UNIVERISTY PARK, Pa. – Growing up around water in South Carolina, Joshua Hasenau never imagined he’d spend his summer in a Pennsylvania limestone quarry.
But that’s where the third-year Penn State student found himself as part of a summer internship with the New Enterprise Stone and Lime Company, a construction company from New Enterprise, Pennsylvania, that produces aggregates, asphalt and concrete.
“I didn’t think I would ever end up actually in the mining industry just because we don’t have a lot of exposure to quarries where I grew up in South Carolina,” said Hasenau, who is studying environmental systems engineering in the College of Earth and Mineral Sciences. “Penn State has definitely given me a more well-rounded education and the knowledge of a lot more kinds of industries I can jump in to and use my skills.”
During the internship, Hasenau’s main project involved helping complete environmental product declarations (EPD), a method for documenting the environmental impacts of construction materials like asphalt and concrete over the course of its lifecycle. PennDOT plans to begin collecting EPDs for all asphalt mixtures starting in 2025.
“This is a tool we're using to assess things like natural gas usage, electricity usage, transport distances for the raw materials, basically analyzing carbon footprints and how much output we're producing,” Hasenau said. “It’s helping us find ways to work more efficiently and cut down on potential pollution.”
In addition to his primary responsibilities, the internship provided Hasenau with a broad range of environmental engineering experiences. He was able to take part in water testing at the company’s well and discharge points and air quality permits at sand and gravel storage sites. He also was able to visit an underground mine in Somerset County where the company sources limestone for concrete.
“We were a smaller team, so no job was the same every week,” he said. “Sometimes I was in the office doing EPD paperwork and permitting and then there were weeks where I was out in the field doing audits or assessments all day. I liked floating around a bit to see where I could end up in this sort of industry.”
Hasenau said he found a passion for environmental engineering on a study abroad trip to Belize were he saw first-hand the changing climate’s impact on barrier reefs.
“There was a lot of bleaching causing decay and killing some of the biodiversity down there, which is tough to see,” he said. “But that's kind of my drive – I want to be able to make an impact. Even if I'm just a small cog in the machine helping to push it along.”
While asphalt is necessary for roads and materials society relies on, Hasenau said environmental engineers and tools like EPDs can help limit the negative impacts. After graduating, Hasenau said he hopes to continue working in the construction industry.
“We often don’t think about how many resources are in the various things that we have – from the stuff we cook with to the clothes wear,” he said. “If we can go about limiting the pollution outputs and emissions, maybe we can get back on the right track.”