drainage engineer
Drainage engineers design and construct drainage systems for sewers and storm water systems. They evaluate the options to design drainage systems that meet the requirements while ensuring compliance with legislation and environmental standards and policies. Drainage engineers choose the most optimal drainage system to prevent floods, control irrigation and direct sewage away from water sources.
drainage engineer drainage engineers design and construct drainage systems for sewers and storm water systems. They evaluate the options to design drainage systems that meet the requirements while ensuring compliance with legislation and environmental standards and policies. The role shows moderate AI exposure (0.50 on a 0-1 scale) — some tasks are being automated but the role adapts. The most in-demand skills for the role include engineering principles, hydraulic fluid, technical drawings, hydraulics, engineering processes.
Pay in the UK
UK: median £51,366 a year for Civil engineers (ONS ASHE 2025, full-time)
Middle half of full-time jobs: £39,802 to £65,000 a year
UK jobs are grouped differently; this is the closest UK occupation group (ONS SOC 2020 2121). ONS rates this estimate reasonably precise. 2025 provisional figures; ONS revises them a year later. Source: ONS Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings (Open Government Licence)
Pay in India (occupation group)
Average monthly earnings of salaried employees in the occupation group “Professionals” in India, from the Government of India's Periodic Labour Force Survey (January–December 2025). It covers everyone in this group, not only drainage engineer, and it is not US pay converted to rupees.
Source: MoSPI (Government of India), Periodic Labour Force Survey Annual Report 2025, Table 51 — average wage/salary earnings of regular wage/salaried employees, NCO-2015 division 2. Official India data gives one average per occupation group: there are no official India figures for single careers, experience levels or cities. Read the report
Top skills
Frequently asked questions
What does drainage engineer do?
Drainage engineers design and construct drainage systems for sewers and storm water systems. They evaluate the options to design drainage systems that meet the requirements while ensuring compliance with legislation and environmental standards and policies. Drainage engineers choose the most optimal drainage system to prevent floods, control irrigation and direct sewage away from water sources.
What skills does drainage engineer need?
The most in-demand skills for this role include engineering principles, hydraulic fluid, technical drawings, hydraulics, engineering processes, flood remediation equipment. These are the skills O*NET identifies as most important for competent performance.
Will AI replace drainage engineer?
Our AI-durability model gives drainage engineer a score of 0.50 on a 0-1 scale (higher = more exposure). That places it at moderate AI exposure — some tasks are being automated but the role adapts. Learning to work with AI tools rather than against them is the path forward.