GATE 2025 Envt. Sci. & Engg.
GATE 2025 Envt. Sci. & Engg.
General Aptitude
Q.1 – Q.5 Carry ONE mark Each
(A) Longing
(B) Yelling
(C) Yawning
(D) Glaring
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
Q.3 A 4 × 4 digital image has pixel intensities (𝑈) as shown in the figure. The number of
pixels with 𝑈 ≤ 4 is:
(A) 3
(B) 8
(C) 11
(D) 9
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
Q.4 In the given figure, the numbers associated with the rectangle, triangle, and ellipse
are 1, 2, and 3, respectively. Which one among the given options is the most
appropriate combination of P, Q, and R ?
4
Q
1 P
(A) P = 6; Q = 5; R = 3
(B) P = 5; Q = 6; R = 3
(C) P = 3; Q = 6; R = 6
(D) P = 5; Q = 3; R = 6
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
Q.5 A rectangle has a length L and a width W, where L > W. If the width, W, is increased
by 10%, which one of the following statements is correct for all values of L and W?
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
Q.6 Column-I has statements made by Shanthala; and, Column-II has responses given
by Kanishk.
Column-I Column-II
Q. I am not happy with the marks 2. Well, you can easily look it up.
given to me.
S. I don’t know what this word 4. Don’t worry, I will take it up with
means. your teacher.
Identify the option that has the correct match between Column-I and Column-II.
(A) P – 2; Q – 3; R – 1; S – 4
(B) P – 3; Q – 4; R – 1; S – 2
(C) P – 4; Q – 1; R – 2; S – 3
(D) P – 1; Q – 2; R – 4; S – 3
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
Q.7 Weight of a person can be expressed as a function of their age. The function usually
varies from person to person. Suppose this function is identical for two brothers,
and it monotonically increases till the age of 50 years and then it monotonically
decreases. Let 𝑎1 and 𝑎2 (in years) denote the ages of the brothers and 𝑎1 < 𝑎2 .
Which one of the following statements is correct about their age on the day when
they attain the same weight?
(D) Either 𝑎1 = 50 or 𝑎2 = 50
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
The number of squares that can be formed and the number of triangles required to
form each square, respectively, are:
(A) 3; 4
(B) 4; 3
(C) 3; 3
(D) 3; 2
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
Q.9 2
𝑥2 𝑥 2𝑥
If a real variable 𝑥 satisfies 3 = 27 × 9 , then the value of 𝑥 2 is:
(2 )
(A) 2−1
(B) 20
(C) 23
(D) 215
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
Q.10 The number of patients per shift (𝑋) consulting Dr. Gita in her past 100 shifts is
shown in the figure. If the amount she earns is ₹ 1000(𝑋 − 0.2), what is the average
amount (in ₹) she has earned per shift in the past 100 shifts?
50
40
40
Number of shifts
30
30
20
20
10
10
0
5 6 7 8
Number of patients per shift (X)
(A) 6,100
(B) 6,300
(C) 6,000
(D) 6,500
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
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(A) 𝑠
𝑠2 +𝑎2
(B) 𝑎
𝑠2 +𝑎2
(C) 𝑠
𝑠2 −𝑎2
(D) 𝑎
𝑠2 −𝑎2
Q.12 𝑑2𝑦
For the ordinary differential equation + 4𝑦 = 0, the general solution is
𝑑𝑥 2
(C) 𝑦 = 𝑐1 𝑒 2𝑥 + 𝑐2 𝑒 −2𝑥
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
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Q.18 Match the following and choose the correct option from the following
z.
3.Batch reactor
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Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
Q.19 Multiple effect evaporator is commonly used, in the zero liquid discharge (ZLD)
scheme, for __________
Q : According to the National Air Quality Index released by Govt. of India in 2015,
sub index value of PM10 can be less than that of PM2.5.
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
Q.21 Which option gives the components that are most likely to be present in the
segregated combustible fraction (SCF) separated from raw mixed municipal solid
waste (MSW)?
Q.22 Correctly match the sustainable development goal (SDG) with its theme
SDG Theme
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
(A) Almost all the nations of the world assembled for the first time in the history to
discuss and find out the solution for a common environmental problem.
