What is the future of petroleum engineering as a career choice?

The study of petroleum engineering can be broadly divided into two sectors:

1. The Upstream Sector, deals with the exploration, production and exploitation of hydrocarbons (Petroleum and Natural gas).

2. The Downstream Sector, deals with refining, marketing distribution.

Most of the institutes in India offer petroleum engineering courses which cover the study of the upstream sector, whereas the downstream sector companies recruit chemical engineers. For the sake of this answer, I am going to refer to petroleum engineering as a course of the upstream sector.

The demand of Petroleum products: 

We talk at lengths about unconventional renewable energy sources such as solar energy, wind energy etc. but to what amount are we actually using these sources?

[1&2]

Now, different sources may cite different numbers, but all of them can give us a basic idea of what energy sources we are using today. It is clear that even the most developed countries such as the US depend on Petroleum and Natural gas

for the major portion of their energy requirement, and renewable sources account only for 9% of the total energy needs. The world scenario isn't much different. 

Predicting the future with just the current data is not the best method, so let us take a look at some of the past records and then a couple of predictions about our future energy needs and sources.

[3&4]   

It is clear that our energy demands are increasing at an exorbitant rate and the current technology won't be able to enable us to shift away from fossil fuels anytime in the near future. Let's take a look at the expected change in the demand of Oil:

[5]

I suppose we have established that the demand of this black gold is not going down anytime soon. Now comes the question of supply. This is something every second person I have told about my education has asked me.

"But isn't petroleum going to end? What are you going to do then?"

Well my answer always starts with the following statement:

"If Petroleum(/fossil fuels) ends anytime soon, you should worry more about how are you going to live without electricity, how are you going to operate your car without petrol and how are you going to cook without gas in your stove rather than worrying about what will happen to my job."

None of the above is incorrect but a more direct answer would be:

"No, Petroleum is not ending anytime soon. Yes, the reserves of readily available crude that we have been dependent upon for years are declining, but these reserves are still over half full. The technological advances in the field have not only allowed us to extract more of petroleum with better efficiency, but have also opened the gate to unconventional petroleum sources such as Shale, Coal Bed Methane etc.[6]. According to BP’s Statistical Review of World Energy, we still have 1,333 billion barrels of crude oil out there to pump, enough for 40 years at current usage.[7]"

This has been a question that has been asked numerous times throughout history since the day Edwin Drake drilled the first oil well in 1859. There have been millions of answers and claims saying that petroleum will end in the next few years, suddenly, just as it came, and every time, a new, larger oil field has been discovered extending these "few years". So how much oil is there? How confident are you that anybody knows the real answer? All we can reasonably guess is that by next year there will be more of it.  

I hope that the demand and the supply figures have answered your question, 

Let's now take a look at what a petroleum engineer does and is his job different from people working in the other industries.

Jobs of a Petroleum Engineer:

A petroleum engineer is involved in nearly all of the stages of oil and gas field evaluation, development and production. The aim of their work is to maximise hydrocarbon recovery at minimum cost while maintaining a strong emphasis on reducing environmental impact.

Petroleum engineers are divided into several groups:

• Petroleum geologists: who find hydrocarbons by analysing subsurface structures with geological and geophysical methods.
• Reservoir engineers: who work to optimise production of oil and gas via proper well placement, production levels and enhanced oil recovery techniques. They use computer simulations to assist in the identification of risks and to make forecasts on reservoir potential.
• Production engineers: who manage the interface between the reservoir and the well through such tasks as perforations, sand control, artificial lift, downhole flow control and downhole monitoring equipment. They also select surface equipment that separates the produced fluids (oil, natural gas and water).
• Drilling engineers: who manage the technical aspects of drilling both production and injection wells. They work in multidisciplinary teams alongside other engineers, scientists, drilling teams and contractors.[8]

The Pros of being a petroleum engineer:

There are two big reasons that fascinate me about the profession of a petroleum engineer. The first one is the opportunity of being part of an industry that shouts of "Power". Oil has since its discovery played a role in the power politics of the world and continues to do so, ever heard of jokes about US attacking you for a few residual drops of oil? Well those are jokes indeed, but they have a small truth hidden within. The second of my fascination has to do with the extraction process, the idea of working an off-centre job away from my comfort zone, far from all the luxuries of the city that I have become accustomed to captivates me, a nine to five office job isn't my cup of tea. Now, don't get misled, petroleum engineering offers numerous office jobs too, but it also gives you the opportunity of an adventurous, challenging field job that other industries generally don't.

Apart from this, a profession in petroleum engineering is one of the highest paying professions, there may not be as many jobs as say the IT sector, but there aren't as many petroleum engineers either, there are only 5 popular institutes offering the course in India [9].

[10]

The Cons of being a petroleum engineer:

A field petroleum engineering has to face not only difficult but unattractive work conditions in the field, he has to work in dangerous conditions which pose a threat to his life and he has to give up on the comforts of an office. But again if you opt for an office job in the oil and gas industry, you can enjoy the air conditioning just as much as a software engineer.  Also, in India, if you are a petroleum engineer, then as a general trend, you will either get a very lucrative job or you will find it very hard to find a job at all, so if you do decide to become a petroleum engineer, make sure to work hard, and I am sure you will reap the benefits.

"So yes, petroleum engineering has immense scope, and if you are thinking of becoming one, make sure you like it, or whatever else you are getting into, and you will do great."