T.H. Wu Lecture Series

ENGINEERING A SUSTAINABLE FUTURE

Today, the greatest opportunities and challenges for the engineering professions and industries are the support of development that is economically, environmentally and socially sustainable. Sustainable development will require approaches in which the use of
natural resources, the direction of investments and the orientation of technological development are in harmony and enhance meeting both current and future human needs. Sustainable development will be the dominant economic, environmental, political, social, and, hence national security issue of the 21st century. For better or for worse, our professions will create the built environment of the future, and will consume significant natural resources in the process. Our enduring handiwork will bear witness for decades and even centuries as to whether we have respected the needs of future generations and preserved their options for their own sustainability.

Guest Speaker: Henry J. “Hank” Hatch

In 1992 Henry J. Hatch retired from the Army as a Lieutenant General, the Chief of Engineers and Commander of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. He is an active volunteer with several professional organizations. Among these have been two boards of the National Research Council (NRC) (the operating arm of the National Academies of Engineering and Science). He also is active with the American Association of Engineering Societies (AAES) and the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE). He chairs the International Activities Committees of the former. He is a past National President of the Society of American Military Engineers and currently chairs the Natural Sciences and Engineering Committee of the US National Commission for UNESCO. Hatch earned his Bachelors from West Point and his Masters from the Ohio State University. He is a registered professional engineer in the District of Columbia, a Distinguished Member of ASCE and a member of the National Academy of Engineering.