The Datum Report

Occupation 2152 · Professional occupations

Environment professionals

Half of full-time environment professionals in the UK earn more than £43,362 a year, and half earn less.

Environment professionals investigate, address, and advise on a variety of terrestrial and marine environment and resource management issues, including the development and implementation of environmental policies and remedies that address the impacts of human activities and industrial processes on the environment.

How people enter it

A good degree in a relevant subject is normally a minimum entry qualification, and some employers will require a postgraduate qualification. Relevant work experience to complement academic qualifications is highly desirable. Professional qualifications across a wide range of areas of work are available

What the work involves

• identifies contamination of land, air or water and assesses any adverse impact on the environment
• advises on and provides solutions for mitigating the effects of such contamination
• implements remediation works
• carries out environment-related desk-based research and fieldwork to collect, analyse and interpret data to determine their validity, quality and significance
• carries out or assists in environmental audits and environmental impact assessments
• communicates scientific and technical information to relevant audiences in an appropriate form, via reports, workshops, educational events, public hearings
• assists organisations to conduct their activities in an environmentally appropriate manner
• implements, reviews and advises on regulatory and legislative standards, guidelines and policies
• provides professional guidance to clients, government agencies, regulators and other relevant bodies, having regard for sustainable approaches and solutions

Also called

Energy manager · Environmental consultant · Environmental engineer · Environmental protection officer · Environmental technician · Flood risk manager · Water quality scientist

What it pays

How pay has changed

Median gross annual pay for environment professionals, full-time employees, 2023 to 2025. Each point is that year's ASHE April snapshot as published — revisions are not backfilled into earlier years, and a year ONS withheld is a gap rather than a joined line.

ONS, ASHE Table 14 - occupation by four-digit SOC (national). Table

Year-on-year change

The change from each year to the next, in per cent, computed from the figures in the chart above — so the two cannot disagree.

ONS, ASHE Table 14 - occupation by four-digit SOC (national). Table

Pay by region

Median gross annual pay for full-time employees, ranked, against the UK figure. 7 of 11 regions are published: ONS withholds a cell where the survey sample cannot support it, and those are shown as gaps rather than dropped — an absent region is not a region without the work in it.

ONS, ASHE Table 14 - occupation by four-digit SOC (national). Period 2025. Table

Every regional figure

ONS does not publish occupational pay below region. Cells the survey could not support are shown as withheld, with its reason — adding a region split to a specific occupation leaves roughly a tenth of cells publishable.

Common questions

Classified alongside this

Conservation professionals