Courses
The Environmental Engineering Program administers a small number of courses to supplement course offerings from our participating departments. Below is a list of regularly offered EVEN courses with links to more detailed descriptions.
EVEN 1000 (1 credit) Introduction to Environmental Engineering
Instructor: Joseph Ryan
Introduces students to environmental engineering as an academic major and a career.
Covers air quality, aquatic ecology, chemical processing, energy, site remediation, and water resources and treatment. Includes reading and writing on the history of environmental engineering major environmental issues, and professional ethics.
Offered: Every fall (syllabus)
EVEN 2004 Introduction to Global Engineering
Instructor: Carlo Salvinelli, Evan Thomas
Introduces students to the emerging field of Global Engineering, concerned with the unequal and unjust distribution of access to basic services such as water, sanitation, energy, food, transportation and shelter. The course places an emphasis on identifying the drivers, determinants and solutions favoring equitable access. Topics include technology development and validation, data collection and impact evaluation. Recommended restriction: for engineering students.
EVEN 3012 Thermodynamics for Environmental Science and Engineering
Instructor: Mark Hernandez
Energy management is a crucial societal need, and thermodynamics is used to analyze energy flow in virtually every branch of science and engineering. In an environmental context, this course introduces the technical language of thermodynamics and its application to the thermal management of buildings and infrastructure, fluid motion, our hydrologic cycle, as well as the understanding of weather and climate.
EVEN 3550 (3 credits) Sustainability Principles for Engineers
Instructor: Mark Hernandez
This is a fundamental sustainability course for sophomores in EVEN. This course introduces students to sustainability principles in the field of environmental engineering. During this class, students will apply these principles to engineering problems in order to evaluate the environmental, economic, and social implications of engineering and design decisions. Topics include definition(s) of sustainability, main engineering sustainability challenges (e.g., water, energy, climate, and materials), pollution generation and prevention, and sustainability assessment tools (e.g., life cycle assessment).
Offered: Every Fall (syllabus)
EVEN 4404 (3 credits) Water Chemistry
Instructor: Azadeh Bolhari
Introduces chemical fundamentals of inorganic aqueous compounds and contaminants in lecture and laboratory. Lecture topics include thermodynamics and kinetics of acids and base reactions, carbonate chemistry, air-water exchange, precipitation, dissolution, complexation, oxidation-reduction, and sorption. Same as CVEN 4404. Requires prerequisite courses of CHEN 1211 and CHEM 1113 and CVEN 3414 (all minimum grade C-). Restricted to Civil (CVEN) or Environmental (EVEN) Engineering majors only.
Offered: Every fall.
EVEN 4414 (1 credit) Water Chemistry Laboratory
Instructor: Azadeh Bolhari
Reinforces chemical fundamentals of inorganic aqueous compounds and contaminants from EVEN 4404, Water Chemistry, in laboratory experiments and reports. Topics include acids and bases, carbonate chemistry (alkalinity), and other water chemistry characteristics (hardness, dissolved oxygen); precipitation, complexation, and oxidation-reduction reactions; and laboratory techniques and reporting. Same as CVEN 4414. Requisites: Requires prerequisite courses of CHEN 1211 or CHEM 1113 and CHEM 1133 (all minimum grade C-). Requires corequisite course of EVEN 4404. Restricted to Civil (CVEN) or Environmental (EVEN) Engineering majors only.
Offered: Every fall.
EVEN 4424 (3 credits) Environmental Organic Chemistry
Instructor: Joseph Ryan
Examines the fundamental physical and chemical transformations affecting the fate and transport of organic contaminants in natural and treated waters. Emphasizes quantitative approach to solubility, vapor pressure, air-water exchange, sorption, hydrolysis and redox reactions, and photodegradation. Same as CVEN 4424. Requisites: Requires prerequisite course of CHEN 1211 (minimum grade C-).
Offered: Every spring.
EVEN 4434 (4 credits) Environmental Engineering Design
Instructors: William Becker, Nicholas Clements, Azadeh Bolhari
Examines the design of facilities for the treatment of municipal water and wastewater, hazardous industrial waste, contaminated environmental sites, and sustainable sanitation in developing countries. Economic, societal, and site specific criteria impacting designs are emphasized. Same as CVEN 4434. Requisites: Requires prerequisite course of CVEN 3414 (minimum grade C-).
Offered: Every spring (syllabus).
EVEN 4464 (3 credits) Environmental Engineering Processes
Instructor: Julie Korak
Develops and utilizes analytic solutions for environmental process models that can be used in a) reactor design for processes used in the treatment of water, wastewater and hazardous waste and b) process analysis of natural systems, such as streams and groundwater flow. Models facilitate the tracking of contaminants in engineered and natural systems. Same as CVEN 4464. Requisites: Requires prerequisite courses of CVEN 3313 and CVEN 3414 (all minimum grade C-).
Offered: Every fall
EVEN 4484 (3 credits) Introduction to Environmental Microbiology
Instructor: Cresten Mansfeldt
Surveys microbiology topics germane to modern civil and environmental engineering. Provides fundamentals needed to understand microbial processes and ecology in engineered and natural systems and reviews applications emphasizing the interface between molecular biology and classical civil engineering. Same as CVEN 4484. Requisites: Requires prerequisite course of CHEN 1211 (minimum grade C-).
Offered: Every spring.
EVEN 4494 (3 credits) Contaminant Fate and Transport
Instructor: Azadeh Bolhari
The course requires students to design and conduct experiments, analyze, interpret data, and write technical engineering reports. This lab-based course gives students an understanding of processes that govern the behavior of pollutants in the environment. The subject includes aspects of intermedia contaminant transport, surface and groundwater hydrology, air pollution modeling, degradation processes and remediation, human exposure pathways and risk analysis.
EVEN 4830 (3 credits) Special Topics: Environmental Empact Assessment
Instructor: Paola Guerra
EVEN 4830 (3 credits) Special Topics: Applied Global Engineering
Instructor: Carlo Salvinelli, Evan Thomas
EVEN 4840 (1-3) Independent Study
See individual instructors to arrange independent research projects, including a senior thesis. Select an instructor from the Faculty List working in your area of interest, and contact them by email or phone. Please refer to the EVEN BS Guidelines for policies to follow and to contact the EVEN undergrad advisor for
EVEN 4969 (3 credits) Water and Sanitation in Developing Countries
Instructor: Mathew Bentley
Studies the design and fundamentals behind effective water and sanitation treatment processes and engineering solutions targeted for developing countries. Approaches to clean water and sanitation in lesser industrialized countries often demand alternative solutions to those developed for industrialized societies and require approaches beyond just the technology details. Explores issues and solutions developed to tackle these problems. Includes 3 hands-on laboratory-based projects to augment the in-class work.
Equivalent - Duplicate Degree Credit Not Granted: CVEN 4969
Requisites: Requires prerequisites courses of CVEN 3414 and CVEN 3424 (all minimum grade D-). Restricted to students with 57-180 credits (Juniors or Seniors).
Offered: Every spring
EVEN 4980 / 4990 (3/3) Senior Thesis 1 / 2
Provides 2-semester faculty-supervised independent research in environmental engineering, including a written thesis and oral defense at the end of the second semester. Select an instructor from the Faculty List working in your area of interest, and contact them by email or phone to discuss potential research topics. Please refer to the EVEN BS Guidelines for policies to follow and to contact the EVEN undergrad advisor for