Eldest daughter is keen to pursue this subject at Degree level.
We have attended the open day at Huddersfield and their course, which seems to be rated well, appears to include a good amount of Chemistry, organic, non-organic etc (whatever that means 😳).
We went to Heriot-Watt yesterday and they seemed to focus more on the mechanisms of it, heat transfer, fluid flow etc. This is all stuff that I did on my mechanical engineering course, On the point of chemistry, the course leader somewhat jokingly suggested they leave that part to others. This is possibly reflected as they also look for a good Physics grade for entry, which my daughter hasn’t taken. She’s doing chemistry, maths and French.
We are going to Sheffield uni for an open day in a few weeks so it will be interesting to see how they discuss the content.
My daughters preference is for the course with more Chemistry as this is what she enjoys but is keen on the industrialisation of chemistry.
Surely a Chemical Engineer needs to have a decent grasp of Chemistry?
Any thoughts, advice or even ramblings would be gratefully read!
Hi, yes, PhD in chemistry here.
Main branches are organic, inorganic and physical. The physical aspect of it tends towards the engineering side if you will focussing on areas such as thermodynamics. This is where chemical engineering comes in.
I did post-doc in Nottingham Chem Eng department on polymer manufacture. I explained the Zielger-Natta method of creation of polymers and the lecturer's eyes glazed over so I got the impression they are more interested in the physical characteristics of heat transfer, fluid dynamics and the like.
Just looking at the Nottingham syllabus for Chem Eng year one shows this to be so:
Fluid dynamics
Engineering mathematics
Heat and mass transfer
Process Engineering Fundamentals
Separation Process Fundamentals
Introductory Chemistry
Engineering Thermodynamics
Introductory Geology
Engineering principles
Chemistry in the Environment
Fundamentals of Engineering Design
As opposed to the areas such as the disconnection approach to organic synth, IR spectroscopy, etc.
Suggest you peruse the syllabi of different universities to see how they set-up their courses to give you a better view.
And good luck!
I did a Chem Eng BSc at Edinburgh (did a MSc at Heriot-Watt too but not in Chem-Eng). My experience at Edinburgh was of minimal Chemistry, I only did 2 chemistry modules, one was shared with chemists and the other was industrial organic chemistry, neither were particularly my thing, lots of remembering convoluted reaction pathways! (I took Advanced Higher Physics, Chemistry & Maths at school in 6th year) Chem Eng is oftern used interchangably with Process Engineering which I suppose better describes what a lot of people end up doing. I think most people who took my undergrad and have gone into industry now describe themselves as Process Engineers. Not sure if that's because most have gone into O&G/Petrochemicals. As a gross simplification I think of it as industrial cooking, someone else gives you the recipe and you have to make it as cost effectively (and safely) as possible!
Regarding Heriot-Watt, I thought it was pretty good if you're wanting to go into industry, good links for placements etc... Ed seemed more focussed on academia, which is fine but it's not for everyone!
I did Chem Eng at Sheffield, mostly for the mountain biking.
They are very different courses, chemistry is about the detail, chemical engineering (which when I did it was called chemical and process engineering ) is more focused on the process involved.
For me the distinction is that a chemist makes 100g of a new substance in a lab, then the chemical engineer has to work out how to make a million tonnes of the substance that the chemist made, without it being cost-prohibitive or lethally dangerous.
I'd be inclined to say that chem eng is more vocational than straight chemistry*, but when I was there the mathematicians were slowly replacing the old guys from industry as lecturers, so it felt as if it was becoming more theoretical than practical.
*Unless your dream job is a being a pure chemist. It was also said that chem eng gives you more of a flavour of the other engineering disciplines, as for example designing a reactor involves some chemistry, process engineering (HMBs and such), mechanical engineering, structural engineering, instrumentation/control engineering, along with some material science in ensuring you spec the correct materials for the process involved.
At degree level, I’d stick to a Chemistry degree which covers all the fundamental aspects in the first year. If it’s a modular degree course, she should be able to make choices in her 2nd and 3rd years to explore her preferred areas. If, not she can specialise post-grad if she really wants to.
Lots of work out there for people with a good Chemistry degree. In the last decade too many people took crap like ‘Forensics’ or ‘Combined Science’ degrees.
