Kudos to the Texas A&M petroleum engineering department once again

A while back, you may remember this letter to freshmen from the Texas A&M petroleum engineering department: 

Dear Admitted Aggie PETE Applicant,  

The Harold Vance Department of Petroleum Engineering, Texas A&M University, is pleased that you applied and were admitted to our top ranked petroleum engineering program. If you pursue a degree in petroleum engineering, our program is committed to providing the highest quality education available.  

Recent data suggests that some concern about the sustainability of the entry level job market during a time of explosive growth in the number of students studying petroleum engineering in U.S. universities may be prudent.  

Our advice is that you become aware of graduation projections and petroleum industry employment outlook for people with petroleum engineering degrees. For example, between fall 2011 and fall 2012, the number of freshmen in petroleum engineering programs in the U.S. increased from 1,388 to 2,153, a 55% jump in one year. Based on the many inquiries and applications TAMU is receiving for the petroleum engineering major, the number of U.S. students in petroleum engineering will probably continue a strong upward trend, as long as the employment market remains stable. 

These days, a very large number of people are already studying in petroleum engineering programs (see attachment, showing data made available through the Society of Petroleum Engineers, SPE), at a time when: the number of recent graduates, who began their studies several years ago, is already at about historical highs and growing rapidly (see attachment); our program’s board of industry advisors are recommending that we “do not grow” our undergraduate program at this time; and oil and natural gas price projections and expectations of U.S. governmental policy influences are viewed as not particularly encouraging by the U.S. petroleum industry. 

Considering the layoffs happening in the oil industry, I want to take this opportunity to once again congratulate that department not only for their foresight*, but for their due diligence in looking out for their students and their long-term best interests.

[When do we think WTI will be back above $100? I say by December, but I am neither a soothsayer, nor a pessimist.]

*OK, it may not take that much foresight to recognize that there are boom-and-bust cycles in the petroleum industry. 

A comparison of AiCHE and ACS membership dues

No real comment, just an interesting comparison. I think the graded dues would be something I'd like to see for ACS. Also, getting undergrads in for free seems like a good idea for chemical engineers (a lot fewer of those than for chemists, I'll bet.) 

NACE: petroleum engineers making average $95,000 starting salaries

From the National Association of Colleges and Employers: 

I'm detecting a trend here. 

Your morning troll: B.S. chemists need to be supervised, chemical engineers are teh awesome

Believe it or not, I have quite a few things to say, but I wanted to find time for this gem from a 2013 National Academies workshop on undergraduate chemistry education. (You can read it for free at the site, or you can download it, if you register.)

There were lots of professors and representatives from industry at the conference. Here, John Kozarich (president of ActiveX Biosciences), Joel Shulman (professor at the University of Cincinnati), Shannon Bullard (HR director at DuPont), Francine Palmer (Solvay) and Robert Peoples (sustainability director at the Carpet America Recovery Effort) discuss recent graduates in the chemical sciences:

Kozarich and Shulman both thought that students need to have some exposure to interviewing skills, which is in a sense an extension of problem solving. Shulman thought that these kinds of “employability skills” could be incorporated into the new requirement in the ACS guidelines that call for students to have a capstone experience.  

Shulman also asked the panel if the salary premium that chemical engineering graduates receive compared with chemistry graduates is a result of the former having more of these employability skills. Both Palmer and Bullard agreed with that statement completely. Palmer noted that the chemical engineering graduates she hires have much more experience in collaborative problem solving and in presentation skills because those are emphasized in the chemical engineering curriculum. Bullard added that the training focus in chemistry is on independent research in a specific area, not interdisciplinary research in a team context.  

Peoples noted that when a company hires a chemical engineer, it knows that it can assign him or her a problem and the chemical engineer will know how to tackle it and solve it. Chemists with a bachelor’s degree come with the expectation that they will be supervised.

I think that chemists and chemical engineers are typically asked to work on different sorts of problems, but Dr. Peoples' opinion has the air of truthiness around it. I'm skeptical that it is indeed an accurate statement (especially that chemical engineers have magic problem-tackling skills), but what do I know?

UPDATE: Should I nominate Dr. Peoples' for the first-ever Banholzer Award in Truth-Telling about Chemical Employment for his opinion that B.S. chemical engineers have more Git-'Er-Done-ness than B.S. chemists? I am tempted. 

MOAR MATH

Also in this week's C&EN's letters to the editor, the magic of chemical engineering knowledge to provide people with job skills: 

An Idea For Unemployed Chemists 

Have you ever wondered why chemical engineers fresh out of school, or at any level for that matter, are offered higher salaries than chemists? Or, why is unemployment for chemists a more likely circumstance than it is for chemical engineers? Both majors take the same organic and physical chemistry classes. We all love the beautiful science of chemistry, so why this startling difference? 

Linda Wang’s recent article, “Hired … for Now,” highlights eight career-related benefits from the American Chemical Society to aid unemployed members (C&EN, Dec. 2, 2013, page 33). Here’s another: Any students majoring in chemistry as well as any unemployed chemists would find their career enhanced by even a brief exposure to chemical engineering. 

