Scientia Professor David Waite

Scientia Professor, UNSW School of Civil and Environmental Engineering

Executive Director and Chairman, UNSW Centre for Transformational Environmental Technologies (CTET)

Executive Director, UNSW Technology Commercialisation Centre (TCC)

Scientia Professor David Waite, from the UNSW School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, is a researcher of international standing who has made a significant contribution to the fields of environmental chemistry and engineering over the last four decades. He served as Head of the UNSW Department of Water Engineering from 1993 to 1999 and Director of the UNSW Centre for Water and Waste Technology (now UNSW Water Research Centre) from 1993 to 2006 before taking over as Head of the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering in 2007. He continued as Head of School till early 2013 then took on the roles of Deputy Dean for Strategic Initiatives (2013-2015) and Deputy Dean for Research (2015-2018) in the UNSW Faculty of Engineering. Since 2018, he has been Executive Director of the UNSW Centre for Transformational Environmental Technologies (CTET), a research centre focussed on translation of innovation in environmental technologies to real world application. 

Professor Waite obtained his undergraduate degree from the University of Tasmania (1974), Masters degree from Monash University (1977) and PhD from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (1984). Before joining UNSW in 1993, he spent eight years undertaking research at the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO) and, prior to this, two years as a Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Melbourne and five years as a Research Scientist at the State Rivers and Water Supply Commission in Melbourne.

Professor Waite leads a dynamic group of researchers at UNSW Sydney and has graduated 71 PhD students as primary supervisor and an additional 6 PhD students as co-supervisor. He has particular expertise in the behaviour of redox-active elements such as iron, manganese, copper, silver and uranium in natural and engineered systems and has extended his work in recent years to development and application of advanced oxidation processes and membrane and electrochemical technologies in water and wastewater treatment. His work also has relevance to the improved management of our water and soil resources. He has published over 550 peer-reviewed articles in a variety of international scientific journals, and has been awarded over $30 million in research funding for his work on water quality and treatment technologies. His work has been widely cited with over 50,000 citations and a Google Scholar h-index (as of July 2026) of 122.

Interest in engineering

Why did you get into engineering?

I initially trained as a scientist but was keen to see knowledge applied to solve real world problems.

What excites you about environmental engineering?

Understanding how nature works allows us to develop solutions which are both appropriate and sustainable.

What are your research goals?

My aim is to undertake biogeochemical research which improves our understanding of natural aquatic systems and enables us to i) prevent environmental degradation and ii) develop appropriate solutions to challenges such as provision of water supply and improving human health.

What do people not understand about you do?

There are huge gaps in our understanding of the biogeochemical relationships in nature. Filling these knowledge gaps will both help prevent future environmental problems and assist in finding solutions for existing problems.

Lectures taught

Principles and Applications of Water and Atmospheric Chemistry

Water Treatment