Professor Kinaci received his Bachelor’s Degree (1980) and Master’s Degree (1982) and Doctorate (1987) from the Faculty of Civil Engineering in Istanbul Technical University (ITU). He started his career working as a research assistant between 1981 and 1992 in ITU in the field of Environmental Technology. He studied as a post-doctoral researcher at The University of New Jersey-Rutgers in 1990. After returning back to ITU, he became an assistant professor in 1992 and an associate professor in 1993. In 2003, he became a full professor in the Department of Environmental Engineering.

His research interests include water and wastewater treatment technologies, design and operating principles of infrastructure systems, and engineering economics. He published articles in more than 150 national and international journals. As of March 2021, he has 50 articles published in internationally reputable journals. They were cited 958 times (h = 15) according to Web of Science and 1049 times (h = 17) according to Scopus. He reviewed many papers for more than 20 distinct international journals.

He was the supervisor of 11 doctorate (3 with co-advisors) and 42 master theses. He taught more than 20 different courses at undergraduate and graduate levels in 4 different universities. He served as the Chair of the Department of Environmental Engineering (2003 - 2010) and a Member of the Board of Directors of the Faculty of Civil Engineering (1998-2003). He was the principal investigator in 11 research projects and worked as a researcher in 20 other.  He wrote chapters for 5 Turkish books. He also participated in the planning and design of many large-scale infrastructure projects.

He served as General Director of Environmental Management (2010-2011), General Director of Water Management (2011-2017) and General Director of Ankara Water and Sewerage Administration (2017-2020).

Professor Kinaci was appointed as the Rector of ITU Northern Cyprus as of September 2020. He is married and has two children.