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Facilities Engineer to Inspector/Consultant: Good or bad career idea?

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engr2GW

Petroleum
Nov 7, 2010
307
Hi everyone,
I am currently a facilities engineer with an O&G company here in the US, I feel like I'm well paid but my job function does not have a clear path for me in the future:

CURRENT SITUATIOIN
My Degree: B.Sc Mechanical Engineering, May 2009
Title: Facilities engineer (Upstream operations), started May 2009
Salary: $85,000 starting and $96,000/year right now
Bonus, Benefits: Bonus + stock over $20k/year
Benefits: Insurance, wellness benefits, 100% match in 401-k, etc
lenght of time with this company: 2 years and 5 months.
Job function: Not defined, depends on what's needed, is not engineering related 40% of the time. Typical:
1. Do economic analysis for production facilities to optimize cost
2. Study industry codes and communication application for Operations
3. Train Operations on equipment tracking soft ware
4. Develop standards and BMP for piping, welding, spacing, tank grounding, pressure releiving, and a whole bunch of stuff.
5. It appears to be comprised mostly of researching new techs. and codes and communicating to Ops.

WHAT I THINK
I think that facilities engineer in other corporations are deeply involved in design (I may be wrong), and that they get involved in capital projects, design, simulate, model, and build the facilities, involved in operation and maintenance support to field folks, etc. So if I'm right, it appears that I might not be very useful if I'm not in this company

WHAT I'M THINKING ABOUT DOING
My last/current assignment is to
1. Develop welding procedures for our piping/gathering line welding
2. Develop a welding standard and BMP
3. Develop Piping standard adopted from B31 codes including Inspection, testing, and examination
4. Develop minimum requirements for welder qualification, inspection, inspector, etc from ASME Section IX, B31, etc.
This assignment has exposed me all year to the world of welding and inspection, and reading of the code as a young engineer. After talking with CWIs, and working with SCWIs, I'm begining to think about studying, writing exams, becoming a PE and going into being a consultant, contractor in that area, i.e. get my CWI, and many other qualification with API, ASME, etc to be able to be a inspector/consultant for O&G construction, offshore and onshore, material/metallurgicals, BPV inspection, etc.
Sometimes I get tempted to stay and enjoy the money or get an MBA to climb within the company, but inside me, I know I like to engineer and have my time and get things done.
PLEASE ADVICE...THANKS A MILLION.
 
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Sounds like a great entry level job. Most of the work , that I have seen, for entry level is what you described.What the facilities engineer actually does depends ont eh company. At my current and previous employers, teh facilities engineer most sorked ont hemaintenance side with some input into design, but there were departments for that. I did / do statndards for operations, operators, troubleshooting, code enforcement, etc. Usually around 5 years is where you move and narrow your path. Now you are gaining valuable experience in a lot of different areas.
 
Some one adviced that if I want to go in the welding/metalurgical direction, I should work for a little while and then take the AWS WELDING ENGINEER EXAM. Does this sound promising?
I konw for sure that I like mechanical, metalurgical, material engineering, but what is the job outlook and pay is like for AWS CWEng?

Thanks.
 
You probably already make more money than most who would have only a CWEng. It is a certification, not a license and carries less weight than a P.E. in Welding Engineering.

If you plan to do consulting or independent inspection, the P.E. will be a necessity. Having only the CWEng can get you into trouble with some state boards.
 
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