Realizing the Value of Nature Length: 18 minutes, Air Date: November 16, 2022 Season 5 of the Engineering With Nature® Podcast launches on November 30. Host Sarah Thorne recently talked about highlights from Season 4 and what’s ahead for Season 5 with Todd Bridges, Senior Research Scientist for Environmental Science with the US Army Corps of Engineers […]

In the premier episode of Season 5 of the Engineering With Nature® Podcast, host Sarah Thorne, and Burton Suedel, Research Biologist at the Engineer Research and Development Center (ERDC), are talking with two ERDC colleagues – Alan Kennedy, who is in the Risk Branch of the Environmental Laboratory, and Zackery McClelland, who is in the Concrete and Materials Branch of the Geotechnical and Structures Laboratory.

What happens when a nation focuses on addressing the critical challenges posed by climate change by investing in nature? That’s what we’re talking about in Season 5, Episode 2, of the Engineering With Nature_® Podcast.

The first ever National Nature Assessment (NNA) is currently underway to better understand how nature is faring in the United States and what it means to all our lives. That’s the focus of our discussion in Season 5, Episode 3, of the Engineering With Nature_® Podcast.

How do we measure what’s most important to us? And how do we translate those values into decisions about infrastructure projects so that they can deliver a diverse set of economic, environmental, and social benefits? That’s the focus of our discussion in this episode of the Engineering With Nature_® Podcast. Host Sarah Thorne and Todd Bridges, National Lead of the Engineering With Nature Program, are pleased to welcome Justin Ehrenwerth, President and CEO of The Water Institute.

The Network for Engineering With Nature (N-EWN), which we introduced in Season 1, Episode 10, is a community of researchers, practitioners, and educators who are working together to advance the practice of Engineering With Nature (EWN). We’re back in Season 5, Episode 5, to talk with N-EWN’s visionary leadership about what’s been accomplished and what lies ahead. Host Sarah Thorne and Todd Bridges, National Lead of the EWN Program, welcome back Brian Bledsoe, Director of the Institute for Resilient Infrastructure Systems (IRIS) at the University of Georgia, and our guests, Ellen Herbert, Senior Scientist, Sustainability and Nature-Based Solutions with Ducks Unlimited, and Chris Mack, Principal, Coastal Engineering Lead and Regional Coastal Solutions Director with Stantec.

In this episode, Lieutenant General Scott Spellmon joins Todd Bridges, Senior Research Scientist for Environmental Science and National Lead for the Engineering With Nature (EWN) Program, and host, Sarah Thorne, as their special guest. Lt. Gen. Spellmon is the 55th Chief of Engineers and the Commanding General of the US Army Corps of Engineers (USACE). We’re discussing the role of EWN, the importance of innovation, partnerships, and the General’s perspective on priorities for the future.

This very special episode of the EWN Podcast features Todd Bridges, Founder and National Lead of the Engineering With Nature Program. We’re celebrating his 30-year career and retirement from the US Army Corps of Engineers (on February 28, 2023), and discussing his visionary leadership of EWN and what’s up next for him. Host Sarah Thorne is joined by Dave Trafford, Producer of the EWN Podcast, and Chief Executive Producer, Story Studio Network.

Host Sarah Thorne and Jeff King, the new National Lead of the Engineering With Nature_® Program, are joined by Daniel Hayden, President and CEO of Restore America’s Estuaries (RAE). RAE, a nongovernmental organization dedicated to protecting and restoring bays and estuaries along the coasts, has a bold vision for the future, one in which Engineering With Nature and nature-based solutions play a critical role.

Coastal ecosystems provide an essential part of the solution to global climate change, along with multiple benefits. Among other things, coastal ecosystems sequester and store ‘blue carbon’—carbon that’s stored in coastal and marine ecosystems. We’re talking with leading scientists about their foundational research into how blue carbon is helping to address climate change.

