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New directions in technology
F
or several years, the editors of ES&T have struggled to reestablish the importance of technology in diis journal. We euphemistically refer to this as "putting the T back into ES&T.."ast year we etok two oiant steps in this direction by appointing Gary Sayler of the University of Tennessee and John Crittenden of Michigan Technological University (MTU) as Associate Editors. They bring different but equally valued assets to ES&T, Gary in the area of biotechnology and John in other areas of environmental engineering. One of the challenges that face us as we approach the job is deciding what we are trying to accomplish by putting the "T" back. I answer that question with an abbreviated statement of ES&Ts mission: :o serve enviionmental professionals by providing them with the information they need to do their jobs and to grow intellectually and professionally. Since the environmental profession includes thousands of people worldwide who are using environmental technologies, it is part of our mission to serve them as well as diose who are doing basic research, policy studies, and regulatory development. Many of the people who are direcdy or indirectly using environmental technologies are not as interested in research as those who make research their life's work. Those who are doing applied research—for example, the development or testing of new technologies—are less interested in detailed mechanisms and are willing to live witii empirical rather dian a priori models. They do not always examine all possible aspects of a technology, preferring to focus on those that relate to the application at hand. ES&T has traditionally been more interested in publishing technology papers that are closer to basic man applied research. Our editorial policy states: "Research articles describing advances in environmental technology should go beyond treatability studies; that is, diey should explore the mechanisms of the technology or develop process models to describe it...." In the research section we will continue to follow this policy, but with the help of new editors and Editorial Advisory Board members we will continually evaluate our interpretation of it. I expect that we will liberalize our policy to encourage technology demonstrations such as large-scale bioremediation projects, side-by-side evaluations of alternative technologies, and innovative processes for which the mechanism is not immediately clear. Another challenge we face is deciding just what do we mean by environmental technology? As Sayler and his colleagues recently pointed out, environmental technology has come to be focused on remediation of contaminated environments (Sayler, G. S.; Sanseverino, J.; Davis, K. L. Biotechnology in a Sustainable Environment; Plenum Press: New York, 1997; pp 1-4). In the future, the focus will be on new applications of technology to emphasize pollution prevention and control of old processes. The driver will be materials and energy conservation and economics more so than regulatory compliance. This perspective is precisely the major focus of Crittenden's program at MTU, and we expect diat it will be 3. new focus for ESSiT in the future. With the leadership of Gary Sayler and John Crittenden, we will continually reexamine the appropriate role of ES&T in this dynamic arena.
0013-936X/98/0932-115A$15.00/0 © 1998 American Chemical Society
William H. Glaze, Editor (bill_glaze@unc. edu) MARCH 1, 1998/ENVIRONMENTALSCIENCE &TECHNOLOGGY N E W S B 1 1 5 A
