Petroleum Engineer Vs. Chemical Engineer

[Homayun]

Hi.
Can anyone help me understand what a Petroleum Engineer exactly is? What does he do? I was thinking that it is simply another term for Chemical or Process Engineers...

THanks

 

[zdas04]

Oh, I thought this was going to be a "Battle of the Network Stars" kind of thread.

Petroleum Engineering has aspects of Chemical, Mechanical, and Civil Engineering. The "reservoir" aspect of the discipline deals with storage and transport of hydrocarbons through a semi-permeable media. Reservoir Engineers make extensive use of reservoir and fluid properties models to predict how much hydrocarbon is there, how much of that is recoverable, and how fast can it be extracted.

The "drilling" aspect deals with making a hole in the ground from the surface to reservoir depth. These guys are dealing with drilling fluids, materials selection in wellbore tubulars, and mechanically drilling a hole through rock.

The "completions" aspect deals with connecting a hydrocarbon reservoir with the wellbore. These guys are looking at the results of downhole data collection tools to determine where within the wellbore the reservoir should be connected to the wellbore by "perforating" the casing. These guys also design any required stimulation processes to enhance a reservoir's ability to give up hydrocarbons.

The "production" aspect deals with post-stimulation activities such as pumping liquids and separating liquids and gases.

See it is just like a Chem E inside a plant.

David

 

[dcasto]

petroleum engineers make a tad more on average than ChemE's, both are on the top of the payroll rung for engineers.

Some of us are CPR Engineers.

 

[PioneerX]

You can consider petroleum engineering a sub category of chemical engineering. Today, chemical engineering is so broad that it encompasses many different fields.
Petroleum engineers use the chemical engineering fundamentals and apply to the processes primarily related to the crude oil and all its sub categories. They study details of catalytic cracking, hydrocracking etc.

 

[rmw]

Most of the Petroleum Engineers that I have contact with punch holes in the ground and suck dead dinasours out; their words, not mine.

rmw

 

[Compositepro]

Petroleum engineers get the oil out of the ground. Once the oil gets to the refinery the chemical engineers take over.

 

[Homayun]

Thank you all..
Now I know I can't apply for a job as Petroleum Engineer since I am a chemical engineer...

 

[mbt22]

Not so! Or at least at graduate/entry level for the international oil companies. A fairly large proportion, perhaps even the majority, of petroleum engineers did chemical engineering as their degree.

 

[zdas04]

The last statistics I saw from SPE had about half of them with Petroleum Engineering degrees. The biggest segment in the other half was ME's. Th rest were Chem E's, Civil, and "other".

David

 

[BigInch]

He's got a point that seems obvious to me too. If you didn't have a PE degree, you'd always be on hind tit trying to run with that pack. Would you ever make Alpha Male status? I can hear it now, "pssst.... you know he's not got a PE degree, right (no question mark).

**********************
"Pumping accounts for 20% of the world’s energy used by electric motors and 25-50% of the total electrical energy usage in certain industrial facilities."-DOE statistic (Note: Make that 99% for pipeline companies)

http://virtualpipeline.spaces.live.com/