3 hours. 2 hours lecture and 3 hours lab per week.
Natural Resources Engineering
Course Description
Engineering hydrology, soil erosion, introduction to open
channel design, runoff estimations and calculations, engineered
containment structures, landscape-scale water distribution, and
non-point water quality.
Additional Requirements for Graduate Students: Graduate students must complete all requirements of
undergraduate students plus additional readings assigned by
the instructor, additional exam questions based on these
readings, and development of an in-depth, watershed-scale plan
for managing nonpoint source pollution and restoring water
quality as a capstone project. The project will be presented in
a final report.
Athena Title
Natural Resources Engineering
Undergraduate Pre or Corequisite
ENGR 3160 or ENGR 3160E
Semester Course Offered
Offered every year.
Grading System
A - F (Traditional)
Student Learning Outcomes
Students will understand why natural resources engineering is important to society.
Students will understand concepts and principles of hydrology.
Students will understand foundations of water quality.
Students will understand the use of basic engineering containment structures for managing stormwater and preserving land system integrity.
Students will understand concepts of ecological indicators with respect to stream and watershed systems.
Students will understand the impacts and effects of land disturbance, soil erosion, and uncontrolled water flow on human and ecological systems.
Students will predict precipitation for specified frequency and duration of storms.
Students will estimate runoff volume and peak runoff rate for design.
Students will compute infiltration volumes.
Students will generate runoff hydrographs.
Students will estimate erosion losses and analyze erosion runoff.
Students will design vegetated waterways and channels with specified lining materials.
Students will apply engineering standards to hydrology and land system problems.
Students will assess watershed conditions using ecological and hydrologic metrics.
Students will characterize land use for application to engineering problem solving.
Students will apply modern engineering tools to conduct hydrologic analysis of pre- and post-development land disturbing activities and design a control structure to manage runoff.
Topical Outline
Hydrologic cycle: Precipitation
Hydrologic cycle: Infiltration
Hydrologic cycle: Evaporation
Hydrologic cycle: Runoff
Engineering hydrology: Watershed systems, assessment, and delineation
Engineering hydrology: Design storms and precipitation analysis
Engineering hydrology: Runoff analysis
Engineering hydrology: SCS method
Engineering hydrology: Rational method
Engineering hydrology: Peak discharge
Engineering hydrology: Runoff hydrographs
Soil Erosion
Water Quality: Nonpoint and point sources of water pollution
Open channel flow: Manning’s equation
Open channel flow: Vegetated waterways
Open channel flow: Flood routing
Landscape-scale containment structures: Detention and retention
