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Roy D. Bigham has been the editor of Pollution Engineering since 2002. Bigham attended Eastern Michigan University where he majored in chemistry and computer science with an associates degree in mathematics. He has worked as a laboratory technician at a research laboratory, managed an electroplating operation and an associated analytical laboratory. He spent three years overseeing environmental operations of five domestic and five overseas operations for a major manufacturer in the Detroit area. He then managed a field services department for an environmental analytical laboratory before moving on to a position as an environmental engineer for a construction aggregates company.

Bigham won a design award for a waste water treatment system for a landfill in the Detroit area from the State Chamber of Commerce. He has been active in the environmental field since 1980.

Keeping up with Technology

January 24, 2012
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With tight budgets and less time, how does the environmental professional keep up with the latest changes in technology? There is a way!

Budgets are still tightening as corporations convince the stockholders that profits continue to be healthy. The direction from the plant staff is that we still have to do our jobs and keep up with changes and control costs and do it with fewer resources and …..

Keeping up can be hard. The best way is to go to a conference and listen to the sessions, take notes, gather papers and talk with the exhibitors to see the equipment at work. With all the constraints, it seems to be an impossible task.

When I worked in the business, my title was environmental coordinator or environmental engineer. It seemed that every stop on my professional journey was at a company that needed to tighten their belts to maintain a specific profit margin. We were constantly striving to reduce costs. I normally scheduled a maximum of two trips per year to keep up with changes in the environmental industry. Computers cost from eight to $12,000. We connected to other computer systems using phone modems that communicated at 300 baud.

Things have changed these days. Computers can cost less than $1,000. Instead of bits per second, the machines talk to each other at over 100 megabits per second allowing video and audio as if it were a live television feed. Pollution Engineering is working to bring the conference to your desk. Not only that but you can go to the conference nearly anytime you wish.

On May 16, 2012 from 9 AM to 3 PM EST, we will provide a live feed from our virtual environmental conference. We are calling this conference the PE Learning Center. While it is live, you can enter a section of the screen to talk with others that are attending, enter a section and listen to a presentation that has just started after you click on the screen play button, or go into the virtual exhibit hall and talk with the vendor. If you need to leave to attend to something at the plant, just go. The conference will still be there.

  Here is the Best Part
The best part is that there is no charge to register. There are no travel costs. There are no hotel costs. Your time is still yours at no additional costs.

Go to http://www.pelearningcenter.com/ and click on Registration and then VIP Mailing List. We are still building the program and gathering presentations and exhibitors to provide you with the most valuable experience we can for this first online conference. We will send you updates by e-mail so that you will know what is happening and if it is worth your valuable time to attend or view.

Such a thing was only available on science fiction shows 20 or 30 years ago. Not even closed capture television could offer the experience we think you will be able to enjoy at the PE Learning Center. Sign up for e-mail updates at http://www.pelearningcenter.com/ as soon as you can. The more people that are signed up, the more content we can bring aboard.

Thank you for your time. I look forward to seeing you there.
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