Senior​/Principal Consultant - Surface Water Quality

What if you could shape a career as unique as you?

At WSP, you can always find opportunities to grow and do what matters to you. Make the most of our global reach to discover new challenges and chances to work with diverse, talented individuals who will help you expand your horizons.

We need people to join our rapidly expanding team of Water Quality and Catchment Management specialists so that we can continue to deliver sustainable solutions to the water sector and environmental regulators in the UK and help protect the water environment.

With a background in earth sciences and working knowledge of water quality and geochemistry / environmental chemistry you should be aware of the UK situation with regard to:

• How river, lake and Tra Cs water quality is protected through the WFD and other regulatory tools;
• Be aware / have working knowledge of water quality modelling tools (SAGIS SIMCAT, Info Works, ICM etc.).
• Experience of WFD/EIA scoping, reviews and assessments for water/hydrology chapters.
• Experience of water environment data collation (field and/or desk based), quality checking and assurance and interpretation.
• Experience of water quality permitting and completion or review of H1 and RQP assessments.
• Demonstrate understanding of how to conceptualise a water quality problem and knowledge of the available datasets which can be used in problem solving.

Prior work experience, either postdoctoral or in consultancy or working in the water sector (regulator or industry) would be desirable.

You should have an interest in problem solving through interrogation of time series and spatial datasets, good conceptualisation skills and understand the important of source pathway receptor models and be able to clearly communicate ideas either through your writing or visualisations. An awareness of how groundwater and surface water interact would also be useful.

Field experience including sampling network design, risk assessment before field work, and data collation and interpretation (for river and / or groundwater sampling and monitoring) would also be beneficial and some knowledge of catchment management / agri-environment schemes.

• Water quality data analysis, conceptualisation and visualisation and clear communication;
• Carrying out desk-based investigations / interpretation of datasets.
• Helping to design field monitoring campaigns including traditional and non-traditional approaches;
• Delivery of technical reports and presentations to clients; and
• Winning new work and writing proposals for new projects.
• Project and task management.
• Being a key member of our water quality team in Sustainable Water Management;

You will be mainly UK based but will work collaboratively with teams across WSP’s global business. So, being able to work effectively as part of a diverse team, as well as individually for discrete tasks, is very important to us.

Our Sustainable Water Management team works across a spectrum of services covering water quality and catchment management water resources and security, hydrology and hydraulics, geomorphology, hydro ecology and hydrogeology. We provide high-quality technical services and advice to high-profile customers in the UK and overseas, including government departments and agencies, the water industry, and industrial sectors, including power, transport, nuclear, mining, commercial, and oil and gas.

• Access to extensive internal and external training opportunities;
• Supporting for volunteering;
• A mentoring programme; and
• Support for gaining chartership through professional institutions.

This position is UK flexible, although our main offices for SWM teams are Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Cardiff, Manchester, Shrewsbury, London, Bristol or Glasgow offices and you will be able to benefit from hybrid office-home working.