Oil Comp Engr
38 Years Experience
Houston, TX
Female, 60
I recently retired from a major integrated oil company after 38 years. I have degrees in Civil and Petroleum Engineering. I worked with safety, health and environmental management systems and operations in the upstream (finding and producing oil and gas) and downstream (refining, chemicals and distributions) areas. I travelled all over world, enduring good & bad business cycles and good and bad managers.
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I STRONGLY encourage you to diversify. Have you looked at the job market lately? Many companies are not only NOT hiring, but are actively laying people off. Unless you are looking at working for a nationalized oil company and/or are located in the Mid East, things are very, very tough right now. The beautiful thing about the petroleum industry is that there is a wide diversity of backgrounds. Things that you learn in Chemical engineering can be applied to the petroleum industry. Also, keep in mind that the purpose of any engineering degree is to learn how to learn, so to speak. It is all about getting more tools in your toolkit and learning to solve a wide variety of problems. With any master's degree, you are going to demonstrate that you can tackle a tough problem in detail over an extended period of time. I have worked with many engineers who didn't use the specific thing they learned in their master's thesis but they DID use the skills they developed in how to frame a complex problem, set up the research, write the thesis and then, most importantly, defend their ideas.
By getting a masters in Chem E, you will broaden your chances of getting a job upon graduation. You can always come back to the upstream when the economy recovers.
Best of luck to you.
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It's pretty risky. As you can see in my previous posts, you don't have to get a petroleum engineering degree to go into the oil business. The vast majority of engineers have degrees in Mechanical, Chemical or Civil. My undergraduate is in Civil. The only reason I have a master's degree in Petroleum is because my company paid for it while I worked full time and because the demand for petroleum engineers was sky-high. If the industry does rebound by 2026, they will be hiring engineers with diverse backgrounds and training them on the job.
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Right now, I doubt there will be any internships for petroleum engineering students in the USA. Many companies are laying off engineers. The price of oil has collapsed and it will be a long time until we recover. I would strongly advise you to switch to a different major like mechanical, chemical or civil engineering. Even they are going to have a tough time get a job in this current economy.
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No, I do not. If you have good grades and an honors degree, you should focus on getting a job ASAP. The oil industry is collapsing and many companies are laying people off. This is the worst oil recession I have seen in my career, which is nearly 40 years in length. If you can't get a job, considering getting a master's degree in mechanical or chemical engineering, which is much more marketable. Best of luck to you.
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This is beyond my area of expertise. I suggest you consult the internet.
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The best part of my job was (I recently retired) the feeling of satisfaction i got from completing a successful project on time, on budget and with no safety or environmental issues. Knowing that I was responsible for designing and drilling a well that provided essentially energy was a satisfying feeling. Another highlight was doing safety audits and finding systemic but effective improvements that made the workplace safer for everyone. It was great to be able to improve the "system" without any one person getting into trouble or fearing for their job. I like to think that I saved a few lives and limbs over the course of my many safety audits.
The worst part of my job was the uncertainty of oil and gas prices that could lead to massive layoffs at any point. The current situation today is even worse than what I lived through in previous price collapses like in 1985. It was/is terrible to feel so powerless.
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