Academic programs > Environment and earth sciences
Courses in this field are available at Douai, Alès, Nantes, St Etienne, Nancy or Albi offering multidisciplinary engineering courses covering the scientific, technical and socio-economic aspects of environmental issues.
Each school offers majors with a different focus ranging from in-depth generalist competencies in the environmental field to majors with a specific orientation in the environment.
Major: Eco-Industries
Goal: Within the frame of international policy on Sustainable Development to teach the competencies, to required to be able to identify the environmental constraints specific to a given project. The course aims to provide an understanding of the links between regulations, technical issues and social and economic aspects.
Content: The first year includes technical and methodological courses. The second year is structured to reflect applied aspects as closely as possible, through five projects relating to water treatment, industrial risk and local authorities.
Career opportunities: in industry, local authorities, consultancies and government agencies.
Major: Environment, Clean Industries, Recycling
Goal: to raise students' awareness of environmental issues and train them in environmental management and clean technology. The student should see effluent or waste as a product to be managed resulting from an industrial activity.
The aim is not to train engineers specializing in the environment, but rather engineers acting as "citizens", taking the environment into account within industrial activity.
Content: y two main sections - "Risks, environmental audits" and "Environmental engineering"
The program introduces the main systems for treating effluent/waste and the tools for assisting with the selection of the best system.
Major: Environment, Processes and Sustainable Development
Goal: to raise awareness in engineering students of environmental pollution and the issues around the control and treatment of effluents (air, water) and waste.
Content: Course content reflects the concerns of industrial companies and institutions: the availability of design/dimensioning tools for installations and tools for measuring the performances of treatment systems, and how to achieve a better understanding of their limits on their use.
Career opportunities: as engineers within the Environment/Safety or R&D Departments of private companies or in consultancies, government departments and public bodies.
Major: Environment management and Enginering
Goal: to form multidisciplinary engineers able to identify, describe, understand and resolve the environmental problems of industry and local authorities, taking into account both technological and regulatory aspects.
Content: The program follows five themes: applied environmental sciences; process engineering; treatment processes; risks, health and safety for improved protection of people and the environment; environmental management (rules and management systems). This course is not targeted at a particular field but provides a solid general groundingand an optimum range of capacities in the different environments - air, water, waste and soil.
Career opportunities: in industry, consultancies, government departments and local authorities.
Master Professionnel (M.Eng) Law Sciences -Environment and Patrimony orientation - Legal Expertise and Environmental Techniques in partnership with the "Université d'Artois".
Goal: to train managers, engineers and legal experts able to master all technical and regulatory matters relating to environmental issues in industry.
Based on the competencies of both institutions, this program includes a case study which is designed for both student populations.
Career opportunities: in consulting and audit firms, insurance, local authorities, etc.
Major: Environmental Engineering
Goal: to form multidisciplinary engineering with a specialization in the Environment
Content: two major themes:
- purification processes and clean processes: design, dimensioning, modeling, simulation and control
- environmental and business management, sustainable development, risk management, company management and organization, environmental communication.
The special feature of this course lies in the focus on process modeling and the human and social science aspects.
Career opportunities: in the design, dimensioning and development of purification processes, the development of sustainable development policies or certification procedures and environmental communication within.eco-industries, company environmental or R&D departments and public bodies.
Major: Environmental Engineering and Sustainable Development
Goal: to prepare students for careers in the environment in a context of sustainable development whilst retaining a multidisciplinary approach. The aim is to provide future management executives with the multidisciplinary competencies which give them improved "reactivity" in the face of the growing complexity of environmental issues.
Career opportunities:
a) Planning engineer, conducting environmental projects with local stakeholders using different tools (georeferenced databases, mathematical dispersion models, negotiation/decision-making tools, etc.),
b) consultant/service engineer with local authorities and companies, capable of carrying out diagnostic environmental projects, environmental management projects and decontamination projects, with job opportunities in major groups or small consultancies,
c) industrial environmental engineer capable of resolving internal environmental problems within a company.
