BS in Environmental Engineering

Plan Your Classes: Resources

What's the difference?

The department offers two ways to study environmental engineering as an undergraduate: the B.S. in Environmental Engineering or the B.S. in Civil Engineering with a focus on environmental engineering and science.

Learn more

About Environmental Engineering

Environmental engineers address important issues facing society: ensuring clean air, safe drinking water and sanitation; evaluating opportunities and designing systems for sustainable environmental resource management; designing infrastructure and developing technologies to enable climate change mitigation and adaptation; protecting people from natural and man-made hazards; and designing sustainable infrastructure that benefits society. The CEE at Illinois curriculum ensures that students graduate with a deep understanding of environmental engineering fundamentals, and are skilled in computational tools, big data, design strategies, and hands-on research.

Environmental Engineering Focus Areas

The environmental engineering program comprises five focus areas: Energy and Environmental Sustainability; Climate and Environmental Sustainability; Water Systems and Sustainability; Public Health Engineering and One Water. Although each area and program has its own special body of knowledge and engineering tools, environmental engineering projects often use knowledge and data from many of these topical areas together in order to address societal challenges. Brief descriptions of each concentration are provided below:

Energy and Environmental Sustainability (E2S)

The E2S primary focuses on understanding, quantifying, and modeling the interdependencies between energy, water, and the environment. Students will gain fundamental and applied knowledge in thermodynamics and chemical principles, and expertise in water policy, renewable energy systems, and sustainable design.

Jump to E2S courses or continue scrolling for full curriculum overview

Climate and Environmental Sustainability (CES)

CES students will develop skills to quantify and manage the dynamic interactions among society and the built and natural environments, with an emphasis on environmental and water resources engineering to adapt to a changing global climate. Coursework will focus on atmospheric sciences (including physical climate and physical meteorology), natural resource economics, environmental systems analyses, decision and risk analysis, and data science to generate insight from large and complex datasets.

Jump to CES courses or continue scrolling for full curriculum overview

Water Systems and Sustainability (WS2)

The WS2 primary focuses on understanding, designing, and managing natural and engineered water systems. Students learn foundational knowledge of environmental hydrology and hydraulic engineering, and gain skills to develop sustainable solutions to urban water challenges such as flooding, to manage surface water and groundwater transport and pollution, and to design novel nature-based solutions and green and hybrid infrastructure to overcome the challenges imposed by a changing environment.

Jump to WS2 courses or continue scrolling for full curriculum overview

Public Health Engineering (PHE)

Students in the PHE primary will gain skills in monitoring and modeling air pollution, air quality management, air, and water pollution control technologies, and physicochemical and toxicological analysis of environmental contaminants. Students will also learn the skills to analyze and evaluate the interconnections between environmental factors and the progression of human diseases through various designs of epidemiological studies and apply the principles of engineering control for the protection of public health.

Jump to PHE courses or continue scrolling for full curriculum overview

One Water (One W)

The OneW primary centers on the safe and reliable provision of drinking water, sanitation, and storm water management for communities and households. Students in this primary will learn physical, chemical, and biological principles and how to apply them to design and develop innovative water quality control processes and systems. Students will also learn how to design resource (water, nutrient, energy) recovery systems to support circular economies.

The term “One Water” stems from an international trend toward holistic water planning by municipalities (for example, “One Water LA” for the City of Los Angeles).

Jump to OneW courses or continue scrolling for full curriculum overview

Overview of the Curriculum

The curriculum leading to the degree of Bachelor of Science in Environmental Engineering requires 128 hours. A brief summary of the program follows.

Required Courses

The following courses, associated with 67 semester hours of academic credit, are required in the undergraduate curriculum in environmental engineering. These courses provide the foundation for the study of civil engineering.

Orientation and professional development (8 hours)

CEE 190 Project-Based Introduction to CEE 4 hrs
CEE 495 Professional Practice 0 hrs
ECE 316 Ethics and Engineering 3 hrs
ENG 100 Engineering Lecture (freshmen) 1 hrs
ENG 300 Engineering Transfer Lecture (external transfer students) 1 hrs

Foundational Mathematics and Science (32 hours)

