Discussion Thread

Hello ASCE community,

This is my first time using this forum, and I'm suspect there's a great community of civil engineers here who can provide a resource I can count on for a very long time to come.  I want to thank everyone for your support and I look forward to supporting the professional community as well.

I take my FE exam in two weeks and I have only a senior design class remaining before I graduate from the University of Mississippi in May, and I'm moving into the professional engineering job market for the first time.  I am searching for an EIT position in my field of interest and experience, and I have found that my university's resources and connections have little overlap with any fields of sustainable development.

I transitioned into the field civil engineering after working for a decade as a permaculture designer.  Permaculture is a whole systems design science focused the development of regenerative food and water systems, housing, and infrastructure, which is modeled on ecosystems and seeks to recognize natural patterns and utilize the abundant stores and flows of energy in nature.  Permaculture is based on relationships between people and place, and many of the strategies and techniques we apply in modern land management practices are borrowed from indigenous cultures around the world.

I have been a builder and gardener for about 15 years, and my company Mississippi Ecological Design (www.msecodesign.com) has frequently provided consulting and design services for storm water management systems, which introduced me to the field of civil engineering.  For the last 15 years, my long-term career goal has been to become a sustainable developer, and to build the communities where people live and work.  I think I have found an excellent path toward this career through professional civil engineering and now I need an EIT position that will both teach me the skills of the trade to earn my PE license, and provide the opportunity to work directly on developing sustainable infrastructure.

I assume America has land development engineering teams that focus on sustainable development, but I am not really sure where to find them.  I have begun receiving job availability notifications and applying for 'land development engineer' positions through LinkedIn and other job databases, but I haven't ever seen anything come up that mentions sustainable development or focuses on that being an interest or qualification.  I have been trying to search and find who are the larger sustainable land developers in the United States and I have been coming up short.  I thought perhaps the ASCE forum would have knowledgeable and interested people from all over the country who might help answer this question for me, and so here I am.

Are there sustainable land development teams in the United States?  Is there a recommended resource for finding these groups?  Are major land developers generally considering issues of sustainability and are there any firms that have a good reputation for this kind of work?  I don't really have a clear sense of the industry, and much of what I know is colored by the common stereotype of developers as money hungry forest destroyers with little regard for environmental concerns.  I suspect there is a lot more nuance than that, but I also have no interest in working for a company which could fit that profile.

If anyone can provide any recommendations, resources, or personal connections that would support my career development, I would greatly appreciate it.  Thank you all so much for your interest and your help!

-Benjamin Koltai

Check out Opticos Design and PAE. Opticos is more of an architecture and urban planning outfit, and PAE does a lot of mechanical design for Living Building Challenge buildings.

These two firms may not work in your specific field (or region), but someone at either may be able to point you in the right direction.