Matthew Eckelman, Ph.D.
Associate Professor in Civil and Environmental Engineering, Northeastern University | Faculty Affiliate, Global Resilience Institute
Boston, MA, UNITED STATES
Professor Eckelman focuses on environmental engineering and sustainability.
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Areas of Expertise (4)
Material and Energy Use in Urban Buildings and Infrastructure
Environmental Engineering and Sustainability
Design and Engineering
Energy Efficiency and Emissions Modeling
Accomplishments (6)
Boston Society of Civil Engineers Clemens Herschel Award (personal)
2017
NSF CAREER Award
2015
ISIE's Laudise Young Researcher Prize
2013
Anesthesia & Analgesia paper selected for Continuing Medical Education program
2012
Science to Achieve Results (STAR) Fellow, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
2008 - 2012
Project Award, Air & Waste Management Association
2009
Education (2)
Yale University: Ph. D., Environmental Engineering
Amherst College: B.A., Physics and Mathematics
Affiliations (4)
- American Center for Life Cycle Assessment
- American Society for Engineering Education
- Association of Environmental Engineering and Science Professors
- International Society for Industrial Ecology Laudise Prize
Links (3)
Media Appearances (5)
Workshop to address the environmental footprint of clinical care
Yale Sustainability
2018-03-20
A study by Sherman, and Matthew Eckelman, PhD, from Northeastern University, found that in 2013, the U.S. healthcare system was responsible for an estimated 12% of the nation’s acid rain, 10% of the nation’s greenhouse gas emissions, 10% of the nation’s smog formation, and 9% of the nation’s respiratory disease from particulate matter. Health damages from non-greenhouse gas pollutants were estimated at 470,000 Disability-Adjusted Life Years (DALYs)—a measure of years of healthy life lost. A later study by the same authors found that greenhouse gas disease burden increased this number to 617,000 DALYs lost annually...
Researchers reveal the hidden environmental and public health impacts of the US healthcare sector
News @ Northeastern
2016-06-10
“If the U.S. healthcare sector were itself a country, it would rank 13th in the world for greenhouse gas emissions, ahead of the entire U.K.” So states a new paper coauthored by Matthew J. Eckelman, assistant professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, that quantifies, for the first time, the total emissions—including greenhouse gases—that are released into the environment due to the healthcare sector and how those emissions adversely affect the public health...
Hospitals are helping make us all sick
Popular Science
2017-11-06
Sherman and her collaborator, Matthew Eckelman, professor of civil and environmental engineering at Northeastern University, wanted to put a number on the damage of healthcare emissions in a form familiar to healthcare professionals. Based on a series of calculations, they determined that the contribution to climate change by the institutions trying to protect your health will be responsible for the loss of 123,000 to 381,000 years of healthy life in the future. The results were published in the American Journal of Public Health in October...
Exhibition sheds light on environmental impacts
The Huntington News
2017-11-01
Matthew Eckelman, a professor from Northeastern’s Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, partnered with Professor Michelle Laboy of Northeastern’s School of Architecture to create the exhibition, which consists of photographs that portray the impacts students have on the environment by doing simple, everyday things...
Hidden harm: US healthcare emits more greenhouse gas than entire UK
Reuters
2016-06-22
So she enlisted environmental engineer Matthew Eckelman, and the two began quantifying healthcare pollution...
Articles (5)
Cycle assessment of UV-Curable bio-based wood flooring coatings
Journal of Cleaner Production
Mahdokht Montazeri, Matthew J Eckelman
2018 An important recent trend in the paints and coatings industry has been the use of bio-based alternatives to fossil-based building blocks in many applications. This trend is being driven in part by cleaner production and sustainability goals. As bio-based ingredients have been widely shown to present environmental trade-offs along their life cycle, new formulations should ideally be assessed for environmental preference before entering into full-scale production...
Harmonized algal biofuel life cycle assessment studies enable direct process train comparison
Applied Energy
Qingshi Tu, Matthew Eckelman, Julie Beth Zimmerman
2018 The conclusions from life cycle assessment of algal biofuels (eg, biodiesel, renewable diesel) vary significantly due to both modeling and inherent technological uncertainties. The inherent uncertainties of US-based algal biofuels production were investigated by eliminating modeling uncertainty via comprehensive harmonization through a meta-analysis. Following harmonization, the cumulative fossil energy consumption (MJ/MJ), global warming potential (g CO 2-eq/MJ) and water consumption (m 3/MJ) of different algal biofuel process trains were investigated through a stochastic life cycle model...
