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Trottier Symposium on Sustainable Engineering, Energy and Design: Drafting a green blueprint for the future

Published: 20 March 2014

The first annual Trottier Symposium on Sustainable Engineering, Energy and Design will be held March 17-18 at le Centre Mont-Royal from 5:30-7:30 p.m..

Published on March 12, 2014 | McGill Reporter
by McGill Reporter Staff

The Reporter caught up with Prof. Subhasis Ghoshal, Director of the Trottier Institute for Sustainability in Engineering and Design (TISED) at McGill to find out more about this inaugural event. TISED will organize the symposium each year in collaboration with the Institut de l’énergie Trottier (IET) at Polytechnique Montréal. McGill University is the host in 2014 and Polytechnique Montréal will host in 2015.  For more information on the upcoming Symposium, go here.

What exactly do you mean by “sustainable cities” and “sustainable industries”?

Sustainable cities and industries are systems that minimize consumption of resources – for example, materials, energy, water – both in development and delivery of services and products, but also in minimizing waste production and emissions (e.g. solid waste, wastewater, greenhouse gases). Sustainable cities and industries are also systems that enable economic and social advancement. All of this seems like a tall wish-list, but we are finding ways of integrating all this in our blueprints for the future of our cities and industries. Our symposium will feature speakers who have outlined some of the most promising pathways for achieving cities and industries that are more sustainable.

With all the crumbling infrastructure in Montreal, it seems like we’ve got a long way to go to make this city sustainable. Will this symposium provide some ideas about how to go about it?

The symposium will focus on how can we do things right in the future for cities such as Montreal, and highlight efforts being made in that direction already. The symposium will help us think about infrastructure and the city we want in the future.  The technology for building efficient infrastructure is improving over the years, but there are challenges in operating and maintaining infrastructure. A major question that the symposium will deal with is how future development and redevelopment can be planned such that some of those challenges can be addressed.

Read the rest of the story here.

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