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Opportunity Summary:

The National Science Foundation (NSF) Environmental Engineering program (Funding Opportunity Number PD 10 1440; CFDA 47.041) funds fundamental research and associated educational activities aimed at understanding and reducing the environmental and public health impacts of human activities. The opportunity is rooted in the modern evolution of environmental engineering as a distinct discipline that grew out of 20th-century concerns about air and water pollution, while also recognizing older foundations in public health engineering and long-standing water infrastructure practices. At its core, the program is designed to build the scientific and engineering knowledge needed to identify, analyze, mitigate, manage, and ultimately prevent environmental problems linked to human-generated discharges into land, water (inland and coastal), and air.

A major emphasis of the program is transformative, cutting-edge research that applies scientific principles to minimize solid, liquid, and gaseous wastes and to evaluate how these releases affect human health and environmental quality. NSF highlights the importance of developing and improving methods and technologies that can assess the waste assimilative capacity of natural systems (their ability to absorb, dilute, transform, or otherwise handle pollutants) and that can remove or reduce both conventional contaminants and emerging pollutants in air, water, and soil. The program frames environmental engineering work around four classic engineering toolsets: measurement (observing and sensing), analysis (interpreting and modeling), synthesis (combining knowledge into workable approaches), and design (creating practical solutions and technologies).

The scope of research topics is broad, but several priority areas are clearly called out. These include developing innovative biological, chemical, and physical treatment processes that remove or degrade pollutants from water and air; measuring, modeling, and predicting how pollutants move through and persist in the environment; and creating or evaluating cleanup and remediation strategies for polluted sites. Examples of targeted systems include landfills and contaminated aquifers, with a focus on approaches that preserve or enhance natural self-purification processes where feasible. The program also supports work that restores polluted water, air, and land resources and rehabilitates degraded ecosystems, connecting engineering solutions to real environmental recovery outcomes.

The opportunity is positioned alongside related NSF environmental efforts such as Energy for Sustainability, Environmental Implications of Emerging Technologies, and Environmental Sustainability. In that broader context, Environmental Engineering contributes to sustainability by supporting pollution control, resource management and conservation, and pollution prevention strategies that minimize or avoid generating contamination in the first place. This includes research on improving the cost-effectiveness of pollution avoidance, developing new foundational principles for prevention technologies, advancing environmental sensing and monitoring tools, and designing innovative waste reduction, recycling, and reuse processes.

In terms of award structure, unsolicited research awards are typically funded for one to three years, with an average annual award size of about $100,000. The program also considers small equipment proposals under $100,000, but these must be submitted during the designated submission windows. Proposals submitted outside the announced windows are returned without review, so timing is treated as a strict compliance issue rather than a suggestion. CAREER awards, which support early-career faculty, have a five-year duration, with Engineering CAREER proposals generally due in July each year under the NSF CAREER solicitation. Proposals for conferences, workshops, and supplements may be submitted at any time, but they require prior discussion with the program director. Similarly, RAPID and EAGER proposals (which replaced the older SGER mechanism) must be discussed with the program director before submission, reflecting NSF’s expectation that these special mechanisms be used selectively and in alignment with program goals.

Administrative details in the source indicate this opportunity was posted in 2009 and later archived/replaced (the listing notes it was replaced by 11 1440 and archived in December 2010). Eligibility is described as unrestricted, meaning it is open to a wide range of applicant types, subject to any additional eligibility clarifications in the full announcement. There is no cost sharing or matching requirement listed. Applicants are directed to follow NSF’s Proposal and Award Policies and Procedures Guide (PAPPG) for proposal preparation, and to use NSF support contacts for access or technical issues with the announcement.

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