Combinatorial life cycle assessment to inform process design of industrial production of algal biodiesel
Environmental Science & Technology
SM Rahman, MJ Eckelman, A Onnis-Hayden, AZ Gu
2018 The potential health effects associated with contaminants of emerging concern (CECs) have motivated regulatory initiatives and deployment of energy-and chemical-intensive advanced treatment processes for their removal. This study evaluates life cycle environmental and health impacts associated with advanced CEC removal processes, encompassing both the benefits of improved effluent quality as well as emissions from upstream activities. A total of 64 treatment configurations were designed and modeled for treating typical US medium-strength wastewater, covering three policy-relevant representative levels of carbon and nutrient removal, with and without additional tertiary CEC removal...
Life cycle assessment of metals: A scientific synthesis
PLoS One
Philip Nuss, Matthew J Eckelman
2014 We have assembled extensive information on the cradle-to-gate environmental burdens of 63 metals in their major use forms, and illustrated the interconnectedness of metal production systems. Related cumulative energy use, global warming potential, human health implications and ecosystem damage are estimated by metal life cycle stage (i.e., mining, purification, and refining). For some elements, these are the first life cycle estimates of environmental impacts reported in the literature. We show that, if compared on a per kilogram basis, the platinum group metals and gold display the highest environmental burdens, while many of the major industrial metals (e.g., iron, manganese, titanium) are found at the lower end of the environmental impacts scale. If compared on the basis of their global annual production in 2008, iron and aluminum display the largest impacts, and thallium and tellurium the lowest. With the exception of a few metals, environmental impacts of the majority of elements are dominated by the purification and refining stages in which metals are transformed from a concentrate into their metallic form. Out of the 63 metals investigated, 42 metals are obtained as co-products in multi output processes. We test the sensitivity of varying allocation rationales, in which the environmental burden are allocated to the various metal and mineral products, on the overall results. Monte-Carlo simulation is applied to further investigate the stability of our results. This analysis is the most comprehensive life cycle comparison of metals to date and allows for the first time a complete bottom-up estimate of life cycle impacts of the metals and mining sector globally. We estimate global direct and indirect greenhouse gas emissions in 2008 at 3.4 Gt CO2-eq per year and primary energy use at 49 EJ per year (9.5% of global use), and report the shares for all metals to both impact categories.
New perspectives on nanomaterial aquatic ecotoxicity: production impacts exceed direct exposure impacts for carbon nanotoubes
Environmental Science & Technology
Matthew J Eckelman, Meagan S Mauter, Jacqueline A Isaacs, Menachem Elimelech
2012 Environmental impacts due to engineered nanomaterials arise both from releases of the nanomaterials themselves as well as from their synthesis. In this work, we employ the USEtox model to quantify and compare aquatic ecotoxicity impacts over the life cycle of carbon nanotubes (CNTs). USEtox is an integrated multimedia fate, transport, and toxicity model covering large classes of organic and inorganic substances. This work evaluates the impacts of non-CNT emissions from three methods of synthesis (arc ablation, CVD, and HiPco), and compares these to the modeled ecotoxicity of CNTs released to the environment. Parameters for evaluating CNT ecotoxicity are bounded by a highly conservative “worst case” scenario and a “realistic” scenario that draws from existing literature on CNT fate, transport, and ecotoxicity. The results indicate that the ecotoxicity impacts of nanomaterial production processes are roughly equivalent to the ecotoxicity of CNT releases under the unrealistic worst case scenario, while exceeding the results of the realistic scenario by 3 orders of magnitude. Ecotoxicity from production processes is dominated by emissions of metals from electricity generation. Uncertainty exists for both production and release stages, and is modeled using a combination of Monte Carlo simulation and scenario analysis. The results of this analysis underscore the contributions of existing work on CNT fate and transport, as well as the importance of life cycle considerations in allocating time and resources toward research on mitigating the impacts of novel materials.
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