BSc (Hons) Environmental Science

This course has been designed with industry to be employment-focused and will give you knowledge, training, and experience in all of the key sectors for meeting the environmental challenges of the future.

The degree is organised into a series of themes, each linking to an employment sector. These themes include climate change, renewable resources and energy, biodiversity and conservation, environmental pollution, sustainable development, and environmental management.

The degree themes directly target important sectors of employment in sustainability within government bodies and organisations, consultancies, industry, and non-government organisations. These include the principal areas of environmental-related employment in recycling and renewables, pollution and environmental monitoring, land remediation, carbon emissions reduction, future climate adaptations, conservation, and ecosystem solutions.

Each theme is introduced in the first year to provide a background to that area, topics are developed in more detail in the second year, and in the final year, they are applied to consider solutions and provide training for specific career pathways you may wish to pursue.

To learn more about our modules, watch this video.

Year 1

The Climate System

The module will introduce climate change. To understand it you will first consider the climate system and the Earth’s systems that affect atmospheric and climate processes, including atmospheric composition, circulation and weather systems. You will also study other areas that feed into the climate system, including the oceans, productivity in ecosystems and important geochemical cycles including the carbon cycle.

Resources and Materials

This will introduce you to our key natural resources, their use, extraction, sustainability, re-use/recycling, disposal and the concepts of a circular economy. It will include water resources, soil, construction materials, minerals and metals. It will consider the measurement of soil health and sustainable agriculture. It will also introduce material science, product design, reuse, recycling and separation technologies along with disposal and management.

Principles of Ecology

You will study population and community ecology, including population dynamics, strategies and habitat structure. The module will consider food webs, energy flow, biogeochemical cycles, trophic levels and pollution pressures, along with ecological successions, habitats, niches, microclimates and phenology. There will also be field and laboratory work, introducing practical identification skills.

Impacts on Environment

In this module you will study human activity impacts on natural systems (land, sea, air) and biota in the past, present and future. This will include landscape change, extinctions, large-scale resource extraction and exploitation. It will consider pollutants and contamination, including water pollution and microplastics, along with impacts on human health

The Sustainable Society

You will consider concepts of sustainable development and the challenges of integrating environmental, social and economic interests. This will include political ideologies and the way this has underpinned recent government thinking towards the economy, environment and society. Institutions, agencies, organisations and policies responsible for the delivery of sustainable development are considered from the global to the local scale.

Environmental Skills Development

This module will develop your skills and experience in environment science in the field. It will involve multidisciplinary environmental site assessment and environmental impact assessments, developed as project work. This will develop your research and communication skills, allowing you to consider data generation and research methodologies. You will also be introduced to Geographical Information Systems to generate and visualise spatial data, and to consider locational data including using Global Positioning Systems. 

Year 2

Climate Change

You will use a range of records of climate change to consider their natural and human-induced causes and understand the mechanisms for those changes. This will include larger and smaller-scale climate system shifts for a range of longer-term, abrupt and recent climate changes. You will also consider the consequences of those climate changes, including environmental and human impacts on different time scales, to consider recent impacts of climate changes against longer-term patterns.

Energy Systems

You will consider non-renewable and renewable energy systems. This will include conventional and unconventional hydrocarbon systems; nuclear energy systems and nuclear waste disposal; and geothermal energy including deep geothermal plants, ground source heating and cooling. It will also consider renewable energy technologies, resource assessment and utilisation, along with environmental impacts, including solar, wind, wave, tidal, biomass and hydrogen. You will also consider power storage and transmission, energy supply and demand and the reduction in energy demand through sustainable engineering and design.

Ecological Consultancy

This will prepare you for a graduate career in ecology by introducing you to a range of contemporary industry skills and techniques for ecological surveys, assessments, and recommendations. Working alongside practitioners in the sector, you will learn how to survey and assess species, habitat and landscape condition and management. You will also consider biodiversity action plans, environmental policy and conservation assessment.

Environmental Contaminants

This module will allow you to consider the detection, analysis, management and mitigation of environmental contaminants. You will be trained in contaminated land environmental impact assessment, including stages of site assessment, identification and characterisation of pollutant sources, sampling strategies and analytical methods. You will also consider various remediation strategies to manage contaminated environments.

