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What is a senior environmental engineer and how to become one
A senior environmental engineer leads an organization's engineering and environmental projects. Your work is to ensure that all engineering projects meet all environmental standards set by the government and environmental protection organizations. You are in charge of developing project goals and expectations and communicating this to other engineers and the rest of the project team. You will also provide guidance and feedback where necessary. Additionally, a senior environmental engineer is responsible for overseeing interactions with local, state, and federal environmental agencies and processing licensing for environmental projects when needed.
The educational requirement for this position is typically a minimum of a bachelor's degree in Engineering, Environmental science, and other related fields. You also need some years of experience as an environmental engineer. Since you will be working with multiple teams, you must be able to communicate effectively and have great interpersonal skills. Up-to-date knowledge of environmental regulations is also a requirement needed for this role. The yearly income for this role is $96,481.
What general advice would you give to a senior environmental engineer?
Andrea Welker Ph.D.
Associate Dean for Academic Affairs, College of Engineering Professor, Civil and Environmental Engineering, Villanova University
Avg. Salary $84,515
Avg. Salary $59,228
Growth rate 4%
Growth rate 0.3%
American Indian and Alaska Native 0.44%
Asian 13.05%
Black or African American 3.64%
Hispanic or Latino 10.39%
Unknown 3.84%
White 68.64%
Genderfemale 25.08%
male 74.92%
Age - 42American Indian and Alaska Native 3.00%
Asian 7.00%
Black or African American 14.00%
Hispanic or Latino 19.00%
White 57.00%
Genderfemale 47.00%
male 53.00%
Age - 42Stress level is high
7.1 - high
Complexity level is challenging
7 - challenging
Work life balance is fair
6.4 - fair
Senior environmental engineer career paths
Key steps to become a senior environmental engineer
Explore senior environmental engineer education requirements
Start to develop specific senior environmental engineer skills
Skills Percentages Environmental Engineering 7.09% Environmental Compliance 7.07% OSHA 6.09% Environmental Regulations 4.66% Technical Reports 4.21% Complete relevant senior environmental engineer training and internships
Accountants spend an average of 1-3 months on post-employment, on-the-job training. New senior environmental engineers learn the skills and techniques required for their job and employer during this time. The chart below shows how long it takes to gain competency as a senior environmental engineer based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data and data from real senior environmental engineer resumes.Research senior environmental engineer duties and responsibilities
- Redevelop and manage SPCC and SWPPP plans for site.
- Manage company's response to groundwater Superfund issue and EPA investigation into the handling of ozone depleting substances.
- Manage and conduct various environmental engineering projects at DOD facilities.
- Work with project team to perform CERCLA and RCRA hazardous waste site investigation and remediation.
Get senior environmental engineer experience
Generally, it takes 6-12 months to become a senior environmental engineer. The most common roles before becoming a senior environmental engineer include environmental engineer, project engineer team lead and project manager.Prepare your senior environmental engineer resume
When your background is strong enough, you can start writing your senior environmental engineer resume.
You can use Zippia's AI resume builder to make the resume writing process easier while also making sure that you include key information that hiring managers expect to see on a senior environmental engineer resume. You'll find resume tips and examples of skills, responsibilities, and summaries, all provided by Zippi, your career sidekick.
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Build a professional senior environmental engineer resume in minutes. Browse through our resume examples to identify the best way to word your resume. Then choose from 10+ resume templates to create your senior environmental engineer resume.
Apply for senior environmental engineer jobs
Now it's time to start searching for a senior environmental engineer job. Consider the tips below for a successful job search:
- Browse job boards for relevant postings
- Consult your professional network
- Reach out to companies you're interested in working for directly
- Watch out for job scams
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Average senior environmental engineer salary
The average senior environmental engineer salary in the United States is $84,515 per year or $41 per hour. Senior environmental engineer salaries range between $65,000 and $109,000 per year.
What am I worth?
How do senior environmental engineers rate their job?
Senior environmental engineer reviews
Firstly, the most important is to protect our planet for us and the future generations. Secondly our planet is not going to support the pressure and negative impacts because of the big Increased human population . Finally our planet needs more and more environmental specialists to regulate and control all human activities, especially the ilegal ones.
I don’t like when big companies they know what’s wrong and what’s right, but still the destroy, like cutting trees in Brazil and the other side big companies even knowing those trees are ilegal, but still they continuing to porches. There for I can’t understand and I don’t like.
Both indoor and outdoor work environment. Great job satisfaction meeting regulatory requirements.
Can be stressful at times
environmental Impacts accuracy and quality of classification processes handled by their team. Impacts team, partner teams and Process Experts.
pay, responsibly,
Updated January 8, 2025