We’re getting ready to launch Season 4 of the Engineering With Nature® Podcast in May. Host Sarah Thorne recently talked with Todd Bridges, Senior Research Scientist for Environmental Science with the US Army Corps of Engineers and the National Lead of the Engineering With Nature Program, and Jeff King, Deputy National Lead of the Engineering With Nature Program, about the EWN Podcast and what’s ahead for Season 4.

Welcome to the first episode of Season 4! Our theme is “Up, Up, Up, with Nature-Based Solutions” and we have a fabulous line-up of guests who are going to join us and talk about the climate change imperative—and the opportunity to collaborate on developing and implementing landscape-scale projects.

Host Sarah Thorne and Jeff King, Deputy Lead of the Engineering With Nature Program at the US Army Corps of Engineers (USACE), are joined by a roundtable of EWN Practice Leads who are all with USACE. Elizabeth Godsey is the Technical Lead for Coastal Engineering and Regional Sediment Management with Mobile District; Danielle Szimanski is a Project Manager and Ecologist with Baltimore District; Edward Brauer is a Senior Hydraulic Engineer with St. Louis District; and David Crane is an Environmental Resource Specialist with Omaha District.

In Episode 3, the EWN Practice Leads return to talk about how they’re solving challenges, advancing EWN implementation through the EWN Implementation Cadre, and sharing what they are learning with other practitioners.

Welcome to Episode 4! We’re discussing the role of EWN and nature-based solutions (NBS) in addressing urban challenges to build community and regional resilience. Host Sarah Thorne is joined by new co-host, Burton Suedel, Research Biologist at the US Army Corps of Engineers (USACE); Abby Hall, Senior Advisor on Local and Regional Planning, with the Office of Community Revitalization, at the US Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA); and Jim McPherson, Federal Coordinating Officer for Region 1, with the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).

Welcome to Episode 5! Today we’re kicking off the summer season with a road trip! Host Sarah Thorne is joined by Todd Bridges, Senior Research Scientist for Environmental Science with the US Army Corps of Engineers and the National Lead of the Engineering With Nature® Program to talk about a new podcast mini-series. Over the past 2 years, Todd has been traveling across the country to visit people, places, and projects and he’s been reflecting on his experiences by writing a travel blog. We’re bringing highlights from the EWN On The Road blog to a podcast format—easy listening for summer travelers!

Coming Soon—Two Inspirational Conversations about Leadership and EWN. We’re really excited about our upcoming episodes 6 and 7. Tune in July 20th as we discuss leadership and Engineering With Nature with two inspirational USACE Division leaders – Colonel (P) Antoinette Gant, Commander, and Division Engineer of the South Pacific Division (SPD), and Brigadier General Jason Kelly, Commander of the South Atlantic Division (SAD).

In Episode 6, host Sarah Thorne and Todd Bridges, Senior Research Scientist for Environmental Science with the US Army Corps of Engineers and the National Lead of the Engineering With Nature® Program, are talking with COL Gant about the challenges and opportunities facing the South Pacific Division, and how EWN and leadership are being applied to meet those needs.

In Episode 7, host Sarah Thorne and Todd Bridges, Senior Research Scientist for Environmental Science with the US Army Corps of Engineers and the National Lead of the Engineering With Nature® Program, are talking with Brig. Gen. Kelly about the challenges facing the South Atlantic Division. From restoration in the Everglades, to deepening the Charleston Harbor, to ongoing flood control initiatives, to disaster preparedness, we’re talking about the leadership needed to address landscape-scale challenges in innovative ways and how Engineering With Nature (EWN) is an important part of infrastructure solutions.

Welcome to the summer feature podcast miniseries—EWN On The Road. As we teased in Episode 5, in this special series, Todd Bridges, Senior Research Scientist for Environmental Science with the US Army Corps of Engineers and the National Lead of the Engineering With Nature® Program, is sharing some highlights of his travels across the country over the past 2 years visiting people, places, and projects relevant to EWN. The miniseries includes 4 episodes and will post August 3, 10, 17 and 24.