(B) It was for formulating the strategies and guidelines to reduce CO2 and CH4
emissions to control the global warming.
(C) It was for formulating the strategies and guidelines to control the release of acidic
gases that can cause acid rains in another country.
(D) It was for formulating the strategies and guidelines for the trans-boundary
movement of hazardous wastes.
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
Q.25 Choose the correct statement(s) from the following regarding the structure/
reproduction of microorganisms
(D) Both Prokaryotes and Eukaryotes rely on binary fission for reproduction.
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
Q.27 Stubble burning results in release of particulate matter, volatile organic compounds,
oxides of nitrogen and sulfur, to name a few. A researcher is planning to use a
conventional Gaussian dispersion model to estimate the contribution of stubble
burning in a nearby state to air pollution in New Delhi.
Choose the option(s) which could explain the possible limitations in this approach
(A) assumption of steady state conditions e.g. constant wind speed, wind direction, and
emission, etc. in conventional Gaussian dispersion models
Q.28 Choose the correct option(s) from the following in the plastic waste management
(A) Plastic wastes may be burnt to generate fuel oil and fuel gas.
(B) Plastic wastes along with bitumen may be used for road/pavement construction.
(C) Polyethylene terephthalate (PET) and high density polyethylene (HDPE) are the
most common plastics for recycling.
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
Q.29 Choose the option(s) giving the correct process flow-sheet for producing refuse
derived fuel (RDF) from the segregated waste collected in the dry waste containers
(blue coloured containers of the municipal solid waste (MSW) collection scheme).
(A)
(B)
(C)
(D)
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
Q.30 Choose the correct option(s) from the following regarding the symbiotic
relationships
(A) Lichens are a symbiotic association of fungi and bacteria. They can survive in
extreme conditions of air pollution.
(B) Lichens are a symbiotic association of fungi and bacteria. The fungi can absorb
water and minerals from atmosphere, and bacteria can generate foods.
(C) Lichens are a symbiotic association of fungi and algae. They can survive in extreme
conditions, but are very sensitive to air pollution.
(D) Lichens are a symbiotic association of fungi and algae. The fungi can absorb water
and minerals from atmosphere, and algae can generate food through photosynthesis.
Q.31 Methane hydrates have special crystal structure of water, where methane gas
molecules are trapped. Choose the correct option(s) from the following
(A) Methane hydrates exist in abundance near the ocean bed, where the pressure is high
enough for their existence.
(B) Methane hydrates exist in abundance in the polar regions, where the temperature is
low enough for their existence.
(C) Methane hydrates can be a huge source of energy, but can accelerate global
warming considerably if the entrapped methane is released to the atmosphere.
(D) Methane hydrates can be a huge source of energy, but difficult to exploit
commercially.
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
Q.32 Choose the correct option(s) from the following regarding urban environment
(A) Urban heat island can exacerbate urban flooding by intensifying rainfall intensity.
(B) Urban canyons increase ventilation by trapping heat and thus enhancing urban heat
island effect.
(C) Program evaluation and review technique (PERT) is always used to estimate the
economic impact of mitigation strategies for urban heat island effect.
(D) In general, land surfaces in urban areas emit more long wave radiation compared to
those in rural areas, and thus contribute to higher night time temperature.
Q.33 Choose the correct option(s) from the following regarding cumulative toxicity
(C) Bioaccumulation and biomagnification are possible with heavy metals, but not with
pesticides and pharmaceutical compounds.
(D) Bioaccumulation and biomagnification are possible with heavy metals, pesticides
and pharmaceutical compounds.
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
Q.34 ln(1+𝑥)
lim ( ) is _____________ (rounded off to two decimal places).
𝑥→0 2 sin 𝑥
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
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Explanation 1: Significant fraction of the mercury would have changed phase from
aqueous to gaseous phase, thus leaving less mercury in the water
Explanation 2: Fraction of the mercury added to water would have formed aqueous
complexes
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
Q.39 Consider the following figure of an activated sludge process (ASP), depicting the
flow (Q), substrate (S), and microorganism concentration (X) at various points in
the system, where subscripts “0”, “r”, “w”, “e”, and “i” indicate influent, recycle
line, wastage, effluent, and flow from aeration tank to settling tank, respectively.
