Ken Rainwater

About

Dr. Ken Rainwater retired in August 2022 after 37 years and was recognized as Professor Emeritus in the Department of Civil, Environmental, and Construction Engineering at Texas Tech University. He also served as the Director of the Texas Tech University Water Resources Center from 2002-12. He is a licensed Professional Engineer in Texas, a Board Certified Environmental Engineer (AAEES), and a Certified Floodplain Manager. He is currently a consultant in water resources and environmental engineering as well as a part-time instructor in the CECE department. He received his BSCE from Rice University (1979), and MSCE (1982) and Ph.D. (1985) in Civil Engineering from the University of Texas at Austin. Rainwater has over 40 years of experience in water resources and environmental engineering. He taught courses in fluid mechanics, environmental engineering, engineering hydrology, water systems design, groundwater hydrology, groundwater contaminant transport, and water resources management. His research expertise is in problems of groundwater quantity and quality, remediation of soil and groundwater contamination, and water resources management. His research was funded by the Environmental Protection Agency, Department of Energy, Department of Defense, Department of Agriculture, Bureau of Reclamation, Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, Texas State Soil and Water Conservation Board, and Texas Water Development Board. He was honored with several teaching awards at Texas Tech, including the Abell Faculty Teaching Award and the President’s Excellence in Teaching Award. He was named the Whitacre College of Engineering Researcher of the Year in 2010. He served as the co-faculty advisor of the J.H. Murdough Student Chapter of ASCE from 1985 to 2004. He also served various roles in the Texas Section of ASCE, including Vice President for Education and President. He served as a Region 6 Governor and is past chair of the Committee on Student Members. His daughter Janice has both BSCE (TTU) and MSCE (TTU) degrees, and she works in Denver for WSP in their water resources group, while her husband Scott with BSCE (Colorado State University) and MSCE (TTU) degrees works for the Colorado Department of Transportation. His son Kirk has BSME (TTU) and MSEE (TTU) degrees and works at Sandia National Laboratory in Albuquerque. Ken’s wife Kathryn feels outnumbered by the engineers in the family and tries to keep them connected to the rest of society.