Global Production and Consumption

You will examine the centrality of consumption to everyday life and how it connects people and places across the world economically, socially, culturally, politically and environmentally. The relationship between spaces of production and consumption through interconnected networks from the local to global scale are explored and their environmental impact and future sustainability considered. These relations are assessed in relation to themes such as population changes, globalisation, economic trade and development, ethical consumption, alternative networks and waste.

Participatory Project Work

You will be involved in collaborative environmental and development projects with community groups, industrial or organisation partners. This will involve you in the design and implementation of projects and provide you with critical insight into breaking down the barriers (real and imagined) between industry, agencies, institutions, local government and the communities in which they are located and which they serve. It will develop your project management, teamwork, and leadership skills.

Optional year of study abroad, in industry or on a voluntary placement

Year 3

Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation

In this module you will model future climate change scenarios and consider their impacts, risks management strategies and ways to develop resilience, including the needs, options, planning and implementation of adaptation strategies. You will also consider climate change mitigation, including current and future emissions reduction with carbon footprint reduction in a range of sectors including energy, transport, built environment, agriculture and industry. You will also consider carbon sequestration methods and holistic environmental management.

Resources for the Future

You will consider the material needs for a sustainable low-carbon future and future sustainability, including raw materials for the low carbon transition. This will include battery materials, supply and demand; mineral exploration and production, recycling and reprocessing. You will also consider material characterisation and analysis, recycling streams and the production of renewable materials.

Global Ecological Challenges

You will consider approaches to managing landscapes and species in response to global change, including future-proofing. This will include the importance of ecological networks and connectivity, habitat translocation, and the co-benefits of functioning ecological systems. You will be using biological indicators for the ecological monitoring of species and biological communities and identifying research needs in response to projected ecological changes.

Environmental Forensics

This module will use integrated case study and project work to provide you with training in gathering and managing data, including for environmental legal investigations. It will include aspects of environmental law and the role of environmental tools (botany, ecology, entomology, soil science, geology), crime scene sampling, analytical methods, the use of aerial imagery and drones, and methods for evidence reporting.

Politics of the Environment

You will examine the political concerns and contestations that surround the relationship between nature, environment and society. This will be demonstrated through a range of landscapes and the ways in which we conceptualise, represent and manage environments. The module will explore the role and influence of the environmental movements, protests and campaign organisations, NGOs, governments and citizens in developing and planning sustainable environments for the future.

Independent Project

Your research project will be designed with full support from staff and will come from independent field-based research or from a relevant industry, work or voluntary placement. It will allow you to develop a critical, in-depth analysis for an area of the course that most interests you, and further develop your project management skills.

The course is taught via a mixture of lectures, workshops, seminars, tutorials, practical laboratory work, fieldwork, and interdisciplinary team-based learning, in conjunction with industry and alongside communities, which provides the ideal opportunity for building your experience and skills. The degree also incorporates training in industry-standard software in GIS, remote sensing, and quantitative and qualitative data capture and analysis to further develop your technical skills.

The number of hours of formal teaching will vary depending on your module choice and year of study and can be timetabled throughout the week. Fieldwork is also timetabled, including both day, half-day and residential. Normally, depending on the type of study, each module will consist of 48 hours of contact and 152 hours of independent study.

Careers workshops, employer conferences and work-based learning are all built into the course. Engaging you in a range of projects will encourage you to develop your portfolio of transferable skills, build confidence and become a highly employable graduate.

You will be taught skills in communication, project management, research, analysis and reporting through external project work which will help to build your CV and employability. Environmental skills will be at the heart of a future green economy, but your ability to communicate and translate those ideas will also be critically important

We want you to succeed. We will provide you with a range of support mechanisms for both academic and pastoral care. This will come through our Personal Academic Coaching individual tutorial system, but also from your module tutors and course leader. We have an “open door” policy for all students who need immediate assistance, advice or support

You will be assessed using a range of approaches depending on your module choice and year of study which could include for example: writing essays, reports, field notebooks, posters, oral presentations, laboratory reports, industry-style reports, examinations and undertaking practical fieldwork. In the final year, you will complete an in-depth project on a subject of your interest. Some modules are part exam and part coursework. Many modules are entirely assessed through coursework.