ATMS 202 General Physical Climate 3 hrs
CHEM 102 General Chemistry I 3 hrs
CHEM 103 General Chemistry Lab I (to be taken with CHEM 102) 1 hrs
CHEM 104 General Chemistry II 3 hrs
CHEM 105 General Chemistry Lab II (to be taken with CHEM 104) 1 hrs
MATH 221 Calculus I 4 hrs
MATH 257 Linear Algebra with Computational Applications 3 hrs **
MATH 231 Calculus II 3 hrs
MATH 241 Calculus III 4 hrs
MATH 285 Intro Differential Equations 3 hrs ***
PHYS 211 Univ Physics, Mechanics 4 hrs

**MATH 415 Linear Algebra (3 hrs) can be substituted
***MATH 284 Intro Differential Systems (4 hrs) can be substituted

Environmental Engineering Technical Core (35 hours)

CEE 201 Systems Engrg & Economics 3 hrs
CEE 202 Engineering Risk & Uncertainty 3 hrs
CEE 330 Environmental Engineering 3 hrs
CEE 331 Fluid Dynamics in the Natural and Built Environment 4 hrs **
CEE 350 Water Resources Engineering 3 hrs
CEE 449 Environmental Engineering Lab 3 hrs
CEE 453 Urban Hydrology and Hydraulics 4 hrs
CS 101 Intro to Computing, Eng & Sci 3 hrs
SE 101 Engineering Graphics and Design 3 hrs
TAM 211 Statics 3 hrs
TAM 212 Introductory Dynamics 3 hrs

**TAM 335 Fluid Dynamics (4 hrs) can be substituted

Primary Fields (students choose one of five (5) Primary Fields)

Energy & Environmental Sustainability Primary Field (30 Hours)

ABE 436 Renewable Energy Systems 4 hrs
CEE 340 Energy and Global Environment 3 hrs
CEE 433 Water Technology and Policy 3 hrs
CEE 493 Sustainable Design Eng Tech 4 hrs
CHEM 232 Elementary Organic Chemistry I 3 hrs
CHEM 360 Chemistry of the Environment 3 hrs
ENSU 301 Soc Impacts Weather and Climate 3 hrs
ME 200 Thermodynamics 3 hrs
PHYS 212 University Physics: Elec & Mag 4 hrs

Climate & Environmental Sustainability Primary Field (31 Hours)

ACE 310 Natural Resource Economics 3 hrs
ATMS 201 General Physical Meteorology 3 hrs
CEE 340 Energy and Global Environment 3 hrs
CEE 434 Environmental Systems, I 3 hrs
CEE 458 Water Resources Field Methods 4 hrs
CEE 491 Decision and Risk Analysis 3 hrs
CEE 492 Data Science for Civil and Environmental Engineering 3 hrs
ECON 102 Microeconomics (or ACE 100 Introduction to Applied Microeconomics) 3 hrs
GGIS 379 Introduction to Geographic Information Systems 4 hrs
PHYS 213 Univ. Physics: Thermal Physics 2 hrs

Water Systems & Sustainability Primary Field (32 Hours)

ACE 310 Natural Resource Economics 3 hrs
ATMS 201 General Physical Meteorology 3 hrs
CEE 433 Water Technology and Policy 3 hrs
CEE 434 Environmental Systems, I 3 hrs
CEE 450 Surface Hydrology (or CEE 457 Groundwater) 3 hrs
CEE 451 Environmental Fluid Mechanics 3 hrs
CHEM 232 Elementary Organic Chemistry I 3 hrs
CHEM 360 Chemistry of the Environment 3 hrs
ECON 102 Microeconomics (or ACE 100 Introduction to Applied Microeconomics) 3 hrs
ENSU 301 Soc Impacts Weather and Climate 3 hrs
PHYS 213 Univ. Physics: Thermal Physics 2 hrs

Public Health Engineering Primary Field (30 Hours)

ATMS 305 Computing and Data Analysis 3 hrs
CEE 435 Public Health Engineering 3 hrs
CEE 437 Water Quality Engineering 3 hrs
CEE 438 Science and Environmental Policy 3 hrs
CEE 441 Air Pollution Sources, Transport and Control 4 hrs
CHLH 201 Public Health Research Methods 3 hrs
CHLH 274 Introduction to Epidemiology 3 hrs
CHLH 469 Environmental Health 3 hrs
MCB 300 Microbiology 3 hrs
PHYS 213 Univ. Physics: Thermal Physics 2 hrs

One Water Primary Field (29-30 Hours)

