Advancements in Civil Engineering
When I say civil engineering in the title, I really mean to say the environmental side of civil engineering, but either way they both go hand in hand since both affect each other. Also with some of these projects and works that have been improved on environmentally over the years, you will be thankful civil/environmental engineers around.
Sewers have been around since the ancient Greeks in 2000-4000 B.C.E. and they had a very similar system of what we have today, but they environmentally wise almost destroyed the Tiber river from having underground drainage systems feed into it. But throughout the years leading up to recent sewer systems of today, there have been problems with drainage outlets being close to drinking water. Sewers of today are far more complex than the sewers back then though, they go through treatment plants for filtration of the water and disinfecting with chemicals before the water is returned to nature.
Another advancement that has been somewhat recently created and is kind of related to sewers is the process of Biofiltration. Biofiltration can be summed up as the filtration of microorganisms, odors, and contaminants in water through a porous, moist material. This process is beyond important with environment because of the fact that there are bacteria strains in water that could give disease people through drinking it or through airborne odors as well, but it could also quite possibly harm an ecosystem. The big difference between this process and regular filtration is the fact that Biofiltration destroys the toxic emissions and only targets biodegradable contaminants like fuel generated hydrocarbons.
A big advancement that relates entirely to structural engineers is that so many building are "turning green" or being more power and energy efficient, and since buildings have a significant impact on us and the environment it makes total sense why there are so many organizations purely created to improve the effectiveness of buildings. These organizations goals all have one thing in common and that's pretty much just to bring environmentally friendly construction and operational practices into the mainstream because buildings account for 20% of greenhouse gas emissions, but otherwise they all have some smaller details that make them differ from each other.So there are plenty more advancements of civil and environmental engineering that are out there, but these seemed to be some of the biggest improvements on what civil engineers have done over the years. These are also the projects that contribute the most to environmental safety and frankly affect us a lot more than any other project I could possibly think of.