Well I’ve not been a student for a couple of decades and I had a slightly circuitous rout to Chem Eng but a lot of the comments above chime with my experience. Make no mistake Chem Eng is an engineering degree, it is not a pure science and whilst there is a lot of chemistry and maths there are also fluid mechanics, thermodynamics, mass and heat transfer, process control (no idea how I ever passed that one!) as well as the economic side of things.
If she wants to study a science then Chemistry may be a better bet but the chemists I knew at uni all had physics and still studied some physics in first year. (Scottish system so 4 years for an honours degree)
oh oh and for Herriot watt the company I work for (O&G) has taken quite a few graduates and interns over the last few years so employment opportunities aren’t too shabby for a chem eng grad.
process control (no idea how I ever passed that one!)
Ah yes, *that* module.
For me the distinction is that a chemist makes 100g of a new substance in a lab, then the chemical engineer has to work out how to make a million tonnes of the substance that the chemist made, without it being cost-prohibitive or lethally dangerous.
Very much this, and I guess it depends (if she knows yet) if she's likely to want to make stuff in a lab or at the (maybe not millions!) tonnes scale longer term. And if the former, then to access the majors she'll probably be looking to go on to to PhD; if the latter then more vocational like an MSc may suffice.
You see to suggest she's a gram scale girl, I'm not sure (I guess would depend on the course content itself) how easy it is to transition from Chemistry to Chemical Engineering if she changes her mind, and whether you can get into ChemEng at MSc with a degree in chemistry.
tojv (Chemistry, Durham 1990)
in a car on my phone so I can come back later.
Pure chem degree. Now work as an industrial chemist. While we have people who do gram scale stuff we are very much bucket scale. Make fire protection paint for the oil and gas industry.
Plenty of jobs involve the scale up industrial side of things rather than analytical. I've set up factory production facilities. Gone to large scale trials (we paint oil rigs!) Etc.
Do what she enjoys more. We look for a solid broad base but you'll learn more about intumescent chemistry in your 1st three months with us than most chemists ever will.
As said, it's important to be clear that Chem Eng is the ENGINEERING of chemical processes. It's not some hybrid 50/50 mix of the two disciplines. Chemistry is chemistry, a science. So your daughter is choosing between the twin pillars of civilisation here, science and engineering, and they're very different.
Tell me this; have you ever looked up at a starry night and tried to comprehend how some of the stars you see might not even exist any more, such is the unimaginable slowness of the speed of light relative to the interstellar distances of space? And maybe held your hand up to the night sky and realised that the hydrogen, carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, and sulfur atoms that form proteins that make your hand were themselves forged in the heart of those stars you see above you? Stars to atoms to molecules to life on earth to humans - this is the path of science and I shit you not we are only getting started.
On the other hand, have you ever sat on the bog taking a shite and thought - I wonder how big a pipe I would need to connect this here bog to the sewer? And what would be the correct fasteners to use to fix that pipe to the bog? Perhaps I would need 6, but maybe 12 would be better. And how does this toilet flush really work when you get down to it? The answers to these questions lie on the path of engineering.
So it's different strokes for different folks really.
Fwiw I used 2g of material for my master's but now consider anything less than 20kg to be small scale
I did chemistry with chem eng at Huddersfield.
I currently work at a place that marries both together (pharma, where it's a massive growth industry as for years there was so much money they didn't have to chase every efficiency now they are looking to completely redesign whole processes to shortcut everything. We go from 27 month lead times to 14 on first pass alone.
If she is good/enjoys chemistry then do that as it gives you a massive advantage in process development both in secondary and primary manufacturing against the "pure" engineers.
Will try to add more later when on a proper keyboard.
As said, it’s important to be clear that Chem Eng is the ENGINEERING of chemical processes. It’s not some hybrid 50/50 mix of the two disciplines. Chemistry is chemistry, a science.
^^^ This.
My nephew studied Chemistry for his undergraduate degree and now move on to Chemical Engineering for his Masters. Initially he wanted to study Chemical Engineering in his undergraduate years but changed his mind to Chemistry instead. He has done very well in his Chemistry undergraduate degree but now he wants to be more focused as I think he knows the direction he is heading. 😀
Great, I really appreciate the comments and experiences here.
I think her view has been skewed somewhat as she did a work experience at a polymer manufacturer so she was doing the reactions and the subsequent testing of the materials physical properties.
She has this impression, perhaps much as I did, that chemical engineering is the use of chemicals to make and develop goods. It sounds like, strictly speaking, it is the engineering of chemistry. I think.
