About

Professor Meagan Mauter is an Associate Professor of Civil & Environmental Engineering at Stanford University, where she also holds courtesy appointments in the Woods Institute for the Environment and the Precourt Institute for Energy. She directs the Water and Energy Efficiency for the Environment Lab (WE3Lab), focusing on providing sustainable water supply solutions in a carbon-constrained world through innovation in water treatment technology, optimization of water management practices, and redesign of water policies. Her ongoing research includes developing automated, robust, and electrified water desalination technologies to support a circular water economy, identifying synergies and barriers in decarbonized water and energy systems, and supporting the design and enforcement of water-energy policies. She serves as the research director for the National Alliance for Water Innovation, a DOE-funded desalination hub addressing water security issues in the United States. Professor Mauter holds multiple degrees from Rice University and Yale University, including a PhD in Chemical and Environmental Engineering. Prior to her current role, she was an Energy Technology Innovation Policy Fellow at Harvard Kennedy School and an Associate Professor at Carnegie Mellon University.

Research topics

• Computer Science
• Environmental science
• Engineering
• Ecology
• Waste management
• Business

Selected publications

• The Future of Municipal Wastewater Reuse Concentrate Management: Drivers, Challenges, and Opportunities

  UNC Libraries · 2026-04-15

  articleOpen access

  Water reuse is rapidly becoming an integral feature of resilient water systems, where municipal wastewater undergoes advanced treatment, typically involving a sequence of ultrafiltration (UF), reverse osmosis (RO), and an advanced oxidation process (AOP). When RO is used, a concentrated waste stream is produced that is elevated in not only total dissolved solids but also metals, nutrients, and micropollutants that have passed through conventional wastewater treatment. Management of this RO concentrate─dubbed municipal wastewater reuse concentrate (MWRC)─will be critical to address, especially as water reuse practices become more widespread. Building on existing brine management practices, this review explores MWRC management options by identifying infrastructural needs and opportunities for multi-beneficial disposal. To safeguard environmental systems from the potential hazards of MWRC, disposal, monitoring, and regulatory techniques are discussed to promote the safety and affordability of implementing MWRC management. Furthermore, opportunities for resource recovery and valorization are differentiated, while economic techniques to revamp cost-benefit analysis for MWRC management are examined. The goal of this critical review is to create a common foundation for researchers, practitioners, and regulators by providing an interdisciplinary set of tools and frameworks to address the impending challenges and emerging opportunities of MWRC management.

  PublisherDOI

• Informing water and nutrient management for sustainable agriculture

  Stanford Digital Repository · 2026-03-13

  dissertationOpen access
  PublisherDOI

• Optimizing Distribution Controls for Safe, Affordable, Low‐Carbon Water Supply

  Water Resources Research · 2025-09-01

  articleOpen accessSenior authorCorresponding

  Abstract Water distribution systems (WDSs) are increasingly required to respond to dynamic financial and regulatory signals. This study presents a computationally tractable multi‐objective optimization framework for minimizing time‐variant electricity costs, carbon intensity, and water age. We apply this framework in a large, complex WDS over monthly time periods to demonstrate computational tractability and describe tradeoffs in energy costs, carbon emissions, and water quality under realistic operating and billing conditions. We achieve computational tractability by combining a novel model reduction approach with search space reduction (domain targeting) and algorithmic efficiency tools (search‐integrated feasibility prescreening). The result was a 43% reduction in hydraulic simulation time and a 20% reduction in water quality simulation time for our case study system. By modifying a combination of tank level and time control set points in our case study, we identify opportunities for reducing energy costs by up to 5% without compromising GHG emissions and water age and up to 8% with increases in water age. This work underscores the importance of multi‐objective formulations for dynamic WDS optimization and the imperative of computationally efficient optimization workflows for practical application in large systems with monthly billing cycles.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Load-Shifting Strategies for Cost-Effective Emission Reductions at Wastewater Facilities

  Environmental Science & Technology · 2025-01-17 · 6 citations

  articleSenior authorCorresponding

  Significant hourly variation in the carbon intensity of electricity supplied to wastewater facilities introduces an opportunity to lower emissions by shifting the timing of their energy demand. This shift could be accomplished by storing wastewater, biogas from sludge digestion, or electricity from on-site biogas generation. However, the life cycle emissions and cost implications of these options are not clear. We present a multiobjective optimization framework for comparing cost- and emission-minimizing load-shifting strategies at a California case study facility with a relatively low carbon intensity grid and high spread in peak and off-peak electricity prices. We evaluate cost and emission trade-offs from the optimal flexible operation of both existing infrastructure and optimally sized energy flexibility upgrades. We estimate energy-related emission reductions of up to 9.0% with flexible operation of existing infrastructure and up to 16.8% with optimally sized storage upgrades. Only a fraction of these potential savings are realized under actual industrial energy tariffs and the EPA's recommended social cost of carbon. Energy flexibility may hold promise as a short-term emission-saving solution for the wastewater sector, but the extent of savings is heavily dependent on the cost of carbon, electricity tariffs, and emission intensity of the regional electricity grid.

