Author Image

Glad you made it to this corner of the internet!

I'm Aviral

Aviral Agarwal

I am an environmental engineer with a strong foundation in geospatial data analysis, numerical modeling, and sustainable engineering. Throughout my journey in environmental consulting, I’ve applied my technical skills to support informed decision-making and advance public policy toward sustainable outcomes. I thrive in dynamic environments, collaborating with teams to develop innovative solutions that address complex environmental challenges. With a passion for using data to reveal insights, I’m dedicated to leveraging climate data to drive sustainability and make a positive impact on our planet

Skills

Experiences

1
Water Resources Engineering Inc.

January 2025 - March 2025

San Francisco, CA

Staff Engineer

January 2025 - March 2025

Responsibilities:
  • Driving sustainable water supply strategies for Bay Area cities, lead analysis of a $5 million, 10 MGD water reuse project to enhance resilience and optimize costs.
EKI Environment and Water Inc.

July 2023 - October 2024

Daly City, CA

Environmental Engineer

July 2023 - October 2024

Responsibilities:
  • Developed an R-based soil moisture balance model for a 100,000+ acre basin, accurately calculating irrigation demand. Executed MODFLOW 6 simulations using FloPy for scenario analysis to inform pumping stress across one of California’s most over-drafted regions.
  • Streamlined geospatial data for California water districts, optimizing workflows with ArcGIS Pro and Python. Reduced processing time from 2 days to a few hours and improved data accuracy over 20+ years for 5 districts.
  • Independently assessed applied water usage on a 5,000-acre area using 25+ years of land use data for CUP-E and USADR. Compared CropScape and OpenET datasets, analyzing vegetative water use for DWR/UCDANR.
  • Utilized DWR Airborne Electromagnetic (AEM) surveys and borehole datasets to develop coarse fraction profiles across 9 aquifer layers. Generated kriging-based rasters in Surfer for a 130,000-acre water district.
  • Spearheaded a 2-month project to centralize codebases on GitHub, reducing version conflicts by 40% and cutting deployment time by 20%. Potential to to improve team workflows for 10 engineers via Docker and AWS integration.
2
3
Jacobs Engineering Group

June 2022 - March 2023

San Francisco, CA

Environmental, Health and Safety - Information Management Intern

June 2022 - March 2023

Responsibilities:
  • Researched and recommended methodology to develop an award-winning Carbon Sequestration Potential Tool across the carbon sinks in the world.
  • Created and quality checked several Power BI dashboards that transformed complex environmental, health, and safety data into real-time visualizations for 10+ stakeholders, reducing reporting time by 30%.
The Bill Lane Center for the American West - Stanford University

September 2021 - February 2023

Stanford, CA

Research Assistant

September 2021 - February 2023

Responsibilities:
  • Analyzed climate change impacts on Central California water infrastructure, using GIS and DWR data to assess basin vulnerabilities, supporting five regional water management plans.
  • Developed a Python script computing a dynamic resilience index for San Luis Obispo County, integrating 10+ data sources on water demand, supply, and climate projections to enhance drought preparedness efforts.
4
5
Global Projects Center

September 2021 - December 2022

Stanford, CA

Research Fellow

September 2021 - December 2022

Responsibilities:
  • Explored pathways of data that are dynamically priced and traded in the Digital Cities and Disruptive Technology program. Investigated technological components toward creating a marketplace of data.
Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay

December 2019 - January 2021

Mumbai, India

Research Intern

December 2019 - January 2021

Responsibilities:
  • Mapped ambient air pollution exposure assessment in a cohort of adult women at 60+ homes in three metropolitan cities – Delhi, Bengaluru, and Mumbai during the summer and winter seasons. Analyzed spatial traffic proxy variables using ArcGIS, Python, and Excel.
6
7
SUEZ Water Technologies and Solutions