CEE 437 Water Quality Engineering 3 hrs
CEE 440 Fate Cleanup Environ Pollutant 3 or 4 hrs (or CEE 452 Hydraulic Analysis and Design)
CEE 442 Env Eng Principles, Physical 4 hrs
CEE 444 Env Eng Principles, Biological 4 hrs
CHBE 221 Principles of CHE 3 hrs
CHBE 321 Thermodynamics 4 hrs
CHEM 232 Elementary Organic Chemistry I 3 hrs
CHEM 360 Chemistry of the Environment 3 hrs
PHYS 213 Univ. Physics: Thermal Physics 2 hrs

General Education Requirements (12 hours)

The campus General Education requirements fall into several categories. Those in Composition I, Natural Sciences and Technology, and Quantitative Reasoning are met by courses required in engineering curricula. A third-level college language course is required if students don’t satisfy this requirement by completing three years of high school instruction in a single language.

The campus General Education requirements in social and behavioral sciences and in humanities and the arts can be met while satisfying the campus requirements in the areas of Western and non-Western cultures. Beginning with the class that entered in Fall 2018, students must also assure that they take a course that satisfies the campus requirement in the area of U.S. Minority Culture.

Students may obtain credit from different academic sources, i.e., residential instruction, advanced placement (AP or IB) tests, and transfer credits. All course work taken to satisfy campus general education requirements must be taken for grade.

For more information about General Education course work requirements, consult the campus' General Education website.

The Economics requirement. For environmental engineering, either ECON 102 (Microeconomic Principles) or ECON 103 (Macroeconomic Principles) must be included in the 12 hours of humanities and social sciences. The curriculum committee recommends ECON 102 over ECON 103 because the principles of microeconomics are particularly relevant to many of the possible career paths in environmental engineering.

The Advanced composition requirement. The Advanced Composition requirement provides an intensive writing course whose goals are (1) to improve understanding of critical issues within a substantive discipline and (2) to improve mastery of technical aspects of writing. This requirement is satisfied by CEE 300 – Behavior of Materials.

Free Electives (10 hours)

Undergraduate students in the Grainger College of Engineering have 10 (ten) or more semester hours of free electives; the exact number required depends on the major.* Almost any course offered by the University, and most transfer courses, can be used for free electives accordance with the guidelines established by the Grainger College of Engineering to reach the total of 128 hours required for a B.S. Environmental Engineering. https://advising.grainger.illinois.edu/degree-requirements/free-electives

Prerequisites

The study of engineering is a process of building on fundamental knowledge. Hence, the prerequisite structure of the courses is extremely important. Prerequisites, as listed in the course catalog, are meant to be a guide to what you are expected to know when you start a certain course. Your success in any course depends strongly upon your mastery of the prerequisite material. For quick reference the prerequisite please see this website: Environmental Engineering Course Maps

Grade Replacement

All undergraduate students can repeat courses and use the new grade to replace the grade they earned in the first attempt. The benefit to doing this is to recalculate the cumulative GPA, excluding the grade for the first attempt; however, the transcript will still show that all courses taken, and it will show the grade for each. For additional information, see the Registrar’s information on the Campus Grade Replacement Policy.

The following are the guidelines in which students can Grade Replace.

Students are restricted to 4 distinct courses, totaling no more than 10 credit hours during their undergraduate years at Illinois;
The first attempt at the course must be a C- or lower;
Students must not have had an officially reported academic integrity violation for the first attempt at the course;
Students must retake the course at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign in order for it to count for grade replacement. Study abroad courses are not eligible for consideration;
Students can enroll in a GIS or NETMATH online section to replace an on-campus corresponding course grade;
Students must file their intent to use Grade Replacement according to the Campus Grade Replacement policy by the deadline.
https://advising.grainger.illinois.edu/course-registration/grade-replacement

Independent study and special topics courses

A student may take an independent study (i.e., CEE 497) or a special topics course (i.e., CEE 498) in partial fulfillment for the degree requirements. Such a course can count as a technical elective in the primary or secondary field and is subject to the program review process. There are many good reasons to include such courses in your curriculum. Some advice on these courses is given below. Independent Study (CEE 497). An independent study is a self-paced study of a particular topic, carried out under the guidance of a certain faculty member. Each faculty member has his or her own section number. An independent study must be taken for a grade if it is to be used toward graduation requirements as a technical elective.

An independent study can be a very rewarding experience for the student who can manage the self-paced nature of the course. The independent study provides an opportunity to include research in your undergraduate program. The graduation honor of "highest distinction" requires the completion of an independent study and the submission of the resulting report or paper.