As students head back to class, Episode 8 of the EWN Podcast focuses on foundation of EWN—the disciplines of Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Mathematics (STEAM/STEM). In several episodes of the podcast, we’ve touched on the importance of encouraging students—the next generation of scientists, engineers, and EWN practitioners. Here we feature some additional discussion from guests from two episodes this season talking about STEAM/STEM and their advice to students.

In Episode 9, hosts Sarah Thorne and Todd Bridges, Senior Research Scientist for Environmental Science with the US Army Corps of Engineers and the National Lead of the Engineering With Nature® Program, are talking with two guests from England’s Environment Agency (EA) in the United Kingdom (UK). Julie Foley is Director of Food Risk Strategy and National Adaptation; and her colleague, Jon Hollis, is the Nature-Based Solutions Senior Advisor

In Episode 10, hosts Sarah Thorne and Jeff King, Deputy Lead of the Engineering With Nature® Program at the US Army Corps of Engineers (USACE), are talking with Kotchakorn Voraakhom (“Kotch”), an international member of the American Society of Landscape Architects and founder of Bangkok-based landscape architecture company LANDPROCESS, and Derek Hoeferlin, Chair of the Landscape Architecture and Urban Design programs at Washington University in St. Louis.

Season 3 of the Engineering With Nature® Podcast launches October 6. It’s been a big year for Engineering With Nature! Host, Sarah Thorne, recently talked with Todd Bridges, Lead Engineering With Nature, United States Army Corps of Engineers (USACE), about why and what’s coming up in Season 3. As Todd notes: “there’s a whole range of things that make this year a big year, including the fact that Congress recognized Engineering With Nature in very formal way by including it within the budget, which brings importance and urgency to execute.” We’ll be talking about the new policy directives and measuring the benefits of natural and nature-based solutions. Our guests from the new EWN Proving Grounds – Mobile District, San Francisco District and St Louis District – will discuss how they are integrating EWN approaches into their work. And we’ll talk about EWN’s recently launched International Guidelines on the Use of Natural and Nature Based Features for Flood Risk Management that provide technical practitioners the tools and knowledge needed to plan, design, engineer, and construct NNBF projects.

President Biden’s January 2021 Executive Order, Tackling the Climate Crisis at Home and Abroad, emphasizes the urgency of taking action to build climate resiliency and specifically calls for the inclusion of nature-based solutions. Combined with the $1 trillion Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act approved by the US Senate in August, 2021, which describes major infrastructure projects to be undertaken, these represent an unprecedented opportunity to incorporate Engineering With Nature approaches into infrastructure policy and projects. Our guests are Todd Bridges, Senior Research Scientist for Environmental Science with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and National Lead for EWN; Sarah Murdock, Director of US Climate Resilience and Water Policy at The Nature Conservancy; Justin Ehrenwerth, President and CEO of The Water Institute of the Gulf; and Mindy Simmons, Senior Policy Advisor, Aquatic Ecosystem Restoration Business Line Manager at the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

Over 700 people attended the live launch of the International Guidelines on Natural and Nature-Based Features for Flood Risk Management on September 16, 2021. Host Sarah Thorne talks with Todd Bridges, Lead, Engineering With Nature, United States Army Corps of Engineers, about the importance of the Guidelines. This effort was the culmination of five years of collaboration to develop the Guidelines, 1000 pages of knowledge, information and experience about the use of natural nature-based features for flood risk management and, the 150-page Overview that is intended to be more accessible to a broader range of readers beyond the technical community. As Todd notes, “we’ve developed some thoughts, ideas, and information that we believe will help practitioners, agencies, authorities, and organizations and communities around the world pursue this idea of combining nature with engineering and infrastructure to develop better systems that perform in a sustainable and enduring way into the future.”

