Since the 20th century, based on the basic theories of chemistry, physics, biology, geosciences and medicine, the problems of waste gas, waste water, solid waste and noise pollution have been solved by using the technical principles and means of sanitary engineering, water supply and drainage engineering, chemical engineering and mechanical engineering, and the single treatment technology has been greatly developed, which has become the basis of the birth of environmental engineering. In the late 1960s, the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) of the United States stipulated the environmental impact assessment system. Since then, the research on environmental system engineering and comprehensive prevention and control of environmental pollution has developed rapidly. A new discipline of environmental engineering has been formed. The discipline of environmental engineering in China developed rapidly in the middle and late 1970s, and its symbol was 1977. On the basis of the original water supply and drainage specialty, Tsinghua University established the first environmental engineering specialty in China. This also marks the beginning of the development of environmental engineering specialty in China.
China government attaches great importance to environmental education and has established the guiding ideology of "environmental protection, education-oriented". Environmental education is the basic project of lifelong education and the basic means to improve the environmental moral quality and environmental scientific and cultural quality of the whole nation. Environmental professional education is the most important link in environmental work in China.
The main targets of environmental education are students from secondary specialized schools, vocational high schools and colleges and universities. The main task is to train environmental protection science and technology talents and management talents in a planned way. China's environmental education has a history of more than 20 years, and the professional setting and structural system tend to be reasonable, which basically meets the demand of national economic construction for environmental protection talents.
Environmental engineering is still a developing specialty, so it has not attracted more attention. The demand of graduates majoring in environmental engineering is mostly in big cities and enterprises, as well as some companies specializing in research and development of environmental protection products.
Because many regional or local enterprises do not pay enough attention to environmental protection, the demand is much smaller. In addition, the personnel of county-level environmental protection departments are mostly pieced together from the original health and epidemic prevention departments or other departments, and often lack attention to environmental engineering. These reasons lead to insufficient demand for graduates majoring in environmental engineering in Chinese universities. However, with the deepening of environmental protection concept propaganda and the strengthening of people's environmental awareness, there is reason to believe that the demand for environmental engineering students will increase greatly in the next few years.