Dr. Katherine Alfredo is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of South Florida. Dr. Alfredo has extensive international experience that includes two US Fulbright Fellowships. Her first Fulbright was awarded in 2008 (U.S. Student Fulbright Fellowship) to research cultural complications involved in rural, water treatment and management in the Northeast region of Ghana, West Africa. Her second Fulbright was awarded in 2015 (Fulbright-Nehru Postdoctoral Scholar) to investigate how and why rurally-implemented drinking water treatment plants both succeed and fail when their management is transferred to the community. This line of inquiry began during her tenure as a Columbia University Earth Institute Postdoctoral Fellow at the Columbia Water Center and continues to explore today. Prior to joining the faculty at USF, she was the Research Program Manager at DC Water focused on the difficulties large, urban utilities face in ensuring a constant supply of high quality, potable water. She holds a Professional Engineering license in the state of Virginia.
Research Areas: Water utility rates (continued collaboration with CWC), sustainability metrics and evaluations, physical-chemical water treatment processes, drinking water regulatory enforcement policy, rural and resource limited water treatment, utility/water trust, urban water distribution concerns, point-of- use water treatment technologies.
Specialist in: urban drinking water treatment and management, rural water treatment and management, drinking water policy, US drinking water regulations, potable water sustainability concerns.