Is petroleum engineering a dying field?
it seems interesting to me, my understanding is that it isn’t a complete desk job and i will get to work outside alot, and make decent pay, but i’m worried that the field is declining. thanks for anwsering, anyone wanting to add anything else about PE please do..thank you
Steve:
Petroleum Engineering is a sub-discipline of Chemical Engineering and Civil Engineering in the form of Mining Engineering. The number of Petroleum Engineers has always been small when compared to other Engineering disciplines. If you are concerned about the long term viability of Pet. Eng. as a profession then you may want to make sure that your education is some what broader and includes areas within the specialty like Coal and Natural Gas. Alternately stay more in the general disciplines with extra focus on petroleum.
At the beginning of my professional career (late 1970’s) the bottom had fallen out of the Petroleum Engineering market. Major oil companies like Exxon were running around like crazy to find other ways to continue their business because we were going to run out of oil.
They are are still in the Oil business but they are no longer in those other Industries. I had worked for Exxon Office Systems for two years. Exxon closed that company less than six months after I left.
One thing to remember as an engineer, your shelf life with no continuing education will be about 5 to 7 years. If you really love engineering you will be changing what you do on a regular cycle and will need to keep up with the changing profession.
There are a number of Pet. Eng. jobs posted in the Jobs area of Engineering.com [1]. Look at those jobs and the companies posting them. Also look at other sites where Pet. Eng. positions are being posted. See if there are jobs for young engineers. That will give you a good idea of the status industry. Also go to the Society of Petroleum Engineers website [2] and see what they have to say about your industry
Niel Leon
Community Developer – Engineering.com
Practicing Engineering for over 30 years – Someday I will get it correct!
