Building Engineering
Building engineering is an emerging engineering discipline, better known in the US as architectural engineering, that offers a general engineering approach to the planning, design, construction, operation, renovation, and maintenance of buildings, as well as with their impacts on the surrounding environment. The discipline requires pertinent knowledge integrated from traditional well-established disciplines:
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Civil engineering for building structures and foundation;
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Mechanical engineering for Heating, Ventilation and Air-Conditioning system (HVAC), and for mechanical service systems;
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Physics for building science, lighting and acoustics.
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Electrical engineering for power distribution, control, and electrical systems;
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Chemistry and biology for indoor air quality;
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Architecture for form, function, building codes and specifications;
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Economics for project management.
Building engineering students are ideally trained in all phases of the life cycle of a building, and learn to appreciate buildings as an advanced technological system requiring close integration of many sub-systems and their individual components. Technical problems and appropriate solutions are studied to improve the performance of the building in areas such as:
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Energy efficiency, passive solar engineering, lighting and acoustics;
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Construction management;
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HVAC and control systems; Indoor air quality;
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Advanced building materials; building envelope;
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Earthquake resistance, wind effects on buildings, computer-aided design.
The building engineering graduate may work as a consulting engineer, design engineer, project manager, construction manager, cost engineer, facility manager, conservation-utility director, HVAC engineer and operation manager, process engineer, or in research and development, among other career possibilities.