UVSolutions
IUVA Announces New President, President-Elect and Board Members
Jennifer Osgood, PE, PMP, BCEE, vice president, Delivery Leader at CDM Smith, has been appointed to the office of president of the International Ultraviolet Association (IUVA). “The IUVA has gained an important international reputation for technical collaboration, and I am honored to help lead these efforts,” said Osgood. “Since the onset of the coronavirus, IUVA volunteer members worldwide have played a vital role in demonstrating the efficacy of UV technologies. This has led to substantial growth in our organization as we continue to expand our efforts in UV applications that include drinking water, wastewater and water reuse, as well as medical settings, food and beverage, industrial, and indoor air and surfaces.”
In addition, the IUVA has elected Ted Mao to serve as incoming president for a two-year term beginning in 2023. Dr. Mao is chief technology officer at Evercloak, with over 20 years of experience in UV-C technologies.
New IUVA Board members include Troy E. Cowan, owner and founder of Vision Based Consulting, LLC, and chair of the IUVA healthcare initiative; Dr. Wenjun Sun, associate professor at Tsinghua University, China; and Erik Swenson, general manager for Nichia America Corporation. For more information, visit www.iuva.org.
IUVA Announces Sustainable Development Goals
The IUVA board of directors has approved the creation of a new task force to help advance the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), with the objective of providing support to projects that include the use of UV technology to protect public health and the environment in low- and middle-income settings. IUVA Task Force activities will include water technology reviews, surveying local contacts and households and arranging meetings and webinars with stakeholders at the national, organizational, community and household level.
The task force plans to develop a white paper detailing opportunities and challenges for UV to address the UN SDGs and propose a path forward for the IUVA. Non-governmental organizations (NGO) and volunteers from low- and middle-income settings involved with access to clean water are encouraged to join the IUVA effort. For more information, visit www.iuva.org.
NIST Journal Publishes Special Section on UV Technologies for Public Health
Interest in ultraviolet-C (UV-C) irradiation as a strategy for decontaminating surfaces in the health care environment has skyrocketed during the COVID-19 pandemic. But with a lack of standards and regulations surrounding the technology’s implementation, consistent safety and efficacy is no guarantee. In response to the growing need for guidance, the Journal of Research of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has published a Special Section on Ultraviolet Technologies for Public Health in collaboration with the International Ultraviolet Association (IUVA), following a joint workshop on this critical topic for public health in January 2020.
The open access publications that make up the section describe new applications of UV-C technology and detail methods of characterizing how physical and biological materials respond to UV radiation – necessary information for establishing UV standards. The lineup of papers spans microorganism sensitivity to UV-C, decontamination of N95 respirators and other personal protective equipment, UV-C doses produced by different light sources and several other critical topics. Additional publications will be added to this section later this year. To explore the special section, visit https://www.nist.gov/nist-research-library/journal-research-nist.
IUVA Americas Conference Scheduled for September 2022
The IUVA is looking forward to a return to in-person events with the IUVA Americas Conference, taking place September 26-28, 2022, at the Hilton Cincinnati Netherland Plaza Hotel in Cincinnati, Ohio. The event will bring together academic and industry participants involved in all aspects of UV to view and participate in conference sessions, networking and an industry trade fair. The focus of this conference is to present the latest and emerging advancements in technology and research addressing the environmental, health and treatment process challenges of today, as well as discuss the current trends in UV regulations and new applications. Applications include air and surface disinfection; drinking water, reuse water and wastewater treatment; air pollution; hospital infections; ballast water treatment and industrial effluents; and other emerging areas for UV technologies. For more information, visit www.iuva.org.
IUVA to Host 2022 Research Innovation Symposium
IUVA has announced the 2022 IUVA Research Innovation Symposium, an in-person conference taking place at University of Colorado (Boulder, Colorado) from May 23-25, 2022. The symposium has been organized to provide opportunities to explore new and emerging aspects of UV radiation and its applications, and the conference will be conducted as a single-track event to promote engagement in presentations. For more information, visit www.iuva.org/2022-RIS.