In Episode 1 we discussed the unprecedented opportunity presented by President Biden’s January 2021 Executive Order, Tackling the Climate Crisis at Home and Abroad, to incorporate Engineering With Nature approaches into major infrastructure and climate resilience projects. Factoring the benefits and costs of nature-based solutions into decisions about infrastructure investments is a critical step on the path to sustainability. This episode continues the discussion with our guests, Todd Bridges, Senior Research Scientist for Environmental Science with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and National Lead for EWN; Sarah Murdock, Director of US Climate Resilience and Water Policy at The Nature Conservancy; Justin Ehrenwerth, President and CEO of The Water Institute of the Gulf; and Mindy Simmons, Senior Policy Advisor, Aquatic Ecosystem Restoration Business Line Manager at the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

This episode exemplifies our theme for Season 3 – Creating the Future with EWN. Host, Sarah Thorne, and Jeff King, Deputy Lead of the Engineering With Nature program at the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, are talking with three PhD students who are doing truly groundbreaking work: Matt Chambers from the University of Georgia; Joseph Holway from Arizona State University; and Justine McCann from the University of Oklahoma.

How can Engineering With Nature approaches make urban landscapes more livable? In this episode, host Sarah Thorne and Todd Bridges, the Army’s Senior Research Scientist for Environmental Science and National Lead for U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ Engineering With Nature Program, are talking with planners from two very different cities—New York City and Fort Collins, Colorado. Our guests are Adam Parris, Deputy Director for Climate Science and Services at the New York City Mayor’s Office of Climate Resiliency, and Jennifer Shanahan, Senior Watershed Planner in the Natural Areas Department at the City of Fort Collins, Colorado. Both are working to support their city’s efforts to make urban communities safer, more sustainable, and more resilient.

Climate change and the imperative to take action now is top of mind following the COP26 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Glasgow. The effects of climate change – rising sea levels, changing temperature and precipitation patterns, wildfires, and many other changes impact vulnerable natural resources, including national parks and wildlife refuges.

In this episode, host Sarah Thorne and Jeff King, Deputy Lead of the Engineering With Nature Program at the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, continue the discussion with Rebecca Beavers, Coastal Geology and Adaptation Coordinator for the National Park Service and Scott Covington, Senior Ecologist for Refuges within the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

In this episode, host Sarah Thorne and Jeff King, Deputy Lead of the Engineering With Nature® Program at the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, are joined by Tosin Sekoni, Research Ecologist, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, and Art Froehlich, CEO of AgriView and partner in The Communities for Life Network. They’re talking about the importance of plants in the design of natural infrastructure to increase both ecosystem and community resilience.

In this episode, host Sarah Thorne and Todd Bridges, Senior Research Scientist for Environmental Science with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the National Lead of the Engineering With Nature® Program, are joined by author Mark Arax. Mark’s recent book, The Dreamt Land, describes in very personal terms the history of California’s water challenges, its unprecedented irrigation experiment, and the emerging threats of climate change.

The Valley, the most productive agricultural region in the world, is running out of water due to a combination of climate change, expansion of agriculture, urban development, and a century of trying to control nature. How this system can be rebalanced is where we start the conversation.

In this episode, host Sarah Thorne and Todd Bridges, Senior Research Scientist for Environmental Science with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the National Lead of the Engineering With Nature® Program, are joined by Steve Thur, Director of the National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science (NCCOS) at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). NCCOS is the marine science entity of the National Ocean Service; and its role is to serve the science needs of NOAA, other federal and state government partners, and decision makers. We discuss how the practice of Engineering With Nature and the application of NBS are evolving and the importance of protecting critical coastal ecosystems. We’re also telling the story of a powerful collaboration and partnership between USACE and NOAA.

Season 2 of the Engineering With Nature® Podcast launches March 17th, and we’re pretty excited about the lineup. Host, Sarah Thorne, recently talked with Dr. Todd Bridges, National Lead for Engineering With Nature (EWN), United States Army Corps of Engineers (USACE), about the upcoming season. His bottom line: “the future is right and the future is bright for EWN. It is the right direction for infrastructure and the timing is ideal.”

