This town hall event will connect and engage scholars, other experts, community members, students and decision-makers in the examination of the status of wastewater treatment in Hawaiʻi.

Hawaiʻi provides a tractable model from which to generate solutions to wastewater management in a world experiencing rapidly changing climate, population growth and ageing infrastructure.  Aging and failing cesspools, increasingly large episodic storms, and sensitive environments combine to create a “perfect storm,” a combination of factors that together result in unprecedented challenges in Hawaiʻi’s wastewater management. This leads to impacts on beaches and aquatic resources, difficulty pinpointing sources of waste contamination, homeowners burdened with upgrade costs, and difficulty navigating the waste treatment regulatory environment.

Multidisciplinary cluster faculty of the University of Hawai’i at Manoa focused on sustainability and community outreach will each provide their impressions and expertise on this issue forming, in aggregate, a thoughtful and reasoned foundation for identifying specific challenges and seeking applied solutions.  The event will include a presentation framing the challenges and current efforts, followed by small group brainstorm and discussion.

LOCATION
Hawaii Convention Center (Room 306 A)
1801 Kalakaua Ave
Honolulu, HI 96815