David Kosson

David S. Kosson is the Gass Family Chair in Energy and the Environment and a Distinguished Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering in the School of Engineering at Vanderbilt University. He holds joint appointments as Professor of Chemical Engineering and Professor of Earth and Environmental Sciences. From 2011 to 2021, he served as the Cornelius Vanderbilt Professor of Engineering, and he chaired the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering from 2000 to 2012. Kosson directs the Environmental Engineering Laboratory at Vanderbilt and has been a principal investigator for the Consortium for Risk Evaluation with Stakeholder Participation (CRESP), a multi-university effort funded by the U.S. Department of Energy, since 2006. His career includes leadership in remediation and risk mitigation technologies for environmental restoration of DOE nuclear sites.

Kosson received his B.S. with high honors in Chemical and Biochemical Engineering from Rutgers University in 1983, followed by an M.S. in 1984 and a Ph.D. in 1986 from the same institution. His research focuses on nuclear and chemical waste management, encompassing leaching assessment, process development, and reactive contaminant mass transport in porous media such as groundwater, soils, sediments, and waste forms. He has led or contributed to Department of Energy technical reviews on nuclear waste processing at Hanford, Savannah River, and Idaho sites. Through collaborations with the Energy Research Centre of the Netherlands, his leaching studies on wastes and construction materials have shaped environmental regulations for the U.S. EPA, the Netherlands Ministry of Environment, and the European Union's Directorate General for the Environment. Notable publications include 'An integrated framework for evaluating leaching in waste management and utilization of secondary materials' (Environmental Science & Technology, 2014), work on the Leaching Environmental Assessment Framework (LEAF), and 'Development of a Geochemical Speciation Model for Use in Evaluating Leaching from a Cementitious Radioactive Waste Form' (Environmental Science & Technology, 2021). Kosson has earned the Joe B. Wyatt Distinguished University Professor Award (2010), the ISCOWA Award for contributions to alternative materials in construction (2009), and board certification as an environmental engineer from the American Academy of Environmental Engineers and Scientists (2015). His expertise extends to advising the DOE, DOD, EPA, and National Academies committees.

Professional Email: david.s.kosson@vanderbilt.edu