Q&A: Karina Mills
Water Engineer, Karina Mills shares what she loves about being an engineer and working at Bligh Tanner.
What are some of the things you love about being an engineer and working at Bligh Tanner?
I enjoy working across all stages of a project and collaborating closely with our clients and everyone in the project team, particularly the Principal Engineers. Bligh Tanner fosters a supportive working environment, with direct access to the most senior team members – something I have found is different to larger engineering firms that often have a multi-tiered project team. This team structure is extremely beneficial to our clients who feel comfortable knowing their projects are being managed by highly experienced engineers.
We’ve also got a great culture of continuous learning so we can remain at the forefront of industry practice, and it’s great to be able to share that knowledge with others. For example, I recently had the privilege to present at the 9th International Water Sensitive Urban Design Conference in Sydney on Centralised Potable Water Harvesting in the Suburbs of Melbourne.
What has been your most rewarding project to date?
The innovative watercycle management scheme at Fitzgibbon Chase (which we call the FiSH and PotaRoo) is the most rewarding. As soon as I started at Bligh Tanner I was immediately involved in the testing of the water treatment plants, and have been responsible for ongoing commissioning and auditing. This project is internationally significant, so it is rewarding to be immersed in the technical and logistical issues that are critical to making these projects happen.
Water is such a vital resource and as our ever expanding cities put our traditional water sources under stress, projects such as this allow us to explore alternative opportunities to develop in a more sustainable way.
What are you currently working on?
I’ve got a great diversity of projects underway, including water supply and sewerage for housing, school and subdivision projects; the wastewater management upgrade for a caravan park near Pumicestone Passage; the construction stage of the Brisbane City Council Stormwater Harvesting project at Downey Park; and the Fitzgibbon PotaRoo Collection System Audit.
Engineering offers a good balance of creative and technical aspects – as well as office and site work. It is also a very rewarding job – developing new ways of doing things more sustainably.