Note that influent to the ASP has microbes too. V is volume of aeration tank.
Choose the correct option for net rate of formation of microorganisms in the system
at steady state, from the following
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Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
(A) SO2
(B) NO2
(C) O3
(D) CO
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
Q.42 Which option gives the best control strategies for Dioxins and Furans in the flue gas
emitted from waste incineration facilities?
(A) Avoid burning polystyrene (PS) and polyethylene (PE); ensure the furnace
temperature above 1000 °C; and use a bag filter for cleaning the flue gas.
(B) Avoid burning polyvinyl chloride (PVC); quickly cool down the flue gas through
the temperature range 400 - 250 °C; and use an activated carbon treatment for the
flue gas.
(C) Avoid burning food wastes; ensure the furnace temperature above 900 ± 50 °C; and
use an electrostatic precipitator (ESP) for cleaning the flue gas.
(D) Avoid burning metal bearing waste; ensure the flue gas temperature above 1000 °C;
and use a venturi scrubber for cleaning the flue gas.
Q.43 Choose the correct option(s) from the following regarding the solubility in water
(A) Water is a polar molecule because of the asymmetric distribution of charge between
the oxygen and hydrogen atoms of the water molecule.
(B) In a water molecule, the electrons shared between oxygen and hydrogen are
attracted more towards the hydrogen atom.
(C) Non-polar compounds are highly soluble in water because of their strong interaction
with water molecules.
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
(A) Microbial growth follows zero order with respect to substrate concentration.
(B) Microbial growth follows first order with respect to substrate concentration.
(D) Specific growth rate is almost equal to maximum specific growth rate.
Q.45 Choose the correct option(s) for removing solids from water.
(A) chlorination
According to the Bio-Medical Waste Management Rules, 2016, choose the correct
Q.46 option(s) from the following
Bio-medical waste generated should not be taken out of the hospital premise as it
(B) may contain dangerous pathogenic organisms.
The red bag containing the human anatomical wastes like amputated body parts,
(C) cotton and bandages contaminated with body fluids, etc. should be treated using
autoclave or hydroclave to kill the pathogenic organisms.
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
A residential family is considering two cities for relocation. The data related to
pollutant exposure and associated health cost per year are given in the following
figure.
Q.47
The pollutant exposure is characterized in high, mild and low exposure categories
with respective probability values. The difference in expected value of health cost
of City1 with respect to that of City 2 is _____________ lakhs/year. (rounded off
to two decimal places).
𝑥 − 2𝑦 + 𝑧 = 34
2𝑥 + 𝑦 + 𝑧 = 102
𝑥 + 𝑦 − 3𝑧 = 17
Q.49 ∞ sin 4𝑥
The value of ∫
0
𝑑𝑥 is _________. (rounded off to two decimal places)
𝜋𝑥
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
Q.50 A tank has inflow, outflow and stirring mechanism. Initially, the tank holds 500 L
of a brine solution of concentration 200 g/L. At t = 0, an inflow of another brine
solution of concentration 100 g/L starts entering the tank at the rate of 15 L/minute.
At the same time the outflow of thoroughly stirred mixture also takes place at the
same rate so that the volume of brine in the tank remains constant. The brine
concentration C (g/L) in the tank at any time t (minute) can be expressed by the
following differential equation
𝑑𝐶
+ 0.03 𝐶 = 3
𝑑𝑡
The brine concentration in the tank at t = 1.5 hour is _________ g/L. (rounded
off to two decimal places)
Q. 51 Aerobic biomass has yield coefficient value of 0.4 for glucose (molecular weight =
180 g/mole) substrate. Bacteria is represented as C5H7O2N (molecular weight = 113
g/mole). Assume that no endogenous metabolism occurs. The percentage of carbon
going into CO2 from 1 mole/L glucose is _____________. (rounded off to two
decimal places)
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
Q.52 The following figure (not to scale) depicts a rainfall hyetograph for a storm over a
catchment
If the storm produced a direct runoff of 12.5 mm, then the –index of the storm for
the catchment is ________________ mm/hour. (rounded off to two decimal places)
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
Q.53 The following table and figure (not to scale) show characteristics of a catchment
The hyetograph resulting from a storm that occurred uniformly over the catchment,
is as follows
Assuming a constant base flow of 40 m3/s, the peak of the runoff hydrograph
produced by storm for the catchment at the outlet O is ________________ m3/s.
