Nationality Norwegian | ||
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Born August 6, 1954 (age 62) ( 1954-08-06 ) Voss, Norway Education Dr.ing (1983)
Siv.ing (1977) Occupation Professor in Industrial Ecology at NTNU Books Sustainable industrial production: waste minimization, cleaner technology and industrial ecology | ||
Technoport talk helge bratteb an industrial ecology view to urban water services
Helge Brattebø (born August 6, 1954) is a Norwegian chartered engineer and a professor in industrial ecology at NTNU. In 1998, he founded the world’s first university program in Industrial Ecology at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology.
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Career
Brattebø graduated as a chartered engineer from Norwegian Institute of Technology (NTH) in 1977 after studying Water Supply and Wastewater Engineering, and obtained his PhD on water treatment from NTH in 1983. After having worked as a researcher at NTH/SINTEF and later as a consultant in private industry, he returned to NTH in 1989. There he worked as a program coordinator for the strategy project Environmental Technical Sciences and as head of the Environmental Studies Division at the Center for Environment and Development SMU. He then proceeded to initiate the Industrial Ecology Programme (IndEcol), the first university program in Industrial Ecology in the world. Brattebø was appointed professor at the Department of Hydraulic and Environmental Engineering (NTNU) in 1998 and served as department head from 2005-2010. Since January 2013 he is employed by the Department of Energy and Process Engineering at NTNU.
Brattebø has supervised around 20 PhD and 45 MSc students.
Outside of academia Brattebø has contributed to the development of the waste handling policy of Norway as a member of the committee for NOU 2002:19 Avfallsforebygging – en visjon om livskvalitet, forbrukerbevissthet og kretsløpstenking and the committee for the project Bærekraftig utvikling – øko-effektivitet og industriell økologi.
He is a member of the Norwegian Academy of Technological Sciences since 1996.
The built environment
In his work on the built environment, Brattebø established a group that applied Material Flow Analysis (MFA) methodology and Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) in order to link important societal material flows with potential environmental impacts. The group eventually included several PhDs, postdocs and prof. Daniel Beat Müller whom he had worked with at Yale.
His work has since expanded into including infrastructure-related stocks and flows and combining this with LCA. This research has covered infrastructures for waste, water supply, wastewater, district heating and traffic. In recent Scandinavian- and EU-funded projects, his work has focused on developing LCA databases and tools for road infrastructures. These are tools for exploring the aspects of environmental impacts related to road infrastructure, enabling policy and decision makers to make well-informed choices regarding reducing environmental impacts.
Sabbaticals
At Yale he continued and strengthened his work on the metabolism of the built environment, focusing in particular on the stocks and flows of buildings, their dynamic nature and the key drivers that determine their behaviour.
In Portugal, he focused on exploring the sustainability of infrastructure and urban systems (incl. waste recycling, urban water systems, road bridges, building stocks, and district heating).
Other positions
Brattebø is one of the editors of the Journal of Industrial Ecology.
Brattebø has had different roles with the International Society for Industrial Ecology and, today, is part of the election committee