Start with encyclopedia article and science handbooks. Good general encyclopedias include the Britannica Online, Credo, or Gale Virtual Reference. These can all be found under "Research by Subject", then choose Reference.
For specialized content, Go to "Research by Subject" and choose Civil and Construction Engineering. Try several of the resources listed under Core Resources or go directly to the Civil Engineering Research Guide.
Next, you could move on to Academic Search Premier for scholarly articles.
On the internet, try searching Google for the phrase man made islands pdf. As a rule of thumb, when you add the pdf extension you are more likely to get conference papers or more authoritative materials.