The high employment rate of civil engineers is more than enough to convince you to pursue the occupation. Our world is continuously changing, and the role of civil engineers in managing small and large scale projects, such as rebuilding bridges, repairing dams, airports, and roads, as well as in constructing various types of buildings, is needed to cope with this change.
The Importance of Civil Engineering
Civil engineering deals with the design, construction, and maintenance of both human-made and natural formations. Civil engineers play a significant role in the development of skyscrapers, bridges, dams, canals, roads, and other major structures. The spaces we live in were created because of this professional discipline.
Civil engineering is also responsible for improving and protecting lives. Civil engineers are tasked to develop sustainable energy and clean water sources in an era of rapidly depleting fuel and natural resources. Our world today wouldn’t be possible without them.
Civil Engineering Areas of Specialization
If you think that being a civil engineer entails doing only one thing, then you’re sorely mistaken. This is not only an exciting job, but it’s also a purposeful one with a variety of areas to specialize in. Among them are:
1. Coastal Engineering
As a coastal engineer, your mission is to fight against flooding and erosion. You work to address both the human-made and natural changes in the coastal zones, creating solutions that deliver non-structural and structural protection against the changes that may occur in these areas. The goal of coastal engineering is to minimize adverse effects while maximizing the beneficial impact.
2. Earthquake Engineering
Your job as an earthquake engineer mainly entails testing structures to ensure they are resistant to earthquakes. This is accomplished through basic and applied research that helps major decision-makers in the industry reduce seismic hazards.
Who are these decision-makers? These are the agencies and individuals who have a say in the design and construction process, such as owners, insurers, investors, and regulatory agencies, as well as the engineers who safeguard against seismic menaces through the creation of earthquake-resistant designs.
3. Environmental Engineering
As an environmental engineer, your main objectives are to discover new ways to safeguard our environment, work on purifying water sources, treat wastewater, treat solid waste, build wind farms, and much more.
Environmental engineering is concerned with protecting the community from adverse ecological impact, such as pollution, and improving the state of the environment. It deals with issues such as recycling, public health, waste disposal, and air and water pollution control.
4. Structural Engineering
This branch of civil engineering focuses on the designing of flyovers, gas and oil fields, tunnels, bridges, towers, and other structures. They specialize in the structural framework, and on designing structures that can withstand environmental hazards in order to keep them safe, stable, and secure throughout the course of their lifetime.
5. Transport Engineering
Being a transport engineer means you get to work on road, canal, highway, port, airport, and rail system maintenance. Your role covers the planning, designing, operating, and maintenance of reliable and efficient transport systems. In developing these projects, you consider the projected amount of traffic for a transport facility and the quantity, as well as the type of infrastructure components.
6. Urban Engineering
A branch that mainly tackles the design, construction, and maintenance of sewers, water supply networks, roads, public parks, etc. Urban engineers problem-solve, plan, and design to enhance the way people live, play, and work.
Urban engineering, from the name itself, deals with urban infrastructures. Its primary concern is in the specifying, constructing, planning, and maintaining of streets, sewers, water supply networks, street lighting, municipal waste disposal, and storage depots for a variety of bulk materials used in public works and maintenance, cycling infrastructure, and public parks.
7. Hydraulics and Water Resources Engineering
The design and construction of pipelines, channels, culverts, dams, and canals are what this branch of civil engineering focuses on. This sub-discipline tackles the flow and transport of fluids, primarily water and sewage. It creates systems made efficient through the large-scale use of gravity, which propels the movement of fluids.
The fundamentals that govern fluid mechanics factor highly in this sub-branch as they allow it to efficiently deal with various issues, including the control, storage, collection, measurement, use, regulation, and transport of water.
Final Verdict
Civil engineering is comprised of a variety of branches and disciplines that you can explore as you begin your journey into this profession. And whatever specialization suits your fancy, make sure to give it your very best. This would require continuing your education to stay relevant and maintain your position in the industry. Like all the other industries out there, this one steadily provides you with stiff competition, and rightfully so.
So much is expected from today’s civil engineers, which is why they’re required to renew their licenses regularly. So much about one’s success in civil engineering highly depends on their license renewal preparations.
We know you’ve chosen the path to become a civil engineer, but what type of civil engineer are you going to be? We hope this article was able to shed enough light on this aspect to get you thinking.