This competition was published recently in New Scientist: you could win a trip to the Arctic or the deep sea!

Innovative engineering is a key force for changing our lives. In the past few decades, engineers have taken us into space, deep under water and created computers, the internet and mobile phone networks. They have designed superlatives such as China’s three gorges dam, Japan’s Akashi Kaikyo Bridge and the Large Hadron Collider near Geneva, Switzerland.

So what is The Next Big Thing for engineers? Will they build scrubbers to remove carbon dioxide from our atmosphere, create a medical tricorder or harness fusion, the sun’s power source? New Scientist and Statoil want to know what you think.

In no more that 100 words tell us which engineering project you think will have the greatest impact on human life in the next 30 years, and why? You might know of a project already, or have your own idea for a realistic project that should be started. The judges will be looking for ingenuity in both the choice of project and the justification.

The closing date for entries is midnight (GMT) on Tuesday 1 March 2011.

Please go to the competition webpage to submit your entry.