We went to Heriot-Watt yesterday
Should have had an STW ride out... We probably passed each other.
Eldest_oab looking at mechatronics/robotics/mechanical/electronic engineering. Of course only uni near good riding will do... After a year in BC riding a bike as well.
What did you think of the place oab?
The campus and teaching facilities looked a little tired and it must be a tough call trying to attract students when you are up against some facilities like Sheffield with that new diamond/cube thing.
My daughter is keen though and I think she liked the out of town, resort feel. I think it would drive me barmy and reckon that she’d be off, like most students sound to do, into a digs in Edinburgh from yr 2.
Agreed there was a noticeable difference between some of the new areas and some of the teaching areas.
Strathclyde is even more tired/hotpotch of old buildings.
We were taken by how green the campus was.
Only other choice for us is Napier.
All three rate really well for teaching and outcomes.
Eldest_OAB is looking for graduate apprenticeship, and HW is incredibly well organised for that. Is your daughter looking for apprenticeship? Massive debt saving AND paid job = win.
She’s not looked at Apprenticeships, the thought of doing nothing in free time likely appeals too much.....
As others have suggested above, there are entire careers forged by chemistry graduates in the space between bucket scale industrial process chemistry and gram scale synthetic lab chemistry, be that safe scaling up, or working on new processes that are more efficient or safe. The chemistry graduate route is more about designing the reactions than the construction of the rig that is used to do the process, but the two are not completely exclusive (e.g. to avoid thermal run-away, you need to think about heat transfer as an engineer and how exothermic a reaction is as a process chemist).
(Chemistry lecturer)
<disclaimer- I work in student recruitment at Heriot Watt, that was our open day! Hope it went well for everyone, it's been a mental time getting it together this year and there's always things to improve but it felt pretty good to me. Nobody got trapped in a revolving door at least, that's a definite improvement>
I'm not the right person to get into chemistry vs chem eng but the short version I use in schools etc is pretty much what's been said up the page. Chemistry for doing science, chem eng for doing things, from taking these clever carbon nanotubes and turning them into useful, viable products, to brewing and distilling.
Graduate apprenticeships are really interesting, we're definitely one of the leaders on that- our whole uni and mindset suits it well, and also we were very involved in the design stage. If you swung by the stand in the afternoon and spoke to Robin he's one of the handful of people in Scotland that's making the entire thing work. We just took one on ourselves in the team, pretty interesting to see it work in practice. Definitely not for everyone or even probably for 9 out of 10 students but it's going to be fantastic for some.
The engineering buildings are pretty much the oldest part of the campus, mid-1970s so yep, they do feel well used, but they're fit for purpose I reckon- and you probably noticed our glorious breezeblock and brick aesthetic which matches so perfectly with the centuries-old gardens and tree collection and the parked zeppelin that we have for a sports centre. I wish we had a shiny new building to show off though!
(I absolutely love the campus, right outside my office is one of the very first giant redwoods in Scotland... But when I studied there it was really just green wallpaper, I was totally oblivious, different strokes...)
Pretty much everyone moves into town after their first year (not necessarily "first year", their own first year). But you can get into town so easily, and this side of Edinburgh's awesome for students, because you've got us, Napier (also a very good uni btw, they have to work harder than us and Edinburgh), and Edinburgh College all in a row then that bus goes right into town and all along the 25 route is studentville- flats and private halls and everything else, Edinburgh tenaments make great student flats so Gorgie and Dalry are full of our guys. TBF you couldn't do what we do without all that on your doorstep, Edinburgh makes the uni- 1/10th of the population of Edinburgh is a student and the 4 unis and the college completent each other really well.
The mtb soc arrived back from the Golfy halfway through, we should have added it into the programme 🙂 "3pm: Come and speak to Lewis about how he nearly killed his entire society on Lone Wolf". Stirling has the best riding from the door of any university in Scotland but I reckon we're the best location overall and the society's really good. Shame Lewis Buchanan's graduated really!
@northwind - you can tell your staff that a) much, much better set of presentations than Strathclyde. They focused on the courses and opportunities much more. b) simpler to find your way around and more happy student guides and c) the chap who does apprenticeships was brilliant, and you're much more organised than Aberdeen and Strathclyde, yet to go to Napier.