Major: Risk Management
Goal: to provide the theoretical bases relating to different types of environmental disaster such as the floods in the Gard in 2002, the refinery explosion at La Mède in 1992, the Marseilles fire in 1997, the Mont Blanc tunnel disaster in 1999 and the explosion at the AZF factory in Toulouse in 2001 and teach methods of crisis prevention, prediction and management. Skills thus acquired are put into practice through case studies and projects.
Career opportunities: safety managers in industry, management careers in insurance, risk prevention, civil defense, etc.
Major: Nuclear Engineering: Technology, Safety and Environment
Goal: to form engineers for the major industrial groups and the various bodies and official authorities in the nuclear industry. The course is designed to cultivate the acquisition of a "safety culture" and relevant competencies.
Career opportunities: process or safety engineer in a nuclear power station, Head of Section at a nuclear plant responsible for waste management and dismantling, Environmental Manager at a nuclear waste storage center, Research Engineer for developing tools for measuring radioactivity, etc.
As part of its "Graduate Program in Science and Executive Engineering", the Ecole de Paris also covers different disciplines and different subjects in the environmental field, as well as in the field of Earth Sciences: geology, soil science, hydrogeology, industrial impact on the environment, waste storage, geological risks, etc.
Three GEM schools, at Albi, Nantes and Alès, offer five vocational Master's programs specializing in the Environmental field, each one lasting 18 months.
Master of Science in Clean Energy from Waste and Biomas
Goal: program with an "applied research" dimension, designed to train specialists in the thermal conversion of Biomass and Waste with a double emphasis: energy efficiency and environmental impacts.
Language: English
Master of Science in Project Management for Environmental and Energy Engineering
Goal: to train managers capable of taking charge of environmental and/or energy conversion projects.
Language: English
Master of Science in Industrial Safety and Environment concerning companies and their immediate environment Master of Science in Safety and Environment of Mines, Quarries and PrimaryProcessing Heavy Industrie in response to international demand, particularly from Latin America and the Eastern countries. Master of Science in Management and Legislation of Environment and Waste, Air and Water, designed for technical, managerial and administrative training projects defined in partnership with overseas bodies.
In the field of the Environment and Earth Sciences, two schools offer specialist Master's programs, lasting one year, aimed at students already holding a Master's level qualification, or a bachelor's degree AND professional experience, and who wish to obtain a specialist qualification at a high level.
Master's programs :
- Geology for the Engineer and the Environment
- Environmental Engineering and Management
- Course in Environmental Management
- Specialized Geostatistics
- Mining Projects
- Opencast Mining and Quarrying
- Public Administration of Mines
Career opportunities: Posts of responsibility in industry, engineering consultancies and international and public bodies.
The Ecole de Paris is also part of the Center for Advanced Studies of Mineral Resources, which offers several specialist courses in mineral resources production.
Students interested in research in the field of the Environment and Earth Sciences can access research-oriented Master's degrees or DEA (diplôme d'études approfondies), lasting one year, which can be grouped into two major categories:
At St Etienne, Nantes, Albi, Alès and Douai, these programs mainly focus on environmental engineering and sustainable development. EM Saint-Etienne: Industrial and Urban Environment EM Albi and EM Nantes : Process Engineering and Environment EM Douai: Structure and Dynamics of Reactive Systems and Materials and Energy Processing Systems.
At EM Paris and EM Nancy, the research Master's and DEA mainly focus on Earth Sciences.. EM Paris : Geomaterials, Quantitative Methods and Modeling of Sedimentary Basins, Hydrology, Hydrogeology Geostatistics and Water Geochemistry EM Nancy: Sustainable Soil Management for Environmental Protection
Doctoral programs in two main areas:
Environmental engineering and sustainable development
- Environmental Information Systems
- Information Systems and Sustainable Development
- Control and supervision of Eco-industrial Processes
- Natural and Technological Risks
- Environment and Process Engineering (including "fluid dynamics and processes", "processes with mass transfer and reaction", and other related issues).
- Energy and environmental performance of gas engines" (details can be found in the energy section
- Industrial Environment and Natural & Industrial Risks
- Environment and Energy
- Atmospheric Environment".
Earth Sciences
- Geology for Engineers
- Quantitative Hydrology and Hydrogeology
- Subsoil Exploitation and Economics
- Sedimentary Basin Dynamics and Resources,
