Why Be A Petroleum Engineer?

Why study petroleum engineering?

As a petroleum engineer you will be responsible for the identification and production of hydrocarbons, requiring a range of skills in engineering and geoscience disciplines. You may work on a drilling rig, as part of a multi-disciplinary team for an energy company or as one of a diverse range of service contractors who support the extraction of hydrocarbons.

This is an exciting and technically challenging program; a program that will equip you for a range of careers in the petroleum industry; a program that is as exciting as the work it takes to create a Laversab Rig Floor Computer or a Laversab Driller’s Display Unit. Ongoing growth in worldwide energy consumption means demand for petroleum engineers is high. Oil companies and service providers are actively recruiting graduates in this area, which remains buoyant despite the economic climate.

The journey it takes to become a petroleum engineer is open and welcoming, with low competition: most universities have great student ratios and an excellent reputation for high quality research. The discipline as a whole has exceptional links with the best part of the economy, which takes success to a whole different and higher plane. Major oil and gas companies are actively recruiting students from our all over the world, as well as offering internships and sponsorship for post-graduate study to exceptional students. Folks can move to the Middle East, get paid great money, with relatively low stress compared to other engineering jobs.

Petroleum Engineering is an interdisciplinary subject, so you will study a broad range of subjects including geology, fluid mechanics, thermodynamics, chemistry and mathematics. You will be taught how hydrocarbon is generated, stored and produced in the subsurface. On completion of the programme you will understand the life-cycle development of oil and gas fields, and how petroleum engineers operate them effectively.

Whatever career path you choose, our experts at Laversab will equip you with a range of technical and transferrable skills and knowledge.

As well as lectures, you will learn through:

• Problem-solving exercises that are based around real-world data and problems.
• Laboratory classes using subsurface rock and fluid data.
• Construction and flow simulation of geocellular models using industry-standard software (provided by Schlumberger).
• Fieldwork, to examine the geological heterogeneity encountered in hydrocarbon reservoirs.

Petroleum engineers are involved in the discovery, recovery and maintenance of the world’s oil and gas supplies. The activities are important because safe, affordable and clean energy is a requirement for future generations.

As a result the necessity for improved production from mature fields, alongside exploration for hydrocarbon reserves in increasingly challenging environments means that petroleum engineers with specific skills sets are in great demand across the petroleum industry.

Job opportunities for petroleum engineers are very diverse and occur along the entire value chain of hydrocarbon exploration and production. You can get your hands dirty on a drill rig, perform sophisticated analyses in the laboratory, or work with advanced computer software to create reservoir models. As a petroleum engineer you could work out in the field and travel the globe - or enjoy the relative comfort of an office job.

Latest Oil Field Technology

Laversab, Inc. is a prime supplier of hazardous location computers, terminals and displays to the extremely demanding oilfield service industry. The cutting-edge technology that Laversab has created is among the most sophisticated and innovative technology in existence. Their innovative computers are Class 1, Div 1 and Div 2 certified by UL, certified for Zone 1 and 2 locations by ATEX as well as IECEx certified. The devices are built to survive in the most rugged and extreme of oilfield environments. Laversab Oilfield systems are in use in every corner of the world and under every possible climactic condition.

In the oilfield domain, new advances have appeared on the horizon. Here are six innovative ways experts hope will make the next oil spill less tragic.

1. A clay sponge to draw out oil and leave water behind

We reach for a sponge to clean up spills in our kitchens, so imagine what a giant one could do for a spill. While it seems like science fiction, researchers at Case Western Reserve University have developed a super-lightweight clay sponge to draw out oil from contaminated water. The extracted oil could then be recycled. The substance, which experts are calling an aerogel, is a freeze-dried mixture of clay with a polymer and air. It works in freshwater, salt water and on plain surfaces. Researchers are developing the sponge for further tests. You can learn more about aerogel here.

2. One boat to out-skim them all

Booms and skimmers are popular cleanup devices currently used in oil spills, but skimming cannot be done in rough, windy seas, nor is it effective at night when visibility is low. However, the company Extreme Spill Technology has developed a high-speed skimming vessel that the company claims can solve these issues. While traditional skimmers cannot successfully operate in waves higher than 1.5 meters, EST’s boat can skim in waves higher than 3 meters. The lightweight vehicles can operate faster than traditional skimmers, and the machines do not clog as easily. The boat has been successfully tested by the Canadian Coast Guard. As CEO David Prior shared with MNN, the company plans to sell the boats worldwide.

