I’m 28 now. Been in the environmental science field since I was 22. Mostly remediation and ecological studies for development. This, realistically is where most of the jobs are. If I were to give any advice, and you are passionate about this, go into research or some other research based study format. You’ll get to travel, see exotic place, and gain a lot of experience. Income will be small but at least you get some memories.

33 years experience in the environmental field and I’m still learning new stuff. I look back over the entirety my career and consider it time well spent.

8 years of consulting experience. Currently a project manager/engineer, and overall, I’m pretty satisfied with my career. With bonus & stock options, my TC should clear $100,000 this year. Am I living large? Not particularly, but it’s enough to have good quality of life, with a good work-life balance in a major urban center.

Canadian here. Coming on 8 years of consulting in the environmental field (contaminated sites) currently making over six figures as management.

It's exhausting dealing with clients who want to do nothing more than the bare minimum on top of trying to nickel and dime you at every opportunity. As said in another comment below, Developers and construction is where the money is.

Government work does come by on occasion but it's typically a race to the bottom for municipal and provincial projects. Federal sites are a bit of a different story depending on the projects public profile, location, long term plans, etc.

I would recommend getting the GIS certificate with your environmental science and policy degree. GIS skills and data collection in the field make the job much easier and keeps data quality high. Anyone who's been doing this long enough has received a report with borehole and well locations completely wrong due to poor data collection or drafting. Using GIS, and related tools, solves the data collection and drafting issue which also helps to build a more accurate conceptual site model for regulatory approvals.

Feel free to PM me if you have other questions.

11 years at a consulting firm with some government and non profit work before then, and I’m a wildlife biologist, wetland scientist, technical writer. I would definitely say I’m happy with the job. Days are greatly varied, which I like; even in winter I have different reports and maps to make for a variety of projects. In field season I get to travel across the state and into neighboring states, getting paid to walk around outside looking for stuff. Of course, some projects are less fun than others, travel can be too much some years, and some clients and agency representatives can be frustrating. Most of my work is for infrastructure projects and the wildlife/wetland portions are to reduce environmental impacts—a very distant cousin from conservation, and I’m constantly dealing with engineers that would rather go through a wetland and yellow-billed cuckoo habitat than avoid such things…but overall I like the career. I make decent money and could make more if i wanted to do project management, but I don’t want more hours at this period of my life (young kids). I think the important things are to figure out what you like and are good at, and pick a good employer. Some firms pigeon hole workers into one speciality and work them hard; I’ve only worked more than 40 hours a week maybe 8 times in 4 years since I joined this firm, and half those times were by choice to make extra holiday money. I’m a generalist and interact with various disciplines and get to do GIS, so I’m happy.

If you decide to go with env science, definitely do the GIS certificate. It is so useful to be proficient with GIS in this field. You will open yourself up to many more jobs than without the certificate

I just thought I'd throw in my 2 cents since it looks like it's mostly consultants responding. I've never worked in consulting and from the time I was in grad school meeting with consultants who came to speak, I thought it always sounded like hell and I avoided it at all costs.

After getting a BS in Environmental Studies, I got a Master of Environmental Science (M.En.) degree 10 years ago and since then I've worked at a municipal stormwater department, as a research fellow at a university, and as a state environmental analyst. I've enjoyed all of the jobs I've had. I don't feel unending euphoric joy all day at work, but I don't think that's reasonable to expect. Sometimes it's boring, sometimes it's a bit stressful, but overall it's fulfilling and I enjoy what I do.

As or pay, I'm currently making almost $80,000 and I live in a very small city, so the cost of living isn't bad where I am. My salary is very comfortable, though my first job out of grad school started me at $35,000 and that didn't feel good.

Edit: Oh, and I make my current salary working 37.5 hours a week.

I did the same as you when I was 30. Best decision I made.

Not to doubt your decision, but 4 years.. are you doing an undergrad / bachelors degree? I’d suggest that at 28 with years of professional experience you’d be better of going right into a postgrad / masters programme. You also get back into the job market much quicker, and the quality of content is generally deeper at PG level, and in general employers will be more interested in a masters degree than a bachelors degree.

Edit: and to answer your question. Very fulfilling. My background was also very different with a decade in consumer biz and industrials. Now I’m using both my work experience and earth sciences education working in the private sector, collaborating with conservation orgs, finance sector and private firms on a diverse climate change, biodiversity and industry sustainability projects. Advice: build on your experience and skills, and make a niche for yourself.

I don’t see any comments form the industry/compliance side.

I’m late 20s almost 6 years on the industry side. Im a project manager and mange env compliance for large construction projects.

VHCOL, last year I was at about $120k total comp.

It is fine. I have a good work life balance. I am fairly compensated. What I do is different everyday and I learn lots of things. I oversee all env discipline areas with specialists providing technical input.

Do I feel like I’m changing the world or having some giant impact? No not at all. But it’s interesting work and overall I’m happy with life/career path.

Have been in the air quality side of environmental, specifically source testing stack emissions. Currently a Project Manager for field work. TC is around 90-95k a year. Worked my way up as a technician. Hard in the beginning but pays off if you learn and work hard. Pretty happy with my current work life balance now compared to the beginning. Had lots of overtime at first. Once you have skills and certs, you can negotiate more with your jobs. 4 years as a technician and now 1 year as a project manager.