Planning Grant: Engineering Research Center for ENgineered Solutions for rUral REsilience--ENSURE: Food, Energy, Environment, and Infrastructure

Kansas State University, Manhattan KS

Investigators

Abstract

Kansas State University (KSU) will partner with the University of Nebraska (UN-L) and Washington State University (WSU) to plan for the Engineering Research Center for ENgineered Solutions for rUral Resilience - ENSURE: Food, Energy, Environment, and Infrastructure. ENSURE seeks to create sustainable rural communities through engineering innovations and in partnership with rural stakeholders. Rural areas are distributed across the country, and their spread out nature can enable efficient distribution of food, clean energy, and healthy environments. This is particularly important since 80% of the U.S. population lives in cities that are vulnerable to climate change, such as rising sea levels, storm surges, and heat waves. Agriculture is a key economic driver in many states and, subsequently, at the heart of many rural communities. Some examples of ENSURE's research include sustainable and profitable food production, micro-grids which harness wind energy and use solid oxide fuel cells, and recovery of nutrients from animal waste. ERC planning activities include a Research Visioning Meeting hosted at WSU in the fall, three webinars focusing on research themes, and a Facilitated Workshop hosted at KSU in the spring; all meetings will bring together academia, industry, and rural stakeholders, such as small business owners and farmers. This ERC planning grant fundamentally questions the societal assumption that the current migration towards cities is the ideal resource distribution; investment in infrastructure and systems in rural areas could create more resilient infrastructure overall (e.g., food systems, energy resources, healthy environments). The vision of the ERC ENSURE is to generate resilient, engineered systems in conjunction with rural stakeholders, creating sufficient capacity in rural communities - across the U.S. and worldwide - to adapt and respond to shocks and adverse conditions. Using this planning grant, the team will develop a more complete vision of the rural landscape including the differences in, and relationships between, the social, political, human, and cultural capitals in conjunction with the natural, built, and financial capitals. The proposed team includes engineering (i.e., bio/ag, civil, chemical, electrical, environmental, and mechanical), public health, sociology, agricultural economics, agronomy, extension agents, geography, and regional and community stakeholders. Through a convergent approach, the team will create new intellectual merit that would not exist through parallel, discipline-based studies and disparate connections to stakeholders. This project will capture a more complete understanding of the rural landscape as defined by a wide range of stakeholders, allowing the team to understand the challenges and create better engineered solutions. Information gained through the facilitated discussions will be used to create a detailed database. This database will paint a contemporary picture of rural landscapes, highlighting the differences in human and natural capital, and providing the information needed to make informed decisions. The database will be used to develop multi-criteria decision support models, planning and analysis tools, and a story map. Outcomes of planning activities include 1) asking convergent, fundamental research questions; 2) forming the team using Google?s Project Aristotle framework; 3) creating a consensus regarding ERC goals; and 4) generating an informational geospatial database to serve as the foundation of story maps to communicate the information. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.