I have a degree an Honours degree in Chemistry from the University of Edinburgh and now work as Project Manager at the local Council,
Realised quite early on that a Chemistry career probably wasn't for me, but had a great time at Uni.
What will be will be would be my advice.
Chemistry with a year in industry for me (Cardiff, 1998 - 2001).The Year in Industry thing was essentially a route into Chem Eng if required but the degree was pure chemistry.
Chemistry itself is a mix of theoretical and applied - it's all very well knowing the reactions and the basic bits of moving electrons around the place but if you can't actually do that in a lab, it's somewhat pointless. I worked with a PhD guy for a short while who had theoretical chemistry second to none, knew all the reactions back to front. Sadly he was completely incapable of actually doing the work when confronted with glassware and lab equipment...
Surely a Chemical Engineer needs to have a decent grasp of Chemistry?
Very much so - it's all very well designing a lovely piece of equipment but if the liquid you're piping through it is corrosive as hell then the pipes and all the joints need to be made of something that doesn't react. Same with designing reactor vessels, plant scale kit and so on. We did a lot of scale-up work: taking reactions from gram-scale in conical flasks to 20L scale to 100L scale and then farming them out to plants with 1000L scale capabilities and at every stage all the various bits of exothermic reactions, by-products, reactor cleaning etc needed to be considered and accounted for.
The lack of physics shouldn't be *too* much of an issue. They're usually much more keen on the maths side of things, in fact if you didn't have A-level maths you HAD to do 4 maths modules in 1st Year and that screwed everybody. People without maths (almost always chem / biology / geography or chem / physics / geography) had done maths GCSE and then done 2 years of near zero maths, often a year out as well and then were suddenly hit with essentially a condensed A-level which went into differentiation, integration, Fourier Transform... They were crying. I did chemistry, biology, maths so I got to play around in bichem modules instead which was much more fun.
Chemistry academic here who sees a good deal of chemical engineers. I pretty much agree with everything said above about the two disciplines.
I think it's really important to go somewhere she likes the feel of, and study a course that really interests her because, unless she's self-motivated, she'll flounder, and a contented, interested student will do well.
Chemical engineer here. Chemistry is important but probably less so than the other things that you need to be able to understand to build or operate a chemical plant. This is reflected in degree courses.
Also worth mentioning that the arse has been ripped out of the UK chemical, process and engineering industries. So the probability of a degree qualified chemical engineering working in a relevant field is <50%. The fact chem eng is not very chemistry based is it's biggest attribute so employability is decent as folk get work in other industries where "systems" thinking is useful. Language skills and willingness to travel anywhere are crucial prerequisites to pursuing an engineering career these days.
That and study what ever you like as the only thing that'll change are the numbers in a spreadsheet and only until AI does that and then who knows.
Which polymer company?
It might be worth looking at some job options. Our site has some info
https://www.akzonobel.com/en/careers/career-overview
We are a chemicals company and would take pure chemists to develop polymers and then scale up to a full size industrial process. There would be engineers as part of that team as well but it is typically led by a chemist.
The coatings I develop start off small but then you take them all the way to production travelling to worldwide factories to train people and ensure they scale up from lab scale to multi tonne scale.
I'd say this is pretty common for any industrial chemist. Research in industry is a means to produce a tangible product.
Happy to answer specific questions if you message me.
Cheers Matt!
Great, I really appreciate the comments and experiences here.
I think her view has been skewed somewhat as she did a work experience at a polymer manufacturer so she was doing the reactions and the subsequent testing of the materials physical properties.
She has this impression, perhaps much as I did, that chemical engineering is the use of chemicals to make and develop goods. It sounds like, strictly speaking, it is the engineering of chemistry. I think.
I work on a plant making polymer (potential to make 40ktne per year)which we then convert into polyester film. Think you could be correct. Whole new product being developed at the moment. We have recently taken on graduate apprentices from one of the above Scottish universities. I would say that they stand a better chance of understanding the complexities of the machinery and how things work(or don’t!!!)than coming into industry straight from uni.Our top man is from Oxbridge, can’t remember which. I’m a mere wrench monkey nearing retirement....
Thank you to everyone who commented here, some great advice and real world experiences to mull over.
Rockhopper - HWU Chemistry Alumni Here (20 years since I graduated so your comments about aging facilities are harder compare - especially as never been to Sheffield - there is a lot more about a place than how shiny it’s benches are though).
The Chem Eng students studied most of the same chemