Also called: Water Treatment Engineer, Potable Water Engineer
Designs and upgrades the plants that make river, lake and well water safe to drink.
You design a new filter building for a city water plant, deciding how big the settling tanks must be and how much chlorine to add. You test river water after a storm to see how much extra treatment it needs.
Approximate: anchored on Bureau of Labor Statistics data for a broader job group.
Bachelor's degree (4-year), about 4 years after high school. Bachelor's in environmental or civil engineering; PE license.
Ways in: 4-year college. Training cost: $15k – $60k.
Majors to look at: Environmental Engineering, Civil Engineering.
Growing about average (about 4% over 10 years).
Low risk for 10 years. AI helps monitor plants and predict pipe breaks; treatment design, aging-pipe replacement and public health accountability stay human.
Classes: Chemistry, Biology, Environmental science, Algebra II.
Official data: O*NET occupation 17-2081.
Career Universe is an early version. Pay, training and AI-risk figures are estimates to start your own research, not verified facts. The research was written with AI research assistants, checked by validation scripts and spot-checked by hand. Check anything important with schools, employers and official sources. How the numbers work.