Workshop Speakers

Dr. David Allison, MD, FRCPC
Medical Officer of Health, Eastern Health
Clinical Associate Professor, Division of Community Health, Faculty of Medicine, Memorial University
Dr. David Allison serves Eastern Health as Medical Officer of Health. He is also a Clinical Associate Professor in the Division of Community Health at the Faculty of Medicine of Memorial University of Newfoundland.

David has worked in public health settings in New Brunswick, Alberta and Saskatchewan and internationally in several countries. He and a group of colleagues have collaborated for several years in reviewing and assessing the concerns about environmental lead in St. John’s, Newfoundland.

 

Ian Douglas, PEng
Water Quality Engineer and Plant Manager, Drinking Water Services, City of Ottawa
Ian Douglas has 25 years of experience in design, research and plant operations, both in the environmental and industrial sector. After working five years in the petrochemical industry, he moved into the area of drinking water quality and treatment. He earned degrees in both chemistry (1984) and chemical engineering (1987) from the University of Western Ontario. As Water Quality Engineer and Plant Manager for the City of Ottawa, Ian has worked on more than 50 research and optimization projects with partner organizations such as the Water Research Foundation, NSERC, Health Canada, CIDA and several Canadian universities.

Under Ian’s leadership, the City of Ottawa has been recognized as a North American leader in process optimization and applied research. During 2007 Ian spent a one-year work term with Health Canada working on microbial risk assessment and various treatment guidelines. He was recently appointed as an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Civil Engineering at University of Toronto, where he teaches and advises students in the areas of drinking water treatment, process optimization and microbial risk assessment. During 2010, he was also appointed to the Ontario Drinking Water Advisory Council, which advises the Minister of Environment on matters related to drinking water quality and testing standards. Ian lives with his family near Ottawa in the town of Almonte, Ontario, Canada.

 

Dr. Marc Edwards
Charles Lunsford Professor of Civil Engineering, Virginia Tech
Dr. Marc Edwards is  the Charles Lunsford Professor of Civil Engineering at Virginia Tech, where he teaches courses in environmental engineering and applied aquatic chemistry. In 2004, Time magazine dubbed Marc “The Plumbing Professor” and listed him amongst the four most important innovators in water around the world.

Since 1995, undergraduate and graduate students advised by Marc have won 22 nationally recognized awards for their research work on corrosion and water treatment. Marc has published more than 110 peer-reviewed journal articles, made more than 100 national and international conference presentations on six continents, and has delivered dozens of keynote and endowed lectures.

Marc is a Past-President of the Association of Environmental and Engineering Science Professors, and in 2004 and 2010 he testified to the United States Congress on the issue of lead in Washington, DC’s drinking water. His awards include a Presidential Faculty Fellowship from the White House in 1996, Outstanding Science Paper awards from three different journals, a Walter Huber Research Prize from the American Society of Civil Engineers, State of Virginia Outstanding Faculty Award, a MacArthur Fellowship (2008–12), and the 2010 Praxis Award in Professional Ethics from Villanova University.

 

Dr. Colin Hayes
Chairman, IWA, Specialist Group on Metals and Related Substances in Drinking Water
Honorary Lecturer,  College of Engineering, Swansea University, UK
Dr. Colin Hayes is currently Chairman of the International Water Association’s Specialist Group on Metals and Related Substances in Drinking Water and is an Honorary Lecturer in the College of Engineering at Swansea University in the UK. He has worked in the water sector as a practitioner, consultant and researcher in a career spanning more than 35 years. Colin was editor of the IWA Best Practice Guide on the Control of Lead in Drinking Water (2010), which contains an up-to-date review of monitoring and control options in Europe and North America.

Colin’s PhD was awarded for research into the simulation of lead emissions to drinking water and the development and application of computational methods for optimizing plumbosolvency control. A major focus of his research has been to investigate the characteristics of the sampling methods that are used to monitor lead in drinking water. The modelling methods developed were also used successfully in the optimization of ortho-phosphate dosing for numerous water companies in the UK.

 

Dr. Bruce Lanphear
Senior Scientist, Child & Family Institute, BC Children’s Hospital
Professor, Faculty of Health Sciences, Simon Fraser University
Dr. Bruce Lanphear, MD, MPH, is a Senior Scientist at the Child & Family Institute, BC Children’s Hospital and Professor in the Faculty of Health Sciences at Simon Fraser University. He is widely recognized as an authority on children’s environmental health, particularly for his work linking biomarkers of low-level environmental exposures with the development of disease and disability in children.

Bruce’s research was the impetus for further lowering the allowable levels of lead in house dust, ambient air and consumer products. He is the principal investigator for an NIH/US EPA–funded birth cohort to study the relationship of low-level prenatal and early childhood exposures to prevalent toxicants, including heavy metals, pesticides, environmental tobacco smoke and Bisphenol A with behavioral problems and learning disabilities.

 

France Lemieux
Head, Materials and Treatment Section, Water, Air and Climate Change Bureau, Health Canada
Chair, Public Health Review Board, Water Quality Association
France Lemieux has worked at Health Canada since 1988 in various programs, including radiation protection, the Workplace Hazardous Materials Information System, consumer product safety, pesticides and in drinking water. She is currently the Head of the Materials and Treatment Section in the Water, Air and Climate Change Bureau, where she handles a number of files in addition to overseeing the development of the treatment and analytical methods sections of the Guidelines for Canadian Drinking Water Quality, her primary role.