As the world emerges from the COVID 19 pandemic, infrastructure will play a key role in helping economies around the world recover. The World Economic Forum estimates $100 trillion dollars will be committed to infrastructure projects in the next thirty years.

In this episode, we’re talking with Rob Holmes at Auburn University, Sean Burkholder at the University of Pennsylvania, and Brian Davis at the University of Virginia. They are landscape architects who have joined forces with Engineering With Nature®. Jeff King, deputy lead of the Engineering With Nature program at the US Army Corps of Engineers, shares his excitement about bringing these disciplines together and discusses the synergies, opportunities, and potential for advancing the practice of EWN.

In our next episode, we’ll be talking with Enda Murphy of the National Research Council of Canada and Sam Whitin of EA Engineering, Science and Technology about Building Resilience in Cold Regions with EWN and Natural and Nature-based Features. They’ll be talking about interesting projects underway and planned in Alaska and Canada.

Climate change is having a significant effect on Arctic communities. The loss of permafrost and ice sheets, sea level rise, erosion, and many other factors are putting people living in coastal communities and their traditional way of life at risk. In this episode, we’re discussing the unique challenges and opportunities involved in identifying and designing resilience strategies to help remote northern communities in Alaska and Canada whose future and way of life is imminently threatened by climate change

In 2020, natural hazards like storms, floods, droughts, and wildfires caused more than $200 billion in damage worldwide and the death of 8,000 people. Since 1980, there have been 285 weather and climate-related disasters in the United States alone that have produced at least $1 billion in damage. In this two-part episode, we’re talking with Dr. Todd Bridges, Senior Research Scientist for Environmental Science with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and National Lead for Engineering With Nature®, and Dr. Brenden Jongman, Senior Disaster Risk Management Specialist with the World Bank’s Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery (GFDRR).

Seventeen hundred U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) bases around the world are subject to sea level rise, which has increased by seven to eight inches since 1900. Natural hazards, such as severe storms and hurricanes, are occurring more frequently; and climate change is changing the profile of those hazards. Innovative solutions are needed to protect these bases. In this episode we’re talking with Dr. Todd Bridges, Senior Research Scientist for Environmental Science with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and National Lead for Engineering With Nature®, and Dr. Lori Adornato, Program Manager at DARPA, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, about the passion they share for oceanography and for solving future challenges by using innovative nature-based solutions.

In 2020, the United States experienced extreme droughts, wildfires, flooding, and a record number of hurricanes. What if there was a better way to monitor and prepare for these natural events, and how could an Engineering With Nature (EWN) approach add value to “the climate change imperative?” That’s what we’re exploring in this episode with Safra Altman, PhD, Research Ecologist in the Environmental Laboratory at the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, and Marshall Shepherd, PhD, Meteorologist and Director of the Atmospheric Sciences Program at the University of Georgia. Through the Network for Engineering With Nature (N-EWN), Safra and Marshall have initiated a project to assess pre- and postdisaster monitoring. What they learn will be an important part of a bigger project to ultimately help improve community resilience to climate change and extreme weather events by applying EWN approaches.

From flood risk to extreme drought and wildfire, California is feeling the brunt of climate change impacts and is, by necessity, at the forefront of climate change innovation. In this episode, we’re talking about the unique challenges of managing California’s precious water resources and about a new collaboration between the California Department of Water Resources (DWR) and Engineering With Nature®. Our guests are Dr. Todd Bridges, Senior Research Scientist for Environmental Science with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and National Lead for EWN, and Kris Tjernell, Deputy Director, Integrated Watershed Management for the California Department of Water Resources. The goal of the collaboration on EWN is to advance opportunities for truly integrated solutions to water resource challenges.

