Water management increasingly important

Clean water and flood prevention are top priorities for communities today. Photo / Alan Gibson

If you're good at maths and would like a job that gets you out of the office, a career as a river engineer might be for you.

River engineers are in high demand as the need for water management becomes increasingly important in New Zealand and around the world.

"Rivers are alive. We can go in there and manage them so it works for everybody," says Dr Stephen Coleman, associate professor at the University of Auckland's Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering.

Clean water and flood prevention are top priorities for communities today. Regional councils rely on river engineers as consultants for key policy-making decisions. The engineers are consulted on everything to do with the management of rivers, including the environmental impact, the ecological effects and clean water demands.

From 30 to 50 graduates will be needed each year to fill roles in this growing sector. Coleman has 30 students registered this year and says more are needed for what he sees as a good, long-term career.

"It takes skills that they have in maths and science and applies them to the world around them. It's a nice mapping of skill sets on to things they can do that make a difference," Coleman says.

But engineering graduates are not just focused on managing how humans impact on and use rivers.

"What we teach the students in the river engineering course is how water flows and how river dynamics change, so that they can apply it to manage flora and fauna for habitat. What's becoming more important is managing habitat for wildlife rather than ourselves."

Engineers use weirs, dams, intakes and stop banks to influence the flow of rivers and make sure they can sustain fish and plant life. They are often consulted on how land near rivers is used. River management is becoming so critical to the way we live that the Institution of Professional Engineers New Zealand, IPENZ, recently launched its Rivers Group to share technical knowledge among interested parties. Everyone from anglers to kayakers showed up at the first meeting in August.

Coleman is working to help his students understand the processes involved in rivers so they can consult on planning future communities around them.

"You don't build a house just downstream of a bend because the bend will be moving and it will take out the house."

One example of river engineering at work is with the flood-prone Hutt River. Its flood plains are designed as golf courses, parks or rugby grounds so they can take the flooding and return to their intended uses within five days.

As the population increases, people will continue to gravitate toward rivers, Coleman says.