Prof. Michael J. McGuire, Fellow of the National Academy of Engineering (NAE), was invited to deliver a speech at the Environmental Forum on May 15. The topic of his speech was “The Chlorine Revolution: water disinfection and the fight to save lives”.

During the lecture, Prof. McGuire reviewed the origin and development of the water disinfection technology over the past 100 years, and also emphasized the function of chlorine disinfection on public health, a practice which was promoted strongly by John L. Leal.

After his speech, Prof. McGuire discussed with the present students the problems of disinfection by-products (DBPs). He believed that the chlorine disinfection would be a long-term dominant economic and effective way for drinking water treatment, and the objective of the study on DBPs was to improve the chlorine disinfection rather than to hamper it.

Around 30 faculty members and students attended the forum. Prof. Xie Yuefeng presided over this forum.