<p>Just curious. Assuming you believe that we have decades of oil left and it will most likely be in demand until we run out, do you think the salaries of PEs will go up in the future as the oil/gas supply drops and the price rises?</p>
<p>I guess the only way the salaries would go up is if the demand for PEs increasingly outweighed the supply, which leads to my next question. Well actually another reason I could see the salaries increasing is as a result of the remaining majority of oil being located in unfavorable areas (deep sea, arctic, middle east). But on to my next question..</p>
<p>I'm from Canada and we only have two schools here that offer PE at the undergraduate level so I don't really have a good idea of the supply of new PE graduates coming into the job market each year. Is the amount of newly minted PEs on the rise in the US?</p>
<p>One last question. Most PE graduates in Canada end up working for companies in Alberta, aka tar sands. Say I work in the oil sands for 5 years, is that going to hurt my chances of getting a job with an operation that extracts from a well? Seeing as it's not a similar process would my experience not really be worth anything?</p>
<p>I assume from your username that you are located at UofA in Edmonton. Great school; I’d go there if I were Canadian.</p>
<p>Petroleum engineering is definitely becoming more popular. At the 16 US institutions that granted degrees in PetE in 2008-09, the number of bachelors degrees granted rose 182% from 2002-03 (244 to 689). At these same schools, all engineering degrees (including petroleum) increased by only **12%<a href=“5857%20to%206609”>/b</a>.</p>
<p>Similar work experience is certainly an asset. However, if you look at job descriptions, any experience in production is viewed positively. Well experience might just be viewed more positively.</p>
<p>As others have said, the business goes through booms and busts depending on the price of oil and other factors such as regulation. With oil currently hovering at $90 per barrel, mid-level to senior salaries and jobs should continue to see strong demand. However, the same may not apply for entry level positions, but many people say that these same senior Pet engineers will be retiring soon, so that will open up the door for recent college graduates to enter the profession. I’m not sure why you would be worried about pay raises when the salaries are already very high.</p>
<p>Regarding the tar sands, I read that the US has one of if not the largest known supply of tar sands in the world so if you have experience working in tar sands in Canada, then you certainly can work with tar sands in the US. If you want to work on deep sea rigs, then should specialize in that field and not in tar sands.</p>
<p>but with the number of students increasing considerAbly,dont u think salaries wud go much down even if the prices remain Aroundabout the same over the next five years or so ?</p>
<p>In the 1990’s, you saw 6 figure salary offers to students with BS degrees in CS regularly. In fact it was expected to make that much if you were one of the better students at a top school. Starting around 1999, the number of students with CS degrees increased rapidly as everyone flocked to the high paying career, and salaries dropped substantially. Now, despite 10 years of inflation, the starting salary for CS degrees are well below what they were back in the high demand, low supply days. I have a feeling that PetE will follow a similar path.</p>
<p>I don’t think so. Not many schools have PetrE programs so even if this massive demand developed we’d first have to see schools adopt the program. Which I don’t think will happen. The vast majority of the students getting PetrE degrees are the ones that grew up in oil producing areas. Most high school grads have no interest in the oil industry simply because it is foreign to them. Everyone has computers. In order to work as a PetrE its likely that you will have to live in one of the relatively few oil producing areas, some of these areas are not so attractive to many students. Theres also the likelihood of an abnormal work schedule that sees you working 2 or 3 weeks straight with no time off. So basically what I’m saying is, PetE simply isn’t and never will be an attractive career for anywhere near as many people as a CS degree is.</p>
<p>^^but even then there are not many companies offering petroleum engineering and hence the number of people being hired every year are way less than cs where there are many many companies you can apply to.so i very much think that banjohitter is correct.i feel that would happen anytime soon.</p>
<p>The good news is that if PetE graduates start to outpace job growth, you won’t see the market completely fall out ($35,000 / year PetE jobs). What you’ll instead see is starting salaries that equilibrate with other similar engineers (e.g. ChemE at $65,000 / year). That will decrease the number students going into that field instead of others.</p>
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<p>Don’t doubt the influence of money on an otherwise undecided engineering major.</p>
<p>less companies,less vacancies,many applicants,plus its a gamble if prices fall during recruitment time–points driving away from petroleum engineering career</p>
<p>^^i mean there will be less vacancies in the future looking at the growing pace of people getting into this field.i see the statistics go much down anytime soon.and even as of 2010,its not more than 70% recruitment.so with less companies and growing number of people,its obvious that it has to go down.</p>
<p>Salaries are linked to the price of oil. If independents cannot compete, they will be absorbed by larger corporations. If corporations cannot compete, independents will take over that market share. Salaries will not decrease.</p>
<p>I am looking for an internship, I am senior in petroleum engineering. But I realize that you have to be referred or know someone in those petroleum companies to get an internship. My phone number is 443-813-3018. My email is <a href="mailto:nagha12@yahoo.fr">nagha12@yahoo.fr</a>
Thanks a lot</p>
<p>Salaries are linked to the price of oil. If independents cannot compete, they will be absorbed by larger corporations. If corporations cannot compete, independents will take over that market share. Salaries will not decrease.</p>
<p>-then whats the point behind saying that the experienced petroleum engineers will retire within 5 years so there will be more jobs available within that period ? I guess its because there will will be vacant seats as they retire–now how does this meet your opinion that recruitment is not based on vacancies and on the prices of oil ?
