Location
Manchester (Hybrid role with office attendance typically up to 3 days per week, remote working to promote well-being, and occasional visits to other offices and sites)

Hours
Full Time

Salary
Negotiable

About the Role
Due to continued growth within CEL, Costain’s in-house multi-disciplinary engineering and design team, we have an exciting opportunity for a Senior Geotechnical Engineer to join our Ground Engineering team. You will work on some of the UK’s most high-profile infrastructure projects including HS2 High Voltage Rail Systems, Net Zero Teesside Power, the Northern Endurance Partnership, AMP8 Water frameworks, and the HALEU project for Urenco. CEL delivers comprehensive design solutions across a range of UK infrastructure sectors including Energy, Defence & Nuclear, Water, Rail, Roads, and Integrated Transport. We support the full project lifecycle from feasibility to construction, focusing on sustainable, future-ready, and safe-by-design outputs.

As a Senior Geotechnical Engineer, you will own ground engineering activities and designs from outline design through to construction, producing high-quality reports, specifications, and calculations. You will identify deliverables, manage ground risks, and solve live construction problems. Your responsibilities include producing and checking geotechnical calculations and specifications for shallow and deep foundations, retaining walls, and earthworks; reviewing and guiding the production of BIM/CAD models and drawings; processing AGS files and managing geotechnical data; producing digital 2D/3D ground models; and deriving soil/rock design parameters for engineering use.

You will contribute to team initiatives for automating repetitive tasks and calculations, utilising programming languages such as Python where advantageous. You will produce industry-standard and Eurocode 7 compliant reporting including desktop studies, Ground Investigation Reports (GIRs), and Geotechnical Design Reports (GDRs). You will plan and scope ground investigations, interpret laboratory and in-situ test results, and collaborate closely with internal engineers and project managers to coordinate project activities, attend design reviews and interdisciplinary design check sessions, and deliver technical presentations.

This role requires independent workload management to deliver assigned work packages to agreed cost, time, and quality standards, managing change and resource allocations. You will respond to site Technical Queries (TQs) for permanent and temporary works designs and guide construction teams by reviewing previous designs and proposing alternative ground and civil engineering solutions.

Experience
- UK experience as a Geotechnical Engineer or Engineering Geologist within civil engineering
- Proficient in design calculations using industry recognised packages such as GEO5, WALLAP, Plaxis 2D/3D, or Oasys packages
- Experience scoping and analysing field and laboratory data to develop ground models and derive project-specific geotechnical solutions
- Strong working knowledge of UK regulatory frameworks including CDM Regulations
- Good awareness of geotechnical data management and workflow automation
- Excellent communication and relationship-building skills to collaborate across multidisciplinary project teams
- Unrestricted right to work in the UK (sponsorship not available)

About you
- Ability to work independently and manage multiple priorities
- Collaborative mindset with strong interpersonal skills
- Enthusiastic about innovation and automation, with experience or interest in programming languages such as Python or Grasshopper for data processing and automation
- Awareness of environmental and sustainability considerations in project work

Qualifications
- Degree qualified in Civil Engineering, Geotechnical Engineering, Geology or Engineering Geology or equivalent experience
- Chartered status (e.g. CEng or CGeol) or near chartered with equivalent industry experience
- Additional technically focused qualifications or training are desirable
- Multi-sector project experience such as Rail, Water, Energy, and Highways is advantageous
- Rock mechanics experience is desirable