Each faculty member has a different style in directing independent studies. It is essential to establish, in writing, a clear scope of the work to be done and the expected products (e.g., a written report). Careful planning up front can help you avoid many problems associated with delivering satisfactory results. To help minimize problems associated with execution of an independent study, each student must submit an Independent Study Application/Approval Form. This form includes a description of the independent study and requires the signature of the instructor, the student's advisor, and a department officer (generally the associate head of the department). The form can be obtained from the Academic Advisor.

Because an independent study is self-paced, these obligations tend to find their way to the bottom of even the most organized student's to-do list. As a result, it is common for the student to fail to complete the independent study within the fifteen weeks of the semester. It is usually acceptable to continue the study beyond the confines of the semester, but all parties must be agreeable and a clear plan for completion should be hatched during the semester in which the study was meant to be completed.

Special topics course (CEE 498). Special topic courses provide a mechanism to easily introduce new classes into the curriculum. These courses are designated as "experimental courses" because they have not been through the required review process of permanent courses on campus.

Some civil engineering disciplines rely on special topics courses to complete the course offerings in the category of advanced technical courses. These courses will generally be approved by the Program Review Committee for the primary or secondary field in the area which offers the course, even though they do not appear on the list of recommended courses.

Integrated Design Courses

An integrated design course is a course that has a design project as part of the course requirements. The following courses meet the conditions of an integrated design course. Some environmental engineering courses have an integrated design project required as part of the course work. The integrated design project provides an engineering design experience based upon knowledge and skills acquired earlier. The design experience incorporates engineering standards and realistic engineering constraints and generally includes economic, social, and political concerns.

CEE 449 Environmental Engineering Lab
CEE 453 Urban Hydrology and Hydraulics
CEE 493 Sustainable Design Eng Tech

Environmental Engineering Laboratory Course

CEE 449 Environmental Engineering Lab
CEE 458 Water Resources Field Methods

Design Content of Environmental Engineering Courses

The design content of a course is a number representing the number of credit hours of the course that are directly associated with engineering design. The term "design" in the context of environmental engineering we mean the process of using fundamental engineering principles in the creation of some facility or process to solve engineering problems or to meet societal demand, such as designing a water treatment plant. The key idea is creation or synthesis. Almost every course in the civil and environmental engineering course catalog is a combination of fundamental ideas and their implementation through engineering design. Therefore, each course has some design content associated with it (there are a few exceptions).

CEE 190 Project-Based Introduction 0.00
CEE 201 Systems Engineering & Economics 1.50
CEE 202 Engineering Risk & Uncertainty 1.50
CEE 330 Environmental Engineering 0.50
CEE 340 Energy and Global Environment 1.00
CEE 350 Water Resources Engineering 1.30
CEE 434 Environmental Systems, I 2.00
CEE 435 Public Health Engineering 0.00
CEE 437 Water Quality Engineering 1.50
CEE 438 Science and Environmental Policy 0.25
CEE 440 Fate Cleanup Environ Pollutant 1.00
CEE 441 Air Pollution Sources, Transport and Control 2.00
CEE 442 Env Eng Principles, Physical 0.50
CEE 444 Env Eng Principles, Biological 0.00
CEE 449 Environmental Engineering Lab 2.00
CEE 450 Surface Hydrology 0.75
CEE 451 Environmental Fluid Mechanics 0.60
CEE 452 Hydraulic Analysis and Design 2.50
CEE 453 Urban Hydrology and Hydraulics 2.70
CEE 457 Groundwater 0.25
CEE 458 Water Resources Field Methods 1.00
CEE 491 Decision and Risk Analysis 1.50
CEE 492 Data Science for Civil and Environmental Engineering 0.00

Program Review and Approval

To qualify for the degree of Bachelor of Science in Environmental Engineering, each student's academic program plan must be reviewed by a standing committee of the faculty (the Program Review Committee) and approved by the Associate Head of Civil and Environmental Engineering in charge of undergraduate programs. This review and approval process ensures that individual programs satisfy the educational objectives and all of the requirements of the environmental engineering program, that those programs do not abuse the substantial degree of flexibility that is present in the curriculum, and that the career interests of each student are cultivated and served.

Each student must take at least one course having an integrated design project. The currently approved courses from which students may select are listed under Integrated Design Courses.
The cumulative engineering design content in the program must be at least 13 hours, where the hours of design content for each course are specified.
CEE 201 and CEE 202 account for 3 additional design hours once a student reaches a minimum of 13hrs.

Contact Us