and when you say salaries dont go down,you should note the falling trend in the recruitment and the salaries from 2006-07 till date !
and isn’t it been rare to hear that petroleum engineering students dont get internships since if they dont get one,they are half their worth when they finish 4 years then it would have been otherwise ! -but yea,today you hear that only 2-3 students from most reputed colleges got internships-isn’t this a sign of what I mentioned earlier ?
and the recruitment-see it fall from close to 100% in 2006-07 to 70% in 2010-and I am afraid whats next.
2-3 students getting internships says it all-and imagine how many of those might have got it because either of their parents were in the oil industry !</p>
<p>I’m not sure what school has only 2-3 students getting internships as PetrE’s. I don’t know much about the oil/gas scene in the US. Maybe because new drilling has been inhibited since the BP incident job outlook has worsened for new grads in the US? But everything seems to be fine here in Canada, lots of students getting jobs/internships. So I wouldn’t say its an industry wide trend. I really doubt placement is down much relative to other engineering majors.</p>
<p>exact words from the OU university website of USA:
For the first time in several years we are seeing a reversal in undergraduate enrollment trend. Still the total numbers of undergraduate students is a very healthy number of 428. The reversal of the trend likely is related to the state of the energy industry. An area of real concern is the lack of job offers to the graduating class of 2010. At this time only 30% of the May graduates have a firm job offer which leaves about 50 students with no job offers. These numbers are very worrisome as this time last year 80% of the graduating class had job offers. Based on feedback from students, it is clear that this year there has also been a drop in numbers of offers for summer internships. Even though there has been no significant drop in the number of companies interviewing on campus there has been definitely a drop in the number of job and internship offers.</p>
<p>and when you say placement is not much down compared to other engineering majors,
the statistics are from say many schools contrasting to petroleum engineering and maybe some other fields-there are counted number of schools that offer the major-you can go on to remember all of those offering it just glancing through all of them.
and when you say other majors,have you ever heard some major recruiting close to 90% ? -maybe school-specific and that too at a very reputable school-the 90% figure once used to be common for petroleum engineering contrasting the present overall recruitment of close to 70%.
also,for other majors,there are schools that are not highly rated compared to others so recruitment wont be high there-and there are many such around the world unlike petroleum where only some schools offer it–there is good possibility that the %recruitment may go down because of these schools unlike petroleum engineering schools where the school hardly matters but the internships you got and most petroleum engineering schools in US are reputable and can hardly be distinguished from each other-in terms of recruitment.
an about 2-3 students getting internships-i’ve been reading it over and over again recently students complaining that one of their good students got it and only ‘2-3’ have been offered from their school-and asking what they should do to get it and one of my friends at texas a&m confirmed this.
and the current condition is much much worse even in the gulf countries-from where the majority of oil comes.
you might want to scan through the news to confirm this condition in the gulf.
I did it + asked a student from egypt who along with some of his friends didn’t get recruited and so they don’t know what to do at home other than waiting for the next recruitment round-they attacked one of the offices of an oil company and he sent me links to three videos proving it.
now how do you say its not industry-wide ?</p>