Specialties
Stormwater and Watershed Management Planning and Design; NPDES Permitting and Compliance; Water Quality Monitoring and Modeling; Green Infrastructure and Low Impact Development; Expert Witness Support
Practice Areas
Environmental Management; Water and Natural Resources; Civil Infrastructure
Education
PhD, Biological and Agricultural Engineering, North Carolina State University, 2016; MEng, Biological and Agricultural Engineering, North Carolina State University, 2014; BS, Agricultural and Biological Engineering, University of Florida, 2012
Registration
Professional Engineer: North Carolina #046964, South Carolina #43810, Florida #101146
Client Service
As a consultant, Alessa serves clients across the southeastern United States, including those in the municipal, industrial, and energy sectors. On their behalf, she develops watershed-level stormwater management strategies for vulnerable coastal communities, conducts source investigations of contaminants in stormwater and surface water, and leads the planning, design, and permitting of stormwater control measures and stormwater infrastructure for flood control and water quality improvement. To strengthen community resilience and improve the quality of receiving surface waters, she has led the development and implementation of multiple stormwater master plans and watershed improvement plans in the Carolinas.
Alessa also helps clients achieve and maintain National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permitting compliance, design and implement green infrastructure and low impact development approaches, and draft stormwater ordinances and other technical documents.
In addition, Alessa provides expert witness support to evaluate compliance with the Clean Water Act and local regulations involving stormwater management and erosion and sediment control. Notably, she also helped develop an innovative approach for evaluating sediment delivered to streams during linear construction projects and estimating the potential impact of that sediment delivery on threatened and endangered aquatic species, an approach that was reviewed and approved by multiple federal agencies.
To advance the state of the practice, Alessa contributes to the American Society of Civil Engineers Environmental and Water Resources Institute, the Southeast Stormwater Association, the American Public Works Association, and other professional organizations. She has also developed design guidance and instructed stormwater design workshops throughout the Eastern United States on topics including green streets, permeable pavement, and modeling stormwater infrastructure under future climate scenarios. Her research has been published in seven peer-reviewed journals, including the Journal of Hydrology and the Journal of Environmental Management. In addition, two models Alessa developed were used to form guidance for the crediting of water quality stormwater control measures in North Carolina.
Contact Alessa at abraswell@geosyntec.com.
