{"id":18415,"date":"2018-01-12T15:45:59","date_gmt":"2018-01-12T20:45:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/clemson.world\/?p=18415"},"modified":"2018-01-12T15:45:59","modified_gmt":"2018-01-12T20:45:59","slug":"a-beautiful-terrible-problem-john-skardon-76-ph-d-11","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/clemson.world\/archive\/a-beautiful-terrible-problem-john-skardon-76-ph-d-11\/","title":{"rendered":"A Beautiful, Terrible Problem: John Skardon '76, Ph.D. '11"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"A<\/a>
\nJohn Skardon is a problem solver. It\u2019s why he earned a degree in engineering from Clemson. It\u2019s why he returned for a Ph.D. in policy studies after decades leading manufacturing companies and various startups. And it\u2019s what he teaches his students at Cal State University where he is a lecturer.
\nSkardon saw a problem in his home city of Monterey, California, where nearly 80 years of expanding agriculture had contaminated wells and ground water with nitrates, primarily from the constant use of fertilizer. This issue isn\u2019t exclusive to California, as the resulting unsightly algae slicks cause ecological and economic impacts across the world. Many farmers are now required to clean up runoff but don\u2019t have an affordable way to do so. When told there was no solution to remove these nitrates, Skardon just saw an opportunity for problem-solving with students.
\n\u201cRemoving nitrates is not a science problem because it\u2019s done all the time in aquariums and fish farms,\u201d explains Skardon. \u201cThe real issue is doing it in an agricultural environment without labs and in some cases without power.\u201d He looked to large-scale denitrifying filters in water and waste treatment systems along the Mississippi River. The challenge was clear: take big technology and scale it down.
\nSkardon and his team of students built five small biofilm reactors, but Skardon tempered his expectations. Drastically downsizing technology usually results in reduced effectiveness. \u201cThe last one worked so well we were stunned,\u201d Skardon says. \u201cThe reactor was 90 percent as efficient as a large-scale reactor, which is amazing. So we said, \u2018We think we\u2019re done.\u2019\u201d
\n[pullquote]The research was moved into practical application through Skardon\u2019s business, Tailwater Systems, where he\u2019s now demonstrating what he studied in his doctoral program \u2014 the role of institutions in perpetuating or solving problems through innovation.[\/pullquote] The company is providing an affordable, scalable solution for farmers dealing with fertilizer runoff.
\n\u201cWhen I realized how big the problem was, I said, \u2018This is a great, terrible problem to work on!\u2019\u201d Skardon says, laughing. \u201cI guess there aren\u2019t many people who get so excited about a \u2018terrible\u2019 problem to solve, but that\u2019s just me.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

John Skardon is a problem solver. It\u2019s why he earned a degree in engineering from Clemson. It\u2019s why he returned for a Ph.D. in policy studies after decades leading manufacturing companies and various startups. And it\u2019s what he teaches his students at Cal State University where he is a lecturer. Skardon saw a problem in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":18494,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[21],"tags":[131,378,3317,3318],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-18415","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-alumniprofiles","tag-agricultural-waste","tag-biofilm-reactors","tag-winter-2018","tag-winter-2018-alumni-profiles"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/clemson.world\/archive\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2018\/01\/Skardon.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/clemson.world\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18415","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/clemson.world\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/clemson.world\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clemson.world\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clemson.world\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18415"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/clemson.world\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18415\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clemson.world\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18494"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/clemson.world\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18415"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clemson.world\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18415"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clemson.world\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18415"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clemson.world\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=18415"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}