Jamie Joice G.

Noche

ChE 150

Week 1 - January 20, 2018 (Saturday)

This week we were introduced to the course and we learned about the foundation of
environmental engineering. The definition of environmental engineering was first defined. It is to
protect the environment from human actions, the humans from environmental effect, and improve
environmental quality. We also learned about the difference between environmental science and
engineer; the scientist plans and quantify while the engineer solves the problem.

One thing that was reiterated was the definition of environment versus its commonly used
synonyms – nature and ecosystem. All in all, environment deals with social impact.

The next three in the outline was resources, population, and pollution. I actually learned a lot
of things from my ChE 197 – Intro to Renewable Energy class regarding resources. We not only
talked about RE but resources in general.

Lastly, the environmental impact model and the types of environmental degradation were
discussed. These make me think that everything we do can affect the environment, and as
engineers, we should be the first one to try and stop the degradation.

To end this reflection, I have two questions in mind. First is how do you actually measure the
natural capacity? Follow-up question: (I don’t know if this will make sense but) can the natural
capacity of the environment increase? Second question is: How is natural capacity related to carbon
footprint?