EPA’s Campus RainWorks Challenge is a national collegiate competition that engages the next generation to design innovative solutions for real-world stormwater pollution problems. EPA invites student teams to compete in two design categories — the Master Plan category, which examines how green infrastructure could be integrated into a broad area of a school’s campus, and the Demonstration Project category, which examines how green infrastructure could be integrated into a particular site on the team’s campus. This webcast will feature the first place teams presenting on their winning submissions for the 5th annual Campus RainWorks Challenge just announced in April. For additional details on this year’s winning entries, please visit our website.

Details

May 23, 2017 
1:00 - 2:30 pm EDT 

Kansas State University won first place in the demonstration project category. Their Stronger Quinlan project weaves innovative green infrastructure practices into a historic campus green space plagued with problems of flooding and erosion. By installing rainwater harvesting and permeable pavement as well as planting trees and native plants, the students estimate their design could reduce stormwater runoff by 46 percent and capture 597,000 gallons of water per year for irrigation.

City College of New York won first place in the master plan project category. Their Castor Project is named after the school’s mascot, Castor canadesis, more commonly known as the beaver. Taking a cue from the beaver’s role as a natural water manager, the team designed a master plan for campus-wide stormwater management. The plan calls for increasing tree canopy 15 percent by adding 89 trees and reducing impervious area 38 percent by adding 23,000 square feet of permeable surface. Additionally, a proposed water storage tank could capture up to 3000 cubic feet of stormwater for gray water uses.

​Speakers 

Kansas State

Lee R. Skabelund, PLA, ASLA is an Associate Professor in the Department of Landscape Architecture / Regional and Community Planning at Kansas State University (KSU).  He has worked in public and private practice leading efforts on Ecological Restoration and Construction Administration at Furstenberg Nature Park (Ann Arbor, Michigan); Sustainable Development of Forestlands and Tom’s Creek Riparian Restoration projects (Southwest Virginia); KSU’s design-build stormwater management projects (including the award-winning KSU-ISC Rain-Garden); and KSU’s green roof and rain-garden monitoring/research. He earned a BLA in Landscape Architecture & Environmental Planning from Utah State University and an MLA from the University of Michigan. He is currently the Mary K. Jarvis Chair in Landscape Architecture at KSU.

Conner Bruns,  a 5th year Master's of Landscape Architecture student, is interested in weaving sustainable design into the process of creative placemaking. He has participated in several design competitions focused on sustainable stormwater management including the Great Plains Low Impact Development competition for which his team received a first-place prize. Three years ago, he participated in the EPA Campus Rainworks Challenge. While his team did not receive an award that year, the experience helped him understand the process of what it would take to put together a winning submission.

Kelsey McDonough, a second-year PhD student, is studying Biological & Agricultural Engineering. Her research focuses on urban stormwater management, hydrologic modeling and ecosystem services. She has worked in research and industry, alongside partners such as the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and the City of Kansas City, MO, to develop innovative water management solutions. Kelsey has participated in multiple design competitions, and was most recently awarded first place for her team’s submission to the 2016 Great Plains LID Symposium Student Design Competition. Kelsey earned her M.S. in Biological Engineering from Kansas State University and her B.S. in Biological Engineering from North Carolina State University.

CCNY:

Naresh Devineni, is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Civil Engineering and a Faculty Affiliate at the NOAA-Cooperative Remote Sensing Science and Technology Center at The City College of New York. He has diverse interests in hydro-climate modeling and extremes analysis, statistical methods, water sustainability and risk assessment and water systems analysis. He has consulted for the World Bank, and he offers information through his blogs where people from all backgrounds can learn data analysis, probability and statistics in a fun and intuitive way without the technical lingo He holds an M.S. and Ph.D. in Civil Engineering from North Carolina State University. He did his post-doctoral studies at Columbia University.  

Lawrence Vulis is a senior in Earth Systems Science and Environmental Engineering. Lawrence’s interests in green infrastructure stem from using natural systems to effectively manage human water use. Some of his previous research experience includes work at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and at the CCNY Environmental Engineering Laboratory. He will begin graduate studies in the fall at the University of California Irvine studying non-linear dynamics in hydroclimatic systems. Lawrence is also a NOAA EPP MSI undergraduate scholar.

Agata Bugala is a junior Earth Systems Science and Environmental Engineering student working for the Environmental Engineering Laboratory in the Civil Engineering Department. She is exploring various methods of water purification and water-testing. Additionally, Agata is studying the impact of dissolved oxygen on carbon solubilization in High Rate Activated Sludge Systems such as the Newtown Creek Water Resource Recovery Facility (WRRF) in New York City.

Uziel Crescenzi is an MLA candidate at CCNY. He has worked as a horticulturalist, writer, and landscape designer completing horticultural internships at the Arnold Arboretum and Wave Hill Botanical Garden, and an editorial internship at the American Horticultural Society. Uziel earned a B.T. in Plant Science from the State University of New York College of Agriculture and Technology at Cobleskill. Working as a horticulturalist, he appreciated the social interactions the community had with the landscape, and he wants to further that interaction to promote environmental and socio-economic activity within communities.