineer for the fluids, hydraulics, and construction surveying labs at the American University in Cairo. Hamza has more than ten years of experience in both academia and industry in the fields of environmental engineering and sustainable development. She received her MSc in environmental engineering (2001) and BSc in construction engineering (2006) from AUC. Her research interests include solid waste management, industrial solid waste recycling, and biological wastewater treatment. Her doctoral thesis focuses on treatment of high-strength industrial wastewater in an integrated anaerobic–aerobic granular sludge bioreactor.
Lama El Hatow is an environmental specialist focused on issues related to climate change and wate