With a background in toxicology and drinking water treatment, France has focused on materials in contact with drinking water, additives and treatment of inorganic contaminants. Her area of expertise and interest include corrosion control, issues related to lead, including sampling challenges and distribution system contaminants.

France participates on a number of committees relating to health-based standards for materials and additives as well as standards for treatment devices and plumbing fittings, in addition to ISO standards on water quality sampling. She is currently the chair of the Water Quality Association’s Public Health Review Board and a project advisory committee member on a number of Water Research Foundation–funded studies relating to lead and corrosion. She has always had an interest in improving public health and has sought to make a difference through her work.

France obtained a bachelor’s degree in biochemistry from Queen’s University (1985) and master’s degree in civil engineering in water resources (2008) from Norwich University.

 

Dr. Patrick Levallois
Professor of Epidemiology and Environmental Health, Laval University
Chair and Scientific Adviser, Quebec Public Health Institute
Dr. Patrick Levallois is an MD who specializes in community medicine. Patrick is currently the Scientific Adviser for the Quebec Public Health Institute on drinking water issues and Chair of the scientific Waterborne Diseases group of this Institute.

Patrick is also a Professor of Epidemiology and Environmental Health at Laval University in Quebec and has been conducting research on drinking water issues for more than 20 years.

 

Dr. Michèle Prévost
NSERC Industrial Chair on Drinking Water and Professor, Department of Civil, Geological and Mining Engineering, École Polytechnique
Dr. Michèle Prévost is a Professor in Civil Engineering at the Department of Civil, Geological and Mining Engineering at École Polytechnique de Montréal, where she holds the NSERC Industrial Chair on Drinking Water.

Michèle has more than 25 years of experience in research and technology in water treatment and distribution. She has completed several projects to investigate filtration and disinfection in treatment plants (microbial indicators, impact of water quality on disinfection, biological treatment, nitrification) and various aspects of distribution systems (corrosion control, microbial regrowth, integrity and intrusion, hydraulic and quality modelling and lead).

Michèle started her career in environmental consulting and acted as the vice president of technical services and research of Veolia North America. She has been active in numerous technical advisory committees to utilities and was a member of the technical advisory committee of the Walkerton Commission.

Michèle has authored more than 90 refereed publications and has made multiple presentations at national and international conferences. She is the principal investigator on the CWN initiative Developing a comprehensive strategy to reduce lead at the tap in Canada, « Élaboration d’une stratégie globale pour réduire les concentrations de plomb dans l’eau du robinet au Canada », a project that joins the efforts of five universities and ten utilities, serving more than 7 million Canadians.

 

Michael Schock
Research Chemist, US EPA
Michael Schock is a research chemist with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. He has demonstrated outstanding research contributions to water supply at a high scientific level. His contributions have found their way into national policy, utility practice and the work of other scientists.

As an environmental chemist Micheal has contributed highly significant work to drinking water research, with emphasis on internal corrosion and scaling within distribution systems. His scientific contributions have lent credibility to the rule-making and implementation processes of the Lead and Copper Rule (LCR). He continues to advance knowledge about metals in distribution systems and is currently leading in research and advocacy to eliminate sources of lead from drinking water to include even non-leaded brass.

Michael is the 2011 recipient of the highly prestigious 2011 A.P. Black Research Award for outstanding research contributions to the water community.

 

Nellie Slaats
Team Leader and Project Manager, Water Infrastructure, KWR Watercycle Research Institute
Nellie Slaats is team leader and project manager of the group Water Infrastructure within KWR Watercycle Research Institute, where she manages and co-ordinates national and international projects related to water distribution, asset management and water quality. She leads a team of 15 people and has a yearly budget around €2.5 million.

Nellie is a Senior Materials Scientist (MSc), specializing in materials in contact with drinking water. She has extensive experience with studies on water quality, water supply and material behaviour, as well as with the acceptance of materials in contact with drinking water.

Through her international work, Nellie has connections with drinking water experts, material experts, regulators and representatives of the pipe materials industry in countries both inside and outside Europe. She helped prepare the standards for construction products in contact with drinking water within CEN.

 

Simoni Triantafyllidou
PhD candidate, Civil and Environmental Engineering, Virginia Tech
Simoni Triantafyllidou is a doctoral candidate in civil and environmental engineering at Virginia Tech. She earned a BS degree in environmental engineering from the Technical University of Crete, Greece, and an MS degree in environmental engineering from Virginia Tech.

Simoni has accumulated more than four years of research experience on the corrosion of drinking water plumbing as it affects drinking water quality and public health. She has authored and co-authored several publications, including a paper in Environmental Science and Technology, on the association between lead in water and lead in blood for children in Washington, DC. This publication received the journal’s 2009 best paper award.

In 2007, Simoni was awarded the Association of Environmental Engineering and Science Professors First Place Master’s Thesis Award, as well as the American Water Works Association First Place Master’s Thesis Academic Achievement Award. She was honored with the Larson Aquatic Research Support Doctoral Scholarship from the American Water Works Association in 2010, and was named Virginia Tech’s Outstanding Doctoral Student in the College of Engineering in 2011. Simoni currently serves as the Young Professionals Coordinator for the International Water Association Specialist Group on Metals and Related Substances in Drinking Water.