The term or phrase “environmental engineering” is not as old as other terms or phrases that popped up in the modern era, especially since the start of the Industrial Revolution.
Environmental engineering actually has a long or longer history, depending on the dates provided by different records or accounts. The roots of environmental engineering go way back to the beginning of culture or civilization. Primitive ways of disposing volumes of waste and providing clean water were commonplace within organized settlements which consisted of many people.
In the distant past, the term “environmental engineer” and “environmental engineering” hadn’t yet been coined. It didn’t exist then. Back then, the masons and builders of wells and aqueducts were the same people who built the city walls, structures, ditches filled with water (i.e., moats), as well as large catapults and other primitive engines used for war.
In the present time, it is only fair enough to respectfully recognize the ancient masons and builders as “engineers of antiquity”. They deserve the utmost respect for laying down some of the best and lasting foundations for modern-day civil, water, and environmental engineering fields respectively.
It wasn’t until the eighteenth century (i.e., mid-1700s) that the engineers who built structures and facilities for civilian populations started distinguishing themselves from the engineers who were mainly concerned with war/warfare. This gave rise to the field and term “civil engineering”.
During the early years of the then young United States, engineers were either mostly self-taught or received training at the United States Military Academy. Some selected engineers—later known better as “civil engineers” or engineers who specialized in constructing buildings, roads, railways, roads, bridges, structures, etc.—were tasked with designing and constructing water supply facilities for cities, and providing adequate waste management systems to properly control and dispose storm water and waterborne wastes.
With the passage of time, increasing population growth and rising levels of industrialization were causing unsanitary conditions in the cities and environment which even suffered the most due to the absence of adequate water supply and appropriate waste management policies and systems.
The populace didn’t seem to bother, as long as the bell didn’t ring too loud; however, almost everyone became concerned when scientists discovered the potential that water had to carry diseases right into helpless populations.
Public health became the concern of civil engineers who were entrusted with building structures and cities and providing water supplies to population centers: civil engineers now knew that they had an even greater responsibility that required more than just constructing cities and buildings and providing adequate water supply, etc.
Civil engineers had to find ways to prevent or protect water supply—adequate or inadequate—from becoming a vector for disease transmission.
In fact, the main objective of the civil engineers during the late 19th century (i.e., 1800s) was to prevent and eliminate waterborne diseases, and many state Acts and regulations were instituted to help engineers take on the new responsibility to achieve their main objective.
Thus the civil engineers that were first entrusted with constructing buildings and drainages and providing clean water supplies became “public health engineers” (as coined in Britain) and “sanitary engineers” (as coined in the United States)—both, forerunners for the now-popular term “environmental engineers”.
Modern-day environmental engineering
Environmental, public health, and sanitary engineers have made a lot of effort to reduce the transmission of acute diseases by contaminated water and air. In the United States, for instance, the acute effects of pollution have been curtailed or even eliminated; however, they have been replaced by more chronic and complex problems such as depleting aquifers; the questionable safety of rapidly emerging materials such as nanoparticles; indoor air pollution; global transportation of toxic and bioaccumulating chemicals; climate change; impacts chemicals, pharmaceuticals, and wastewater effluents on streams and rivers; etc.
The same or related problems exist in many cities, countries, and parts of the world. The challenges to each environmental media such as air, water, and land required the focus of not only “broad science” but more of “specific environmental engineering”.
To address 21st century or modern-day chronic environmental problems and avoid unintended consequences which can grow horns, environmental engineers now seek to understand people, the environment, the cities, and industries, etc., as interconnected and interacting systems.
In most developed countries today where the health effects of environmental contamination are not the only problem of concern, the preservation of species and protection of wildlife habitat, amongst other responsibilities, have also become major objectives for environmental engineers who supposedly should only be concerned with engineering in regard to the environment!
Therefore, the mission to not only design artificial or manmade structures, but to go a step further and protect natural resources and other forms of life (species) as well, has become a major motivator or driving force behind modern environmental engineering which fully recognizes that the Earth’s ecosystems and natural capital are not inexhaustible, and should thus be handled with care.
The modern-day environmental engineer knows full well that to preserve and maintain environmental or public health, the health, social, and economic wellbeing of people has to be protected by preserving and maintaining the integrity of the ecosystems and ecosystem services Nature has given mankind without expecting anything but good management—not only for our good but for the good of the whole environment which consists of countless beings and things.
Nowadays, the common goal of environmental engineering and engineers across the world is “sustainability” or “sustainable development” which, according to a definition formulated by a 1987 United Nations commission in the Brundtland Report, is any “development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”.
Concluding remarks
Environmental engineering, sanitary engineering, and public health engineering—whichever one of the three you use to refer to engineering practices meant to protect the environment— is more prepared now than ever before to deal with complex matters, if the world’s populations will cooperate.
In the past, when environmental engineering was not yet coined but rather wore civil engineering clothing, the civil engineers of the time focussed mainly on providing structures and facilities that populations desperately needed as their numbers were growing unhindered.
As the challenges faced by early civil engineers continued to expand into the environment and local pollution problems were gradually becoming more complex and global in scale, there became a growing need for more focus on establishing principles and frameworks to guide the development of solutions that can protect the environment, people, animals, and everything that is worth protecting.
As a result, environmental engineering and environmental engineers were born and have been expected to work with diverse stakeholders to protect human health, animal health, plant health, and the environment, and generally solve different kinds of environmental problems.
MoTEnv — MTE 