Research areas
Advancing solutions that change lives
The Department of Civil Engineering at the University of Calgary is dedicated to pioneering research that addresses global challenges. Our commitment to sustainability, innovation, and interdisciplinary collaboration drives advancements in infrastructure, environmental solutions, and technological development.
The department's research focuses on sustainable and new ways to manage and clean our water and wastewater, design efficient and safe transportation systems, structure nanomaterials, and advance data analytics and artificial intelligence while ensuring sustainability and community resilience. Civil engineering is a broad and growing discipline that branches into many critical areas of water security, construction, geotechnical, transportation, structural design, and smart technology.
At the University of Calgary, our faculty explores ways to create resilient infrastructure and sustainable engineering practices that are adaptive to the climates of today and tomorrow to ensure societal readiness for the challenges and opportunities ahead. Our focal areas include engineering for the environment, risk and reliability analysis in all sectors, construction and sustainable infrastructure, climate adaptation, stochastic systems analysis, waste and wastewater treatment, water resource engineering, and sustainable transportation. Our efforts also include advances in autonomous vehicle application, including, multi-sensor data fusion, and traffic applications.
Environmental & Water Resources Engineering
Water quality and quantity including advancements in treatment technologies, soil remediation, hydrology, hydraulics, water systems and climate adaptation.
Geotechnical Engineering
Close up of auger, industrial drilling rig making holes
Structural, Materials & Construction Engineering
Structural integrity, material performance, and sustainable infrastructure.
Transportation Engineering
Transportation systems, autonomous vehicles, and traffic management.
Energy & Sustainability
Renewable energy, energy-efficient materials, and GHG mitigation.
Intelligent Systems & Digital Engineering
AI applications, automation, and smart infrastructure.
Research focuses on micromechanics of unsaturated granular soils and resilience of geostructures against climate change, laboratory testing of shales at high temperature and pressure, and hydraulic fracture computation in brittle heterogeneous rocks. We also emphasize machine learning and data-driven computing in geomechanics, innovative laboratory testing techniques, and understanding gas hydrate reservoir response during hydrate production. Additional research includes reliability of linear infrastructure on permafrost and thaw consolidation of degrading permafrost through climate change.
We apply data-driven and analytical methods to advance the planning and operation of traffic, transit, and emerging mobility services. Mobility sensing and survey data are used for behavior and operations analysis. Our transportation group conducts innovative work in multimodal transportation modeling to identify novel solutions with a special focus on four trends: sharing, automation, connectivity, and electrification. We also have one of the few research groups in Canada with expertise in air transportation planning and operations.
Our group focuses on sustainable water systems, greening stormwater infrastructure, flood forecasting advances, remote sensing applications, data assimilation, and probabilistic approaches to water challenges under climate change. Researchers study water movement in natural and engineered systems and develop cutting-edge simulations. Additional efforts include participatory technology development for water & wastewater treatment, emerging contaminants, environmental remediation, and sustainable infrastructure for Indigenous communities.
Research in structural design includes structural health monitoring, innovative structural techniques, and advanced materials. Focus areas include serviceability and sustainability of concrete structures, numerical stress analysis, life cycle and techno-economic assessment of carbon capture, and decarbonization of the built environment. Our team also pioneers new asphalt materials with advanced additives for enhanced durability.
Civil Engineering research contributes to several Faculty of Engineering strategic research themes, including sustainable and resilient infrastructure, water security, environmental monitoring and disaster mitigation, smart mobility, energy systems, and sustainability. Explore the Faculty's broader research themes and associated researchers to learn more about interdisciplinary opportunities and impacts.