Civil engineering is one of the oldest and most important branches of engineering. It is the primary field of work that allowed mankind to develop scientific and technical concepts in order to build structures such as roads, buildings, bridges and more. If civil engineering intrigues you, the following article will definitely capture your attention. It will expose you to the complex and essential work that civil engineers execute every day in order to ensure our safety while using the different structural component present in our lives. It will also anwser other questions that might interest someone planing to study civil engineering in the futur.
To be a civil engineer implies having to work in all aspects of the planing, the designing and the constructing or repairing of a construction project. Those fields of work allow to ensure the correct assembly structures and engineering systems. Being a civil engineer also implies having to work with many other professionals such as architects, technicians, entrepreneurs, clients, superintendents, foremen, health and safety supervisors and more. Therefore, being a civil engineer can be challenging in some cases.
Civil engineers design, plan and direct construction projects involving buildings, roads, dams, water services, land structures and more. They execute tasks such as talking with clients and members of a project to address complex technical issues, evaluating and making recommendations on various building materials, surveying construction work and more.
The typical day of a civil engineer can vary depending on the requirements of a project. In some cases, a civil engineer could spend an entire day site in order to survey the advancement of the construction of structure. While he's on the site he might also have to participate in a site meeting where all or many stakeholders of the project are present. In another case, he could spend his entire day in office preparing cost estimates, analyzing survey reports or planing and designing structures with the use of software. There are even times when engineers execute a part of their day outdoors on sites and another part in office.
Depending on the day and the necessities of a project, civil engineers work on construction sites or in office.
In order to become a civil engineer in Quebec, you first most acquire a bachelor's degree in civil engineering or a related field. You then have to become a junior member of the Ordre des ingénieurs du Québec (OIQ). As a junior member, you'll have to work three years under the supervision of a civil engineer of the OIQ. Finally, after passing the ethics and professional law exams of the OIQ you'll officially be able to hold the title of engineer in Quebec.
The salary of civil engineers varies depending on experience and the specific domain in which they work in. In Quebec, their hourly wage is evaluated between $30,77 and $68,68. Annually, they have an average salary of $100 000,00. Civil engineers starting in the industry generally make between $70 000 and $85 000 per year while the more experienced ones can earn up to $120 000 per year.
Civil engineers need many kinds of additional training. In most cases, they receive training in geotechnical studies, mechanical and hydraulic physics, environmental safety, project management and more. Some of them even receive training in order to obtain a license that allows the manipulation nuclear equipment.
The main danger of being a civil engineer is having to work on construction sites. Indeed, on those sites, heavy machinery such as bulldozers, cranes, mechanical excavators, loaders and backhoes constantly circulating and because those vehicles possess a variety of blind spots, any pedestrian on a site is at risk of getting severely injured by one of them. Furthermore, construction sites often include enclosed spaces where workers are at danger no matter the special equipment used. That is why excavation trenches are very dangerous and always require the presence of a supervisor.
The chances that civil engineers will be replaced by robots in the near future are very low. Indeed, civil engineering is a field of work that would be very difficult to automate because of the adaptability that it requires depending on which region of the world we are located in and the type, the architecture and the environmental impact of the infrastructure, structure or building that is intended to be constructed. Furthermore, it a discipline that requires the compliance with a large amount of complex technical standards that vary from one territory to another. Therefore, automating civil engineering would require storing the entirety of those standards in robots while ensuring that they can produce all the correct calculations and decisions in order to produce solutions that will be the most economical, safe, durable and with list impact on environment. Such machines would probably cost an unimaginable amount of money and be a risk for society in the case of a technical issue.
According to the web, there is not a fixed retirement age for civil engineers. However, a lot of engineers retire between the ages of 50 and 70 years old. A lot of them end their careers by becoming teachers in colleges.
To conclude, civil engineering is a primordial field of work to society. Personally, I just graduated from the Civil Engineering program at Collège Ahuntsic and I plan to pursue my studies in the same domain at the École de technologie supérieure (ÉTS) this upcoming fall. My goals for the near future are to graduate from university and then to work as a full time engineer while completing my master's degree.
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Rationale: to inform or educate
Authority: government
Date: still relevant
Accuracy: probably true
Relevance: relevant for this document
Sources: no sources cited
Rationale: to inform or educate
Authority: government
Date: still relevant
Accuracy: probably true
Relevance: relevant for this document
Sources: no sources cited