Overview of the FE Environmental Exam
The FE Environmental exam is designed for graduates of environmental engineering programs and covers topics spanning water treatment, air quality, waste management, and environmental regulations. This discipline-specific exam is one of seven FE exams offered by NCEES and serves as the first step toward professional engineering licensure in the environmental field.
Who Should Take the FE Environmental Exam?
This exam is ideal for engineering graduates who focused on environmental engineering coursework. If your degree program covered water and wastewater treatment, environmental chemistry, air pollution control, and environmental regulations extensively, the FE Environmental exam will test material you have already studied.
However, if you have a civil engineering degree with some environmental electives, you should compare the FE Civil and FE Environmental exam specifications carefully. The FE Civil exam includes environmental engineering as one content area (7-11%), while the FE Environmental exam covers it in much greater depth.
Content Areas
The FE Environmental exam covers these major topics:
- Mathematics and Statistics (7-11%) - Calculus, statistics, numerical methods
- Ethics and Professional Practice (3-5%) - Professional ethics and responsibilities
- Engineering Economics (3-5%) - Economic analysis methods
- Biology (5-8%) - Microbiology, ecology, toxicology
- Chemistry (7-11%) - Environmental chemistry, equilibrium, kinetics
- Fluid Mechanics (5-8%) - Hydraulics, pipe flow, open channel flow
- Thermodynamics (3-5%) - Energy balances, heat transfer
- Water and Wastewater Engineering (12-18%) - Treatment processes, design
- Air Quality Engineering (5-8%) - Emissions, dispersion, control technologies
- Solid and Hazardous Waste Engineering (5-8%) - Landfill design, remediation
- Environmental Science (7-11%) - Ecosystems, hydrology, geology
- Groundwater and Soils (5-8%) - Subsurface flow, contaminant transport
- Health and Safety (3-5%) - Occupational exposure, risk assessment
Study Approach
Water and wastewater engineering is the single largest content area, potentially accounting for up to 18% of the exam. Master this section thoroughly, covering biological treatment processes (activated sludge, trickling filters), chemical treatment (coagulation, disinfection), and physical processes (sedimentation, filtration). Be comfortable with design calculations for each treatment unit.
Chemistry and biology are more prominent on this exam than on other FE disciplines. Review environmental chemistry concepts including acid-base equilibria, oxidation-reduction reactions, chemical kinetics, and Henry's Law. For biology, focus on microbial growth kinetics, BOD/COD relationships, and ecological principles.
Tips for Success
Practice unit conversions extensively. Environmental engineering problems frequently require converting between mg/L, ppm, kg/day, and other units. Errors in unit conversion are one of the most common reasons for incorrect answers on the exam.
Study environmental regulations at a conceptual level. You do not need to memorize specific regulatory values, but you should understand the framework of the Clean Water Act, Clean Air Act, RCRA, CERCLA, and Safe Drinking Water Act. Know what each regulation covers and the general compliance requirements.
Take advantage of the NCEES FE Reference Handbook during your preparation. Many environmental engineering formulas are provided in the handbook, so your study time is better spent learning when and how to apply each formula rather than memorizing them.