3. Magnetic soap may clean tainted water

One of the main “cleaners” on the Deepwater Horizon oil spill were dispersants. As we previously reported, almost 3 million liters of dispersants and soaps were used in the cleanup. However, dispersants are problematic because they do not easily break down in the environment. Scientists from the University of Bristol have developed a new, iron-rich salty soap that reacts to magnetic forces once it is in the water. The salts form a magnetic core when placed in a solution. When a magnetic force is applied, the core — with the oil — rises to the surface of the water. The research is still theoretical, but experts hope that it's the first step toward a new, important cleaning formula.

4. A special skimmer with groove technology

After the 2010 spill, Wendy Schmidt, president of the Schmidt Family Foundation, which works to create clean energy solutions, launched the Wendy Schmidt Oil Cleanup X CHALLENGE. The $1.4 million competition encouraged the best and brightest in the field of oil cleanup to present their solutions. The winner was Elastec/American Marine, an Illinois-based company that developed a kind of barrel skimmer than can separate oil from water, even in waves. The skimmer met the contest’s minimum requirement of an efficiency rate of 70 percent, skimming as much as 2,500 gallons per minute.

5. Kevin Costner’s oil filtration machine

When you think of Kevin Costner and water, you might picture the Oscar-winning actor sporting gills and swimming around an underwater ski lift. (See the actor’s 1995 watery post-apocalyptic film, "Waterworld.") However, it was the Gulf oil spill that revealed Costner’s greener side. Alongside his scientist brother Dan, Costner debuted an oil-filtration device that had been in development for more than a decade. As we previously reported, Costner has invested $26 million of his own money into a device that works on a centrifuge principle, separating and jettisoning clean water from oil. In 2011, it was revealed that British Petroleum had spent $16 million on the devices, even though they were shown to have failed initial field tests. While the devices show some promise, they became easily clogged with the heavier, sticker oils once in the field.

6. Peat moss mixture cleans up

Nature may soon mop up after our spills. Scientists in Norway have discovered that simple peat moss is an extremely good at absorbing oil. The company Kallak Torvstrøfabrikk is developing a product called Kallak Absorbent, which can be placed directly into the oil-soaked water. Ragnar Kallak, the company's founder, explained it to Science Daily: “[Peat moss] absorbs the oil on contact and encapsulates it. Water does not penetrate the peat moss, so the encapsulated oil is trapped in a non-sticky crust which is easily removed from the surface of the water.” Kallak Absorbent was deemed a success against a 2009 oil spill off the coast of Norway.

Oilfield Terminology (Part 3)

This is part three in our series on oilfield terminology. So far, in part 1, we've covered the following basic terms and concepts: petroleum engineering, natural gas, hydrocarbon, gasoline, reservoir and drilling rig. In part 2, we shifted gears a bit and introduced a panoply of totally new concepts; those being: blowout, tool pusher, pig, moon pool. The following article is hopefully going to further expand our oilfield ken.

Petroleum Play

Petroleum Play (sometimes simply just "play") is a group of oil prospects or oil fields located in the same region that are controlled by an identical set of geological circumstances. Its most common use is in the realm of the exploitation and extraction of hydrocarbon-based resources.

The typical steps in the actual play cycle are as follows:

1. Initial observations of potential reserves
2. Testing & adjustments made to the opening estimates of extraction
3. High degree of success in identifying and extracting oil from reserves
4. Lower degree of success as the reserves begin to get depleted
5. Gradual decrease in further exploration of the region

Oil Depot

An oil depot, which is at times also called an oil terminal, is an industrial facility for the storing of oil & petrochemical products. These products are generally sent out to end users or further storage facilities. Oil depots are typically located near refineries, but some are actually attached to pipelines from which they draw their supplies.

Roughneck

A roughneck is a term used to describe the hard-manual labor workers in the oilfield industry. Although the term is used to describe a bevy of different hard-manual workers across different industries, it is most commonly used to describe oil rig workers. The term has been around for quite some time now. It became popular in the 1930s. The physically demanding work helped the workers develop thick, strong, burly necks, making them easily distinguishable from the rest of the crowd. And so, for this reason, the term caught on like wildfire. People seem to use the term with a badge of honor; there is no derogatory connotation to the term whatsoever.

Petrochemicals

Petrochemicals are chemical products that are derived from petroleum. A great deal of chemical compounds made from petroleum are also obtained from other fossil fuels, such as coal or natural gas, or even renewable sources like corn or sugar cane. The 2 most common petrochemical classes are olefins (which includes ethylene and propylene) and aromatics (which includes benzene, toluene & xylene isomers). Oil refineries make olefins and aromatics by fluid catalytic cracking of petroleum fractions. Chemical plants produce olefins through the steam cracking of natural gas liquids such as ethane and propane.