I am a high school senior debating between these two majors. In high school, I enjoyed both Mechanics and E&M very much so its really tough for me to decide which of the two engineering fields I’ll like more. Whichever field I pick, I am also planning to minor or double in Physics and Computer Science. In terms of career interests, I am very much interested in the renewable energy sector, particularly solar and nuclear fusion.
What would be the roles of these two engineers in these renewable energy fields? Which engineer would be more in demand? Which engineering branch has greater scope for breakthroughs?
Both are great fields. Your sophomore year of college is when you usually start taking actual engineering courses. You can take the “gateway course” to each of these majors and decide what you like better.
You can’t go wrong with either. When it comes to renewable energy projects there are many types of engineers who work on them including both EE’s and ME’s. Just know the EE’s will focus more on the electrical power generation and distribution whereas ME’s will focus more on structures, thermodynamics and heat flow, and so on. Like maybe an ME would have to work on making the angle of the solar panels’ casing properly as to let in the most amount of light to maximize efficiency.
You are in a very good position I would say. At least start with asking yourself what did you enjoy more, Mechanics or E&M (specifically circuits)?. That’ll AT LEAST give you an idea of what you’ll enjoy more as a major. Both of those majors pay well, and have some of the highest employment when it comes to the engineering disciplines which is why you honestly can’t go wrong.
If you are undecided, consider schools where your majors of interest are not difficult to change into. At some schools, engineering majors are enrolled to capacity, so changing into one requires a high college GPA or competitive admission.
I think I enjoyed Mechanics more especially thermodynamics. But I also enjoyed learning about magnetic fields and electromagnetic induction. I think I enjoyed learning the theory and concepts of E&M more than its applications in circuits.
That’s actually something I’m concerned about. I’ve never been a hands-on engineering guy. Usually, I just enjoy thinking of theoretical concepts in Physics and I’ve heard Electrical Engineering goes into higher level physics. Is that true?
It depends on the school and depends a bit what you mean. But I think most EE’s are required to take some level of modern physics; ME’s often aren’t. That may be what those who say EE’s do more fundamental physics mean. If so, the answer is yes, EE’s do more of that.
EE requires more courses in the physics department; ME requires more courses in the math department. That’s probably pretty typical.
How high the concepts go depends on the sort of applications you ultimately work on. But if you like mechanics and thermo, you might want to look at “Engineering Mechanics” and “Engineering Physics”.
That’s actually pretty amazing. I got an ME degree from UIUC not all that long ago and was required to also take PHYS 213/214, which include waves and quantum and those sorts of topics. I am quite surprised that is no longer required for MEs.
Not necessarily. There are plenty of engineering students who hit theory pretty hard and don’t do a lot of “nuts and bolts” type stuff in all the majors. I was a mechanical engineer as an undergraduate and had never (and still haven’t) fixed my own car, for example. At the same time, there are plenty of EE students who got into it because they built a radio and want to tinker with electronics all the while there are some who got into it because they found the theory and applications of E&M to be interesting.
My phd is from UIUC. My undergrad was IIT (back in 81). I had to take waves, quantum, optics etc. In fact, some vestigial thermo/fluid stuff was in the 3rd physics class. I looked because I know things change. Things just get squeezed out. (My area was fluid mechanics.)
I’ve never used the quantum stuff. I did use waves and optics. That said, when I took those courses, the quantum electromagetic stuff were the easy topics. There’s nothing hard about “photons” or “quantization” and so on.
I definitely concur that both EE and ME can be either quite hands on or quite theoretical. Students usually move one way or the other based on what they like and also some somewhat random factors.
Yeah, even my own BS was 8 years ago now but I’m still surprised. We had some of the more “classical” thermo stuff in that PHYS 213 class, and 214 was waves, optics, quantum, etc.
I have noticed over my 33 years on the IIT faculty that modern physics has gotten squeezed out of the ME curriculum. EEs still take some modern physics though.
I have gotten into UT Austin for Mechanical Engineering and if I want to switch I would have to make an appeal before enrollment. If approved its essentially irreversible. UT has an ECE program which has various exciting technical cores to pick from including Nanotech, Software Engineering, and Renewable Energy Systems. The degree plan seems to have more modern physics. On the other hand, MechE has more classical focus with classes in material science and thermal/fluid systems.
From a job perspective Mechanical might be more exciting. From my understanding, the actual capture of energy from wind, water, or the sun is a mechanical process while the transport is an electrical one. Is that correct? Which area is a greater challenge in the way of renewables right now?
Also, outside of renewables, it seems to me that there might be more scope for growth in electrical fields.Increasingly, e lectronic parts seem to be replacing mechanical systems in planes, cars, and almost every machine. With the advent of electric cars, wouldn’t the only mechanical aspect remaining in cars be the drivetrain?
Is this a reasonable assumption? Or are there still opportunities for growth in ME?
So what exactly are you asking us? Both fields have plenty of challenging topics and challenging career paths. Both fields are incredibly broad and encompass many industries. Both have plenty of growth potential. It really comes down to which components of these various systems you wish to study.
The tales of death of the need for mechanical engineers are long standing— and never coming true. But even if you think of solar as being somehow an electrical engineering problem, you might want to consider that manufacturing of panels has a host of classic mechanical engineering problems:
A snazzy robotic arm: Dynamics and control of these is a classic dynamics problem-- and so ME.
A furnace: heat distribution, energy use: ME.
Air quality in the clean room: Classic ME problem.
Even coating on surfaces: Classic stability problem in… ME (and some chem e.)
Motion of more robots: More forces, kinematics, dynamics: ME
More control of heating and cooling in yet another oven and configuration: ME.
Mechanical engineering problems are not going to go away. One reason people who are not ME’s think they are going away is those people don’t know what problems ME’s focus on.
That said: electrical engineering problems are also not going away. Nor physics problems. Nor Chem E problems. Nor civil engineering. It just depends on what you like best.
I would say electrical engineering, there’s more doors open and way more fields covered related to physics, programming and technology in general. I have a degree an EE and physics, I can say EE is a far better degree not only did it covered almost all my curriculum (though not as in depth) but also programming and any type of design : robotics, circuitry, computers, solar power, fiber optics and even atmospheric science.
A lot of the challenegs involve material science and fuel cell/battery technology. UT doesn’t offer a Material Science Engineering degree for undergrad though. Which major would provide me more opportunities in this field?