Groundwater is a critical yet finite resource. When groundwater is excessively pumped for its many uses (drinking, irrigation, etc.), the surrounding land area can sink, known as land subsidence, causing permanent groundwater storage loss. Prof. Ryan G. Smith and colleagues have developed a new model to map subsidence globally for the first time. They published…Read more

The American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) invited Professor John van de Lindt to discuss his new book, Resilient and Sustainable Buildings. CEE professors Hussam Mahmoud and Bruce Ellingwood contributed as chapter co-authors, and van de Lindt served as lead editor for the book. The text examines four NSF projects pertaining to resilient and sustainable structures,…Read more

The New York Times’ article “‘Monster Fracks’ Are Getting Far Bigger. And Far Thirstier.” references research by CEE professors Kenneth Carlson and Tiezheng Tong. The article demonstrated the impact on U.S. aquifers by fracking activity by large oil and gas wells, using “astonishing volumes of water.” Carlson and Tong’s research found hydraulic fracturing in arid…Read more

Assistant Professor Antônio Alves Meira Neto was named a 2022 Outstanding Reviewer by the American Geophysical Union (AGU) for his work with the Water Resources Research journal. The AGU, established in 1919 by the National Research Council, is a leading association in earth and space sciences. Meira joined the Civil and Environmental Engineering Department in the…Read more

Assistant Professor Ryan Smith’s research connecting groundwater depletion to arsenic contamination was cited in a New York Times article entitled “America Is Using Up Its Groundwater Like There’s No Tomorrow.” Below is an excerpt from the article: “In general, as people drill deeper wells, the likelihood of arsenic contamination increases, according to Dr. Smith, now…Read more

Professor Hussam Mahmoud has published an article in Nature‘s online journal under the World View section entitled “The causes of wildfires are clear. How they burn through communities is not.” In the article, Mahmoud calls for community-wide mitigation to reduce damage from wildfires. His own groundbreaking wildfire model is one such way to increase resilience…Read more

Sybil Sharvelle, Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering, is also head of the Water Technology Acceleration Platform Lab (Water TAP) at the CSU SPUR campus. Learn more about the Water TAP Lab in this video.

This week, both NPR for Northern Colorado (KUNC) and Colorado’s 11 News (KKTV) invited Professor Hussam Mahmoud to describe his work on predicting the path of wildfires within communities. While there are several models for predicting wildfire paths in forests and wildlands, communities are more challenging to predict. Yet, his groundbreaking model was able to…Read more

Morrison develops framework for measuring floodplain integrity across the contiguous U.S. Associate Professor Ryan Morrison details his latest research in the development of an index of floodplain integrity in an article published by Communications Earth & Environment entitled “Degradation of floodplain integrity within the contiguous United States.” Floodplains provide critical environmental benefits such as reducing the impact…Read more

Desert Research Institute hires CEE postdoc as research faculty Postdoctoral fellow Sayantan “Monty” Majumdar was hired as an assistant research professor by the Desert Research Institute (DRI) in June 2023. Majumdar earned his PhD from Missouri University of Science and Technology and came to CSU as a postdoc in September 2022. CEE Assistant Professor Ryan…Read more