It’s old home week and time to get the original EWN Podcast gang back together. In Season 7, Episode 4, host Sarah Thorne is joined by cohost Jeff King, National Lead of the Engineering With Nature Program (EWN), and our friend, colleague, and inspiration behind the Engineering With Nature Program, Todd Bridges. Todd is now Professor of Practice in Resilient and Sustainable Systems in the College of Engineering at the University of Georgia (UGA). A lot has happened since February of 2023 when we celebrated Todd’s 30-year career with the US Army Corps of Engineers (USACE), where in addition to being Senior Research Scientist for Environmental Science, he founded and was the first National Lead of the EWN Program.

Having taken only a month off after leaving USACE, Todd says that he “failed at retirement. I’m as busy now, if not more so, than I was before. But, I think a ‘busy life’ is a ‘happy life.’” For Todd, change is inevitable and keeps one energized: “I wouldn’t trade the 30 years that I was blessed to have with the Corps of Engineers for anything. It was vastly fulfilling in so many ways, on so many levels. But change is necessary, and I’ve been enjoying embracing the change and continuing to do whatever I can to make a difference.”

We discussed some of the highlights of Todd’s busy first 11 months at UGA, which included participating in two summits hosted by the White House—the Invest in Nature Summit and the Climate Resilience Summit. Both brought people from organizations across the country to identify and discuss some of the most significant challenges and opportunities society, communities, and people face in the 21st century. In May 2023, Todd traveled to Singapore for the first time to participate on a scientific advisory panel for Singapore’s Marine Climate Change Science Programme as the country is dealing with significant impacts from climate change. And he has just been selected as one of 11 lead authors on the United States’ first National Nature Assessment, which we introduced on Season 5, Episode 3, of the EWN Podcast. Todd will lead development of the chapter on “Nature and the Safety and Security of the United States.” As he notes, it is a bit of a daunting challenge: “How to distill all the ways in which our lives as humans and our lives as communities are dependent wholly upon nature and what nature provides to us, and then try to communicate what all is involved in developing a relationship with nature in the 21st century that is more balanced and more in harmony with our long-term interests.”

Todd started his tenure at UGA speaking with engineering students about natural infrastructure. Since then, he has been actively engaged in spreading the word on EWN at various seminars and several invited speaking opportunities, including conducting a training seminar on nature-based solutions (NBS) as part of the AXA XL Seminar Series for engineers and architects. Over 800 participants dialed into the webinar to learn about creating a more resilient and sustainable future using nature-based approaches. Todd was invited by Mississippi State University to give the Waldorf Lecture and spoke on EWN and NBS. In addition to teaching at UGA, Todd got his first graduate student, Scott Blackstock, a Captain in the US Army who will focus his research on nature-based solutions. The Institute for Resilient Infrastructure Systems (IRIS) at UGA, is also launching its graduate certificate program in natural infrastructure beginning in the fall of 2024.

Todd continues to be active in the Network for Engineering With Nature (N-EWN), which he cofounded with Brian Bledsoe in 2018. As Todd explains, “Progress runs on the rails of relationships. When we stood up the N-EWN, the intention was to bring organizations together across the multisector universe—government, the private sector, NGOs, universities—to work together to advance these approaches and accelerate and upscale nature-based solutions. I’m very encouraged by what I’m seeing in the growth. Today we have more than 25 partners that are committing their own sweat equity to a wide range of N-EWN initiatives.”

Todd is also podcasting at UGA by cohosting the Resilient Futures Podcast with Dr. Alicia Helmrich, an assistant professor in the College of Engineering at UGA. The Resilient Futures Podcast focuses on what it takes to create resilience in a variety of different contexts,exploring the nature, characteristics, and factors contributing to the resilience of systems, including the role of nature, systems thinking, interdisciplinarity, integrative solutions, and fostering ideas across sectors and perspectives.

In February 2024, Todd and Jeff participated in the Policy Forum for Nature-Based Solutions in Washington DC, sponsored by the N-EWN and the National Academies’ Gulf Research Program. The Policy Forum brought together a diverse array of stakeholders, including policymakers, regulators, practitioners, academics, and others involved in funding, policymaking, design, and construction related to nature-based solutions. It provided a platform for rich discussions on the transformative potential of nature-based solutions across various sectors, including infrastructure development, climate change mitigation, and community revitalization. One of the primary objectives of the Forum was to identify and address major obstacles in policy and practice to effectively implement nature-based solutions.

Jeff describes the success of the Forum: “We had over 200 people in the audience and 1600 live views of the webcast over that two-day period. It attracted a very diverse audience. Experts shared information, and we had great discussions all the way around, really offering highlights of what’s happening in this space and where we still have certain obstacles and challenges to overcome. I got super excited about thinking about what those next steps might look like.” Todd agreed, adding, “How do we create a decision-making process, a regulatory system that actually creates a nature-positive society? That’s much different than using regulation to minimize impact or harm on the environment. And how do we ensure that that all people are served by investments in infrastructure? I think nature-based solutions, in particular, are well suited for providing benefits across all of our communities.”

Jeff and Todd are both energized by the growing acceptance of nature-based solutions. As Jeff notes, “Five years ago, nature-based solutions were not ubiquitous. Today we’re constantly talking about NBS, and more and more NBS projects are coming online. NBS is part of the conversations I’m having every day.” Todd agrees: “There’s been a convergence of thinking—an alignment of need and opportunity that we need to capitalize on now if we want to really make a difference for the country and for communities. Of course, we’re going to need a lot of improvements in what you and I would consider conventional infrastructure, but it’s very important in the opportunities and challenges before us now in the United States to not leave nature out of the solution but to embrace nature as a part of the solution.”  He adds, “The future is very bright for Engineering With Nature.”