Home / Academic Programs / Environmental Sciences and Policy / Highlight on Faculty

Highlight on Faculty

Program Chair

John Boland, Ph.D., P.E. is an engineer and an economist, specializing in water and energy resources, environmental economics, and public utility management. He holds the Bachelor of Electrical Engineering, Master of Science (governmental administration) and Doctor of Philosophy (environmental economics) degrees. He is a registered professional engineer. He is currently Professor Emeritus of Geography and Environmental Engineering and Research Professor in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, both at the Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland. Prior to his academic career, he served as Superintendent of the Bureau of Water for Erie, Pennsylvania, and as Chief of Utility Operations for Anne Arundel County, Maryland.

He joined the research staff of Johns Hopkins University is 1971, and was appointed to the teaching faculty in 1975. Dr. Boland served as visiting or adjunct faculty member at Morgan State University, Southern Illinois University, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and the University of New South Wales (Australia).

Dr. Boland has extensive experience in forecasting municipal and industrial water demand and in public utility tariff design in both industrial and developing countries. He has published more than 150 papers and reports on subjects including water demand forecasting, water and wastewater tariff design, drought management, and water conservation. He has co-authored two books on water demand management as well as two others on environmental management issues. He is co-editor and co-chapter author for a forthcoming monograph on water resources planning.

Dr. Boland has studied environmental and urban water supply issues in more than twenty countries. He has served as consultant to numerous utilities and government agencies in those countries, as well as the United Nations, the World Bank, the Inter-American Development Bank, USAID, and OECD. He has served on many committees and panels of the National Research Council, including one term as chairman of the NRC's Water Science and Technology Board. He also chaired a major NRC study of US wastewater management policy and another global study of water and sanitation problems in megacities. He is a Life Member of the American Water Works Association and past chairman of its Economic Research Committee

Associate Program Chairs

Eileen McGurty, Ph.D., serves as Associate Chair of the Environmental Sciences and Policy program. Dr. McGurty's research examines the origins, development and structure of environmental justice movement and its impact on environmental policy and economic development policy making. Her book, Transforming Environmentalism: Warren County, PCBs and the Origins of Environmental Justice (Rutgers University Press) explores the crystallization of the environmental justice movement and its influence on contemporary environmentalism. Current work also includes examining methods of infusing analyses for potential environmental injustices into permitting processes at the state level. She also researches waste policy, and her current study of waste management in New Jersey examines the influence of waste-related policies on neighborhood and community development, as well as the differential social effects of the waste-related policies. She has published in Society and Natural Resources, Journal of Planning History, Environmental History, Journal of the American Planning Association, and Planning Network. She received a Ph.D. in Urban and Regional Planning from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and has worked extensively in community development and environmental planning in Illinois, New York, New Jersey and Maryland. Prior to joining Hopkins, Dr. McGurty coordinated the Environmental Studies concentration for the international Liberal Studies degree program at Long Island University, working with students and faculty in England, Costa Rica, India, China, Japan, Israel, and Kenya.

Dr. McGurty is currently serving on the Sustainable Design Assessment Team for Southeast Tennessee Valley, American Institute of Architects, the following is a link to their May 2009 presentation, http://www.aia.org/aiaucmp/groups/aia/documents/pdf/aiab079854.pdf. She was also a visiting expert at the Institute for Justice and Journalism conference at the Annenberg School of Communication, University of Southern California in April 2009, the following is a link about the conference and the Justice and Journalism Fellowship program, http://www.justicejournalism.org/fellowships/index.html. She was also a Keynote Speaker at the U.S. Department of State International Visitor Leadership Program in June 2009, the following is a link to the program website, http://exchanges.state.gov/ivlp/ivlp.html.

Faculty Members

Carl Bausch is an attorney and Deputy Director for Environmental Analysis & Documentation with the U.S. Department of Agriculture, where he manages an environmental impact unit. He managed an environmental impact assessment unit at the previous Interstate Commerce Commission, and in 1989 was Assistant General Counsel at the President's Council on Environmental Quality.
Bonnie Burgess received her Master of Science in the Hopkins Environmental Sciences program, and was invited to return to the program to teach because of her educational work around endangered species. She serves as an interpreter with the National Zoo, considered one of the foremost conservational organizations in the U.S., and has recently published Fate of the Wild: The Endangered Species Act and the Future of Biodiversity, a research- and interview-intensive history and analysis of the complex issues surrounding the Endangered Species Act. Her course, Biodiversity and Wildlife Conservation, is guest lectured by scientists working for the Smithsonian or other conservation organizations; the U.S. Geological Survey, and Department of the Interior, all working in the field and specializing in biodiversity and wildlife conservation. These are the people leading the field research and making and upholding conservation policy in the face of continued extinction. "It's about the species survival plan and what is happening to animals in the wild. One of our success stories is of the Golden Lion Tamerons. It's a wild little orange monkey native to Brazil. We've reeducating the people of the area to respect the animal; Brazil has made it its National Animal. In China. "Conservation biology is probably the one comprehensive science that has a value system. In the course we have to cover everything from detailed small population biology, and chemical ecology, to broad-based topics like International projects, and the study of how to improve developmental projects so that they become sustainable. We use a lot of case studies." Burgess' book began to take form as her Master's thesis in the Environmental Sciences program. A synopsis can be viewed at www.uga.edu/ugapress/books/shelf/0820322962.html.
David Elbert is Research Scientist at Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences and Program Advisor for the Environmental Sciences and Policy program. David Elbert is an environmental mineralogist in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Johns Hopkins. David's background includes geologic mapping, structural interpretation and petrologic investigation of portions of the New England Appalachian Mountains. His current research centers on application and development of modern techniques of electron microscopy to problems of mineral sorption, bonding and growth. Recent work includes application of energy filtered techniques to oxidation-reduction reactions of dissolved uranium, chromium, copper and silver mediated by iron- and manganese-bearing silicates. David has also worked on identification of grain-boundary structure and transport properties in common silicate systems as well as biomineralization mechanisms in healthy and hyperplastic corals.
Michael Shelby is Chief of the Economic Analysis Branch in the Office of Atmospheric Programs at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). He analyzes climate policy options and legislative proposals intended to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions. Dr. Shelby also oversees workshops with China , India , Mexico, and Brazil on climate policy and climate economic modeling tools. He has worked on air quality, air toxics, and transportation policy, and is author of numerous publications on energy and environmental policy. His Ph.D. is from Boston University.