Career Options of Chemical Engineering

As with all engineers, chemical engineers use math, physics, and economics to solve technical problems. The difference between chemical engineers and other types of engineers is that they apply the knowledge of chemistry in addition to other engineering disciplines. Some of them design and invent new processes while some construct instruments and facilities and some plan and operate facilities. So be it atomic science or polymers or paper or plastics or drugs or food, there is chemical engineering involved in all!

Here are some of the broad things that chemical engineers can work as:

• Chemical engineer (R&D): They develop the ideas for future plants, improving efficiency, environmental performance and even developing new products
• Design Engineer: They determine how the process is to work. For example which pieces of equipment will be needed, and how big they will be.
• Operations Engineer: They spend their time ‘onsite’ ensuring that the plant is producing the right amount of product to the correct specification
• Projects Engineer: They organise and run projects for engineering companies, this can be anything from managing a small modification to an existing pharmaceutical facility to building a multi-billion dollar petrochemicals complex.

 Job Prospects

Since Chemical engineering is a vast field, the job prospects and career options are varied and different across a huge variety of sectors including:

• Chemical and allied products
• Pharmaceuticals
• Energy
• Water
• Food & Drink
• Materials
• Oil & Gas
• Process Plants & Equipment
• Biotechnology
• Environment
• Defence
• Business and Management
• Consultancy

These sectors exist across the private and public sector and thus chemical engineers are spoilt for choice as far as job opportunities are concerned. You can easily find jobs in areas such as processing, operations or manufacturing, research and development, design and construction, finance and teaching.