In Part 2 of Episode 7, we continue our discussion with Todd Bridges, Senior Research Scientist for Environmental Science with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and National Lead for EWN; and Kris Tjernell, Deputy Director, Integrated Watershed Management for the California Department of Water Resources. We discuss their plans to fully integrate EWN into critical watershed projects in California. They hope these projects will showcase innovation and new ways of thinking about climate change adaptation and resilience on a broad scale, while accelerating the multi-benefits of water management, habitat restoration and community resilience.

Climate change is affecting the ecosystems that support life and everything we depend on. The United Nations declared 2021 to 2030 the ‘Decade of Ecosystem Restoration’, and there is a global effort to restore ecosystems and the many benefits they provide, from enhancing food security and safe water to biodiversity. In this episode, we’re talking about the Pacific Region and how Engineering With Nature can learn from and add value to innovative ecosystem restoration, conservation, disaster management efforts, and infrastructure development. Our guests are Todd Bridges, Senior Research Scientist for Environmental Science with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and National Lead for EWN; Anita van Breda, Senior Director, Environment and Disaster Management, World Wildlife Fund; and William Glamore, Associate Professor and Principal Research Fellow at the Water Research Laboratory, UNSW Sydney, Australia.

In Part 2: Nature-Based Solutions for Infrastructure, the Global Sand Crisis, and Wealth Distribution, discussion continues with Todd Bridges, National Lead of the Engineering With Nature program at the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers; Anita van Breda, Senior Director, Environment and Disaster Management at the World Wildlife Fund; and William Glamore, Associate Professor and Principal Research Fellow at the Water Research Laboratory, UNSW Sydney, Australia. We’re talking about the International Guidelines on Natural and Nature-Based Features coming out in September and other critical guidance documents that Anita contributed to, including Natural and Nature-Based Flood Management: A Green Guide and Nature-Based Solutions for Water-Related Disasters. As we’re learning, natural and nature-based approaches to infrastructure challenges are becoming common practice in the Pacific.

After years of development and collaboration with 150+ contributors and authors, from 70+ organizations, from 10+ countries, the International Guidelines on Natural and Nature-Based Features for Flood Risk Management are being released on September 16, 2021.

Length: 1 minute, Air Date: July 13, 2020 *Occasionally external links are blocked when connected to VPN. Host, Sarah Thorne of Decision Partners, has been working with her colleagues at the US Army Corps of Engineers on the EWN initiative for the past decade, and, through this podcast, will share stories of the people, their unique collaborations, […]

Guest: Todd S. Bridges, Ph.D., Senior Research Scientist (ST), Environmental Science, and National Lead, Engineering With Nature Initiative, US Army Corps of Engineers

Guest: Jeff Corbino, Chief, Environmental Function, Operations Division – Technical Support Branch, New Orleans District, US Army Corps of Engineers

Guest: Brigadier General Patrice Melancon,
Executive Director of the Program Management Office,
Tyndall Air Force Base,
US Air Force

Guest: Tori Tomiczek, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, School of Naval Architecture and Ocean Engineering, United States Naval Academy

Guest: Paula Whitfield, Research Ecologist, National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration

Guest: Mike Beck, Ph.D., Research Professor and Head of the Coastal Resilience Lab, University of California at Santa Cruz

Guest: Edmond Russo, Ph.D., P.E., Director, Environmental Laboratory, US Army Engineer Research and Development Center

Guest: Monica Chasten, Project Manager, Operations Division, Philadelphia District, US Army Corps of Engineers

Guests: Don McNeill, Director of Natural Infrastructure Initiative, Caterpillar, Inc. and Mike Donahue, Ph.D., Vice-President of Water Resources and Environmental Services, AECOM

Guests: Brian Bledsoe, Ph.D., Director of University of Georgia’s Institute for Resilient Infrastructure Systems and Todd S. Bridges, Ph.D., Senior Research Scientist (ST), Environmental Science, and National Lead, Engineering With Nature Initiative, US Army Corps of Engineers