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(Confalonieri et al. 2007). Factors contributing to deteriorating air quality in-
clude population growth, energy choices, changing consumption, and climate
change.
Water quality and coastal-system degradation, including challenges to
rebuild old infrastructure and address such issues as urban stormwater and by-
pass of raw sewage (NOAA 2012b). Factors contributing to water quality and
coastal-system degradation include land use, urban sprawl, climate change, and
energy systems.
Non-point-source pollution and nutrient effects associated with agricul-
tural runoff of nutrients and soils. Factors contributing to non-point-source pol-
lution and nutrient effects include climate change, land use, and technologic
change (NRC 2011).
Expanding quantities of waste with a wider array of component materi-
als (Schmitz and Graedel 2010). Factors contributing to expanding quantities of
waste include population growth, energy usage, technologic change, and chang-
ing consumption.
Expanding ecologic disruptions (USDA 2012). Factors contributing to
ecologic disruptions include population growth, land use, climate change, and
transport of organisms.
The first three of the challenges listed above are discussed in greater detail
below, with some examples that illustrate the need for a better approach for ac-
cessing, obtaining, developing, and using science and engineering in the pursuit
of environmental solutions. In addition, an overarching challenge relates to the
ever expanding spatial and temporal scales at which many of these challenges
operate. Although the challenges in this chapter are only illustrative of today's
challenges and although it is difficult to predict what emerging challenges will
dominate in the future and what global implications will arise from local-scale
environmental drivers, it is quite likely that future emerging challenges will
share key features of the examples below. Some of those key features include
complex feedback loops, the need to understand the effects of low-level expo-
sures to numerous stressors rather than high-level exposures to individual stress-
ors, and the need for systems thinking to devise optimal solutions.
Chemical Exposures, Human Health, and the Environment
Human health is inextricably linked with ecosystems and the quality of the
environment. Since the beginnings of the discipline of public health, it has been
recognized that most diseases are influenced by three factors: the agent (chemical,
biologic, or physical), the host (genetic or behavioral), and the environment
(physical or social). Historically, the greatest advances in controlling infectious
diseases have been based on environmental improvements, such as improvements
in water quality, sewage treatment, and food protection. Controlling chemical ex-
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