June 2020 - August 2020

Bengaluru, India

Engineering Sales Intern

June 2020 - August 2020

Responsibilities:
  • Worked with the Strategy and Marketing Team to identify challenges faced at the water and wastewater treatment by Tier 1 pharmaceutical companies in India in the production of API Drugs and formulation.
  • Responsibilities include formulating business plans to tackle existing and upcoming challenges at the site such as ZLD, UPW, and retrofit systems.
Center for Science and Environment

May 2019 - July 2019

Delhi, India

Policy Research Intern

May 2019 - July 2019

Responsibilities:
  • Performed secondary research on Mine Closure and Reclamation in India and Globally. Identified numerous Environmental, Social and Health concerns, Financing, Policies regarding Mine Closure.
  • Analyzed decade long reports on mine reclamation presented by Coal India Ltd., a subsidiary of CMPDI, to observe the trends of various parameters and the status of reclamation.
8
9
Chintan Environmental Research and Action Group

November 2018 - January 2019

Delhi, India

Volunteer

November 2018 - January 2019

Responsibilities:
  • Worked as a volunteer of the core implementation team for a campaign against plastic pollution- the ‘Plastic Upvaas’ or the ‘Plastic Fast’ Campaign.
  • The campaign was in partnership with the Canadian High Commission in India and aimed at motivating consumers to reduce their use of single-use plastics. Actively anchored an awareness session and participated in several awareness drives- interacting with school students and the general public to bring about behavior change.
Global Peace Foundation

May 2018 - July 2018

Delhi, India

Volunteer

May 2018 - July 2018

Responsibilities:
  • Participated in GPF India’s two-month interfaith program with 20 diverse students, engaging in discussions and visiting religious sites across New Delhi, where I gained profound insights from faith leaders about universal spiritual values that transcend religious boundaries.
  • Conducted personal hygiene workshop for students in delhi along with a freeze mob at one of the most crowded places in Delhi on social issues.
10

Education

Stanford Univeristy
2021-2023
Masters of Sciences in Civil and Environmental Engineering
GPA: 3.7 out of 4
Extracurricular Activities:
  • Member of Stanford Cricket Team.
Delhi Technological University
2017-2021
Bachelor of Technology in Environmental Engineering
CGPA: 8.91 out of 10 (Gold Medalist)
Publications:
Extracurricular Activities:
  • President, DTU Toastmasters
  • Creative Head, Entrepreneurship Cell DTU
  • Aerodynamics Head, Okami Racing Team (India’s first Electric Racing Bike Team)

Projects

Soil Moisture Balance Model
January 2024 - August 2024

Developed an R-based soil moisture balance model to simulate daily crop water use and accurately estimate irrigation demand across a 100,000+ acre agricultural basin in California. The model integrated climate, crop, soil, and land use data to dynamically track soil moisture and drive water demand calculations. To evaluate groundwater sustainability, executed MODFLOW 6 simulations using FloPy, modeling various pumping scenarios to assess spatial and temporal stress on the aquifer system. This analysis supported decision-making for one of California’s most over-drafted groundwater basins, providing key insights for sustainable water management strategies under SGMA, including conjunctive use, managed aquifer recharge, and demand reduction planning.

Hydrology
Soil Moisture Balance Model
CARMA - Startup Simulation Project
January 2023 - June 2023

Spearheaded a 6-month startup incubation project with a team of 5 to develop a carbon management app, overseeing program management, team onboarding, milestone tracking, and resource allocation while implementing incentives through discounts and gamification. Presented the idea at TreeHacks 2023 and Stanford Graduate School of Business Ignite Program of 2023.

Sustainability
CARMA - Startup Simulation Project
Frequency Analysis of Non-Stationary Hydrological Extremes in Northern Ohio
September 2022 - Decemeber 2022

Performed frequency analysis on stream flows and precipitation in northern Ohio using the Vogel et al. (2011) method, utilizing 76 years of data from 133 stream gauges. Assessed the impact of trends on extreme events over the next 20 years for 100- to 500-year return periods through the application of magnification factors and reduced return periods.