For an introduction to chemical engineering, chemists at any level should consider enrolling in two gatekeeper courses in the chemical engineering curriculum: “Material Balances” and “Energy Balances.” No need to fret about that great demon for many nonengineering students—math—for in these two courses the most advanced math required is arithmetic. Rather, what is required is detailed analytical thinking and practice in application to many different sorts of problems. Consider this one: Your car runs on gasoline with 10% excess air having a relative humidity of 30%. Calculate the quantitative analysis of the exhaust from the tailpipe. 

One can easily imagine all sorts of similar complex problems to solve. They seem trivial in principle, but they are tedious in practice. So be prepared. Chemical engineering courses are hard—no auditing. After this taste, one might try a course that covers thermodynamics or perhaps heat transfer. But now advanced math becomes essential. 

Henry McGee
Richmond, Va.

Personally, I would attribute the higher salaries and lower unemployment of chemical engineers to the fact that it's a smaller, more specialized field, with higher barriers to entry in terms of schooling (harder to set up a College of Engineering than a College of Science, probably, and there are likely fewer of them) and licensing requirements for chemical engineers. But that's my Economics 101 view of the world, and I'm probably missing something.

[Fans of logical fallacies -- is Dr. McGee's "any unemployed chemists would find their career enhanced..." statement an example of "question begging"? I don't think so, but I can't find the correct logical fallacy.]

I find it amusing that Professor McGee believes that it is the higher amounts of mathematical training that results in chemical engineering being more remunerative. Well, maybe; it certainly results in yet another barrier-to-entry for non-mathematically inclined folks. But somehow I think there are other factors in play. 

This Is What Shortage Looks Like, petroleum engineering edition

From the pages of Bloomberg, a reminder of what actual shortage in an employment field looks like:

Wages in energy and mining have grown at nine times the rate of all industries since 2008, and starting salaries for petroleum engineering graduates are about $98,000, up 9.7 percent since 2008, according to PayScale Inc. 

The need is acute at the newest chemical, refining and export complexes that serve a shale-drilling renaissance that has given U.S. companies the competitive advantage of low gas prices. As shale projects and their infrastructure multiplies, the ensuing war for talent will double labor costs by 2020 for skilled workers such as geoscientists and engineers, according to NES Global and Piper Morgan Associates.

I'm a little bit skeptical about these numbers, in that NES Global and Piper Morgan are both petroleum industry recruiting/staffing agencies. That said, the article is chockfull of encouraging statements like this one:

“If you can spell ‘shale,’ you can get a job,” Ryan Lance, chief executive officer of ConocoPhillips, said March 5 at the IHS CERAWeek energy conference in Houston.

And this one:

Skilled and experienced workers such as engineers are earning an average of between $183,000 and $285,000 a year depending on the position and experience level and about $120,000 a year after graduating from college, NES data show. Salaries in some fields may double in the next seven years, Groeneveld said.

And here's how you know there's a real shortage in petroleum technology workers -- companies are broadening, not narrowing, their willingness to accept workers from other fields :

Demand for skilled workers is so great that companies such as ConocoPhillips have begun to poach graduates from other fields such as electrical, mechanical and civil engineering and develop programs to train them in petroleum engineering, said Sheila Feldman, vice president of human resources for the Houston-based energy company. 

...Colleges in Texas and Oklahoma are leading the nation in efforts to tailor programs to industry needs, said Dan Clark, managing partner of Energy Headhunter, a recruiting firm in Houston. The fluidity of movement in the U.S., as well as an increasing willingness in the industry to train non-technical graduates for some jobs such as in North Dakota, will help meet the challenge, he said.

There is little doubt in my mind that there is indeed a shortage of classically-trained petroleum engineers in the United States. Strong wage increases*, actual (not projected) spending on petrochemical complexes and the willingness of employers to hire graduates from other fields are all indications that there is an actual shortage of them. Remind yourself of that the next time you hear a politician tell you about scientist shortage and ask yourself -- is the wage increasing? In the immortal words of economist Lindsey Lowell, "have the wage lead the way."

*9.7%! That beats the holy crap out of CPI inflation for that time period (3-4%). For that same time period, the median ACS member lost 7% in salary, I think. 

Found data: salaries at IRIX Pharmaceuticals

So thanks to yesterday's discussion, I was pretty interested to see that IRIX has posted more positions and their salaries (incidentally, they'll be interviewing at ACS San Diego.) I think it's instructive for scientists and engineers to compare their salaries:

Scientist I (B.S. chemist, research associate (?)): 35-50k
Principal scientist (Ph.D. chemist, 2-3 years experience): 65-85k
Manufacturing engineer (BS/MS, supervisory level): 85-110k

With the help of GlassDoor, I ginned up a little graphic (above). For the young among us, it might be worthwhile to consider a career change? That said, the life of said manufacturing engineer doesn't sound very fun:

Applies complete understanding of organic/process chemistry and bulk pharmaceutical batch operations. Provides process-engineering support and troubleshoots routine and non-routine process and process equipment problems as necessary to meet all production and customer commitments in support of manufacturing bulk pharmaceutical (API) chemicals. Independently manages project activities and works as part of a team while communicating effectively to support rapidly changing business needs. Directs activities of workers who operate and control such equipment as reactors, pumps, valves, tanks, boilers, compressors, pipelines, and centrifuges to effect the required chemical or physical change.

I guess that extra $25k might help a manufacturing engineer to enjoy life more, I suppose.