Environmental Transport Processes: Modeling Pollutant Movement

How do chemicals, nutrients, and pollutants travel through our rivers, oceans, and atmosphere? Understanding these pathways is the cornerstone of environmental engineering and effective ecological protection. This text-only course provides a clear, step-by-step introduction to the physical processes that govern substance transport in natural systems. By completing this course, you will gain the ability to analyze and predict how contaminants disperse in water, air, and soil, enabling you to evaluate environmental impact assessments with confidence. What you'll learn: Understand the core concepts of mass conservation, concentration, and transport flux; Master the physical principles of molecular diffusion and turbulent mixing; Apply advection-diffusion equations to model pollutant plumes in rivers and streams; Analyze groundwater transport and the behavior of contaminants in porous media; Evaluate atmospheric dispersion patterns using foundational plume models; Explore modern environmental modeling practices and risk assessment frameworks. We begin with key terminology and the fundamental laws of conservation, ensuring you build a strong theoretical foundation. From there, you will progress through practical scenarios, examining transport in surface water, groundwater, and the atmosphere through clear explanations and written exercises. This course is designed for beginners, students, and professionals in civil engineering, environmental science, or public policy who want to understand environmental transport without needing advanced fluid mechanics prerequisites. Start reading now to unlock the principles of environmental transport processes.