Grads also engineering pollution prevention The new breed of environmental engineers is also coming out of chemical and mechanical engineering programs. Graduates in these fields develop cleaner car engines, separate and eliminate waste from industrial processes, and build pollution prevention into product design. 'There has been a tremendous amount of growth in chemical engineering with an environmental emphasis," said Ralph Yang, chair of the chemical engineering department at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. "Many of the major environmental challenges, such as clean air and water, need chemical engineering solutions." According to the January 1996 issue of Chemical Engineerrng Progress, 11% of its readers described themselves as environmental engineers in 1995, approximately 4000 more people than in 1988. Student interest is also on the rise. At the University of Tennessee in Knoxville, chemical and environmental engineering professor Robert Counce says undergraduates have been signing up in droves to take his course on industrial pollution prevention. "Most of these students end up in the chemical process industry. They often work to make products with reduced waste." Chemical engineers get swept up by environmental consulting firms as well, said Yang. As in environmental engineering, a chemical engineer with a bachelor's degree may compete with a student holding a master's in chemical engineering for "environmental" jobs. From the employer's point of view, these two engineers may require a similar amount of training, according to David Allen, a chemical engineering professor at the University of Texas in Austin. "The biggest distinction in chemical engineering is between doctoral students and [undergraduate] students." In mechanical engineering, today's students have good opportunities to pursue air pollution work, said Kenneth Ragland, chair of the mechanical engineering department at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. "The effort to make cars cleaner is a big market for us. There's a strong emphasis on emissions that's driving [auto] design." Across the board, industrial companies today want to add pollution prevention into product design from the very start, engineers say. "That means getting the people doing the design more deeply involved in environmental issues," said Allen. That's where traditional chemical and mechanical engineers come in. In fact, Allen contends that some chemical engineers with environmental know-how may have a leg up on students coming from strictly environmental engineering programs. "A chemical engineer has almost as much chemistry training as a chemistry major," said Allen. "If you're studying things like ozone formation or water [pollution], then a chemistry background will benefit you." Combine that science with the basics of reaction kinetics, reactor design, and other engineering areas, and you have a powerful combination, Allen believes. —K.S.B.
mate a person's ability to communicate what they know," said Steve Tomaszewski, coordinator of the environment and energy staff at General Motors. "It is critical." Albergo agrees: "If you can't write, it doesn't matter how good you are." He says you must be able to convey your message—whether it's rich in science or nrartiral experiencf.
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The coming squeeze Even as students are lining up for environmental engineering majors, many professors have begun to quiedy ask one question: Can all these students find jobs? "I would guess that there's a point of saturation that may come in a few years," said David Chin, head of the civil, architectural, and environmental engineering department at the University of Miami. "We're not there yet, but it is a concern." Estimates suggest that up to 70,000 environmental engineers are already practicing in the United States today. As happened with the auto industry in the 1960s, foreign companies have begun moving into the American market, increasing competition. At the major environmental consulting firms, only a fraction of engineering applicants are called for interviews. Even though the United States represents 40% of the world's market for environmental engineering services, the U.S. market is flattening, according to Philip G. Hall, chairman of the board at CH2M Hill in Denver. Because "global markets continue to grow at a double-digit rate," many environmental engineers are seeking jobs abroad. More generally, environmental engineering is a game of diminishing returns, noted Anderson of AAEE. "Only so many sites need to be remediated,,.. and we've got plenty of people eliminating pollution in the process and design stages. That could ultimately mean little work in the pipeline." Glass adds that ambitious undergraduates could make job hunting harder for others. "If the undergraduates are [willing to accept] lower salaries, then they could cut out graduate students willing to work in the mid-thirties," said Glass. "Is this field big enough for all these students? We'll have to see." Some regions grapple with more environmental regulations—and thus offer more jobs—than others. California, for example, tends to legislate more pollution and water goals than the Midwest. Sometimes, regional differences in engineering jobs are driven by the general economy. At the University of New Hampshire, Collins said environmental engineering graduates are finding it hard to land jobs close to home. Local industries in the area have laid off workers, causing new home construction to plummet and thus leaving fewer jobs for civil and environmental engineers alike. Nationwide, increasing numbers of environmental engineers could feel similarly squeezed as regional economies go up and down says Collins. At Colorado, Silverstein is still optimistic. She pushes environmental engineering students to study a variety of subjects—chemistry, physics, biology, math—to broaden their job opportunities/'Really, if you get the fundamentals, you can do a lot," she said. "At its best, engineering is a collection of skills that can be applied to a variety of problems. You can change your focus once you acquire those skills." After all, that's how environmental engineering got started in the first place. Kathryn Sergeant Brown is a freelance science writer based in Columbia, Mo.