(rounded off to two decimal places)
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
Q.55 A pipe line O P Q R branches into three pipes X, Y, and Z between points P and Q
as shown in figure (not to scale)
Diameter (d) and length (l) of each pipe are as presented in figure and all pipes are
of same material having friction factor (f) of 0.02. Assume acceleration due to
gravity (g) as 10.0 m/s2. If the head difference between P and Q is 10 m, then the
head loss between Q and R is ____________ m. (rounded off to two decimal places)
Q.56 A circular sewer pipe, having Manning’s coefficient (n) of 0.01, is laid at a bed
slope of 1:100. If it is flowing 80% full for a discharge of 2 m3/s, then its diameter
is ____________ m. (rounded off to three decimal places)
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
Q.57 You conducted a batch experiment in the lab for 10 minutes to degrade a toxic
compound, which follows first order kinetics. The compound degrades from
2 × 10−3 M to 2 × 10−4 M. The information from the lab experiment will be used to
design a plug flow reactor in field conditions.
The required volume of the plug flow reactor is ________ m3. (rounded off to two
decimal places)
Q.58 A common effluent treatment plant with a capacity of 2 million litres per day (MLD)
employs reverse osmosis (RO) for water reuse. The RO unit removes 95% of the
total dissolved solids (TDS) and the water recovery rate is 70%. If the TDS
concentration in the RO feed is 8000 parts per million (ppm), the TDS in the RO
reject is _______ g/L. (rounded off to one decimal place)
Q.59 A boiler burns coal at a rate of 1 kg/s. If the coal has 3% sulfur content, assuming
that there is no sulfur in ash, SO2 emitted is _____ kg/day. (rounded off to nearest
integer)
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
Q.60 A particle dispersoid has 1510 spherical particles of uniform density. An air purifier
is proposed to be used to remove these particles. The diameter specific number of
particles in the dispersoid, along with the number removal efficiency of the
proposed purifier is shown in the following table:
1 1000 99
10 500 75
100 10 10
Q.61 An incandescent light bulb operated for two hours per day uses 12.2 kWh of energy
per month. Burning of one kg of coal generates 2 kWh of electrical energy and
releases 7 g of PM10. The reduction in PM10 emitted per month, if this incandescent
bulb is replaced with a light emitting diode (LED) bulb which consumes 1/6th of
energy, is ______ g. (rounded off to one decimal place)
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
Q.62 A street sweeping machine starts from point P and ends at S, as shown in the
network of streets below. It sweeps all the streets at least once.
Length of the streets, in km, are shown on the network. The minimum distance
travelled by the sweeping machine for completing the job of sweeping all the streets
is _____ km. (rounded off to nearest integer)
Q.64 An industry releases three greenhouse gases (GHGs), CO2 (5 kg/day), CH4 (0.5
kg/day), and N2O (0.1 kg/day). The industry flares the CH4 before it is released to
the atmosphere. The Global Warming Potential (GWP) are as follows: CO2 = 1,
CH4 = 21, N2O = 310. The annual GWP of GHGs released from the industry is
______ kg CO2 equivalent. (rounded off to the nearest integer)
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee
Environmental Science and Engineering (ES)
Q.65 Water from a hand pump located near a landfill has 1 mg/L arsenic (oral
carcinogenic potency factor = 1.75 (kg-day)/mg). A person who lives nearby drinks
2 L/day water from this hand pump for 10 years. Assume body weight of 70 kg and
70 years as average life duration. Chances of this person getting excess risk of
cancer is __________________ ×10−3. (rounded off to three decimal places)
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Organizing Institute: IIT Roorkee