MSc Water Engineering

Civil Engineering addresses key challenges associated with infrastructure. There is a global shortage of qualified civil engineers, especially at the graduate/junior engineer career stage. This shortage is expected to increase significantly when the current economic crisis ends. This MSc will help redress this imbalance, providing graduates with an advanced knowledge and skills base, with particular strengths in aspects of water engineering.

Problems associated with water resources, access, distribution and quality have been identified as being amongst the most important global issues for the coming fifty years by a variety of bodies including the United Nations, World Bank, ICE. These problems reflect growing populations, raised expectations and the impact of climate change. Water quality issues and water scarcity are increasingly becoming a major issue due to increasing population, economic growth and climate change. Recent figures indicate that 1.1 billion people, worldwide, do not have access to clean drinking water, while 2.6 billion do not have adequate sanitation (WHO/UNICEF 2005). Currently we are mid-way through the UN’s ‘Water for Life’

International Decade, with a Millennium Development Goal of halving the number of people without access to adequate water infrastructure by 2015. Although significant progress has been achieved, continued improvement towards the target, and maintaining new and existing water supply and sanitation infrastructure requires a much greater pool of qualified engineers than is currently available. Even in developed countries, water resources are under significant pressure as a result of demand for increasing volumes of clean water, with a growing usage of unsustainable sources.

Episodes when there is too much water also present an increasing challenge. Major flood events, such as the 2010 floods in Pakistan, directly affect millions. Water-related risks, including fluvial, pluvial and coastal flooding, drought, and groundwater changes are being given an increasingly high priority by local, regional and national governments. Current budgetary pressures mean that solutions have to be appropriate, efficient and innovative.

Information about the Worshipful Company of Water Conservators bursary can be found in the Fees section.

Aims

This course is designed for both recent graduates and more experienced engineers who wish to update and enhance their knowledge and understanding. Our MSc is unique in providing specialist knowledge on the critical sub-topics of desalination systems, building water services engineering, industrial wastewater management, and water in health care.

The programme will demonstrate the links between theory and practice by including input from our industrial partners and through site visits. Generic modules in financial and project management will underpin specialist modules focusing on Water Engineering topics. Students’ skills in gathering and understanding complex information from a variety of sources (including engineering, scientific and socio-economic information) will be developed in an advanced research methods module. Issues relating to risk and health and safety will be introduced in the research methods module and built on in the more specialist modules.