  PublisherDOI

• Visual‐Analytics Bridge Complexity and Accessibility for Robust Urban Water Planning

  Water Resources Research · 2025-04-01 · 2 citations

  articleOpen access

  Abstract Urban water resources planning is complicated by unprecedented uncertainty in supply and demand. Real‐world planning often simplifies the full range of uncertainty faced by a system into a limited set of deterministic scenarios to enhance accessibility for decision‐makers and the public. However, overlooking uncertainty can expose the system to failures. On the other end of the spectrum, academically developed tools for scenario analysis rigorously quantify the combined effects of multiple sources of uncertainty, but the practical application of these models is limited by the challenges of information visualization and communication of results. In short, municipal water supply planners lack access to planning frameworks that effectively integrate a rigorous treatment of uncertainty with accessible, user‐friendly visual and interactive tools to enhance user accessibility. In this work, we fill this gap by proposing Visual‐Robust Decision Making, and demonstrate an application for the city of Santa Barbara (SB), CA. Santa Barbara faces multiple uncertainties from pending state and federal regulations to changing hydrology and water demand. The city seeks to increase its water portfolio robustness by expanding its seawater desalination plant, but must decide how much capacity to add. We introduce computational tools that assess uncertainty across nine uncertain drivers identified with the help of water planners in SB. To allow public participation in the desalination expansion decision, we develop interactive visual‐analytics to aid decision‐makers and stakeholders in navigating complex scenario analysis outcomes. Our results quantify the tradeoffs between increased capacity and system robustness and aim to enhance participation and uncertainty characterization of urban water planning efforts.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Editorial overview: Transforming water technologies in the United States: Insights from the National Alliance for Water Innovation

  Current Opinion in Chemical Engineering · 2025-09-15

  articleSenior author
  PublisherDOI

• PyPES: A data and metadata schema for portable water system models

  Environmental Modelling & Software · 2025-11-20

  articleSenior authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Incorporating corrosion design constraints in desalination process optimization: A case study in mechanical vapor compression

  Desalination · 2025-11-29

  articleSenior authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Using Bayesian Inference and Flowpipe Construction to Bound Predictions of Biogas Production at Wastewater Treatment Plants

  Lecture notes in computer science · 2025-11-15

  book-chapter
  PublisherDOI

• Retail electricity costs and emissions incentives are misaligned for commercial and industrial power consumers

  ArXiv.org · 2025-11-13

  preprintOpen accessSenior author

  Electrification is contributing to substantial growth in U.S. commercial and industrial loads, but the cost and Scope 2 carbon emission implications of this load growth are opaque for both power consumers and utilities. This work describes a unique spatiotemporally resolved data set of U.S. electricity costs and emissions and applies time series approximation methods to quantify the alignment of electricity cost and emission incentives for large commercial and industrial consumers. We present a comprehensive spatiotemporal dataset of U.S. price-based demand response (i.e., tariff) and incentive-based demand response programs, enabling direct comparison to previously published marginal emission factor, average emission factor, and day-ahead market prices. We resolved the structural incompatibility and fragmentation of these datasets by developing time series approximations of discrete data and unifying geospatially heterogeneous datasets. Analysis of these datasets reveals significant spatial and temporal heterogeneity in cost and carbon emissions incentives for demand-side energy flexibility, underscoring the importance of site selection as a key factor influencing power costs and Scope 2 emissions. Analysis also reveals broad misalignment of economic and emissions incentives under existing electricity tariff structures, meaning tariffs are incentivizing consumption of more carbon-intensive electricity, and highlighting potential barriers to electrification delivering carbon savings.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

Recent grants

• Collaborative Research: INFEWS: N/P/H2O: Remote and autonomous sensing for managing the economic and environmental consequences of salinity-impacted agricultural waterways

  NSF · $231k · 2016–2020

• CAREER: INTEGRATED WATER, ENERGY, AND EMISSIONS DECISION MAKING FOR A LOW CARBON FUTURE WITH COAL-FIRED POWER PLANTS

  NSF · $500k · 2016–2020

• Collaborative Research: INFEWS: N/P/H2O: Remote and autonomous sensing for managing the economic and environmental consequences of salinity-impacted agricultural waterways

  NSF · $155k · 2019–2022

• Collaborative Research: Magnetically Assisted Self-Assembly for Facile 2D Membrane Protein Crystallization

  NSF · $278k · 2019–2022

• SusChEM: Collaborative Research: Identification of the critical length scales and chemistries responsible for the anti-fouling properties of heterogeneous surfaces

  NSF · $320k · 2015–2020

Frequent coauthors

• Timothy Bartholomew

  22 shared

• Alexander V. Dudchenko

  19 shared

• Sarah Fletcher

  Stanford University

  14 shared

• Daniel B. Gingerich

  The Ohio State University

  14 shared

• Marta Zaniolo

  Stanford University

  13 shared

• Menachem Elimelech

  Yale University

  12 shared

• Sneha Shanbhag

  10 shared

• Moshe Herzberg

  Ben-Gurion University of the Negev

  10 shared

Labs

• Vice Provost for Student AffairsPI