Alice Butler

Naming Alice, a graduate at MHB Consultant, as the winner, the judges said they recognised the quality of her research and the wider applicability it would have.

Alice said: “This project incorporated hand calculations, and finite element analysis to explore different options for bridge strengthening top-hat design. By making changes to standard designs we can decrease installation time and costs, improve site health and safety and reduce disruption to the railways.

“Entering this competition was a big personal challenge, I am pleasantly surprised I have made it this far, and I am looking forward to the next stage.”

ICE Scotland director, Hannah Smith, said: “Civil Engineering is a profession tacking the world’s biggest challenges and we saw this in spades in our ICE Scotland Emerging Engineers Awards.

“All of our finalists showed a real aptitude for cutting-edge research, innovative thinking and displayed an infectious enthusiasm for their work. With these emerging engineers in the profession, the future of civil engineering is very bright indeed.”

Bobbi Archer, a section engineer at Barhale, was named as runner-up for her paper ‘An Analysis of Post-Incident Reporting to Enhance Current Standard Practices Associated with Mitigating Damage to Services’ and Ethan Jones, a student at the University of Dundee, was placed in third for his paper ‘Dynamics of Microplastics in Cohesive Sediments’.