Hydrology
Frequency Analysis of Non-Stationary Hydrological Extremes in Northern Ohio
Flood Mitigation Analysis for Foster City
September 2021 - December 2021

Executed a data-driven flood analysis using concepts of expected loss and exceedance probability along with 10,000 Monte Carlo simulations. Proposed a hybrid solution combining insurance and levees, reducing potential annual losses by 40% and eliminating risk of $400K+ damages.

Hydrology
Flood Mitigation Analysis for Foster City
Water Resiliency Model for Central Coast California
September 2021 - February 2023

Analyzed climate change impacts on Central California water infrastructure, using GIS and DWR data to assess basin vulnerabilities. Provided data-driven insights that supported five regional water management plans.Led a team of 3 in developing a Python script computing a dynamic resilience index for San Luis Obispo County, integrating 10+ data sources on water demand, supply, and climate projections to enhance drought preparedness efforts.

Hydrology
Water Resiliency Model for Central Coast California
Life Cycle Assessment of Geothermal Energy for Data Centers
September 2022 - December 2022

Analyzed the environmental and economic viability of geothermal energy for data centers. Conducted a comparative analysis between electricity from the grid and geothermal energy along with a waste recovery system, and presented a poster with findings and recommendations.

Sustainability
Life Cycle Assessment of Geothermal Energy for Data Centers
Sustainable Energy Model for 2050
January 2022 - March 2022

Built a scoping framework that involved looking at the current energy mix, policies, and potential for future technologies of countries to develop a scenario for creating a sustainable energy system for 9 billion people in 2050 in accordance to meet Paris Agreement targets.

Sustainability
Sustainable Energy Model for 2050

Publications

Financial viability assessment of concentrated solar power technologies under Indian climatic conditions.
Sustainable Energy Technologies and Assessments 2020
Sankalp Kumar Aviral Agarwal Dr. Anil Kumar

The study identifies Jodhpur as the optimal location for a 50 MW Solar Power Tower CSP plant in India, with the lowest LCOE and highest NPV, aiding in technology and investment decisions.

Solar Energy Techno-Economic
Details
Comparative study on air quality status in Indian and Chinese cities before and during the COVID-19 lockdown period. Air Quality
Atmosphere and Health, 13(10), 1167–1178 2020
Aviral Agarwal Aman Kaushik Sankalp Kumar Dr. Rajeev Kumar Mishra

Lockdown measures during COVID-19 significantly reduced AQI levels of PM2.5 and NO2 in major cities of India and China, highlighting effective pathways for air pollution mitigation.

Air Pollution COVID-19 PM 2.5 NO3
Details
Predicting Ground Level PM2.5 Concentration Over Delhi Using Landsat 8 Satellite Data
International Journal of Remote Sensing, 42(3), 827-838 2020
Dr. Rajeev Kumar Mishra Aviral Agarwal Ankita Shukla

A multispectral empirical model using Landsat 8 data effectively estimates PM2.5 concentrations in Delhi with adequate accuracy, correlating satellite reflectance with in-situ measurements and meteorological data.

Air Pollution Remote Sensing PM 2.5
Details

Awards

Vice Chancellor Gold Medal
Delhi Technological University August 2017 - June 2021

Highest Cumulative Grade Point Average in the Bachelor Program for Environmental Engineering (2017-2021)

Exceptional Research Awards
Delhi Technological University June 2020 - January 2021

Publications in exceptional peer-review journals for the year 2020 and 2021

Year Topper
Delhi Technological University 2019 - 2021

Highest Cumulative Grade Point Average for the year 2019 and 2020 in Environmental Engineering

Certifications

Stanford Graduate School of Business Ignite Program
Stanford University Graduate School of Business June 20223 - July 2023

Intensive entrepreneurship and innovation program for technical professionals transitioning to business leadership

Engineer-in-Training
National Council of Examiners for Engineering and Surveying Jun 2020 - Jan 2021

Professional engineering designation earned through rigorous examination and practical training

US Green Building Council Green Associate
US Green Building Council March 2024-Present

Certification demonstrating core competency in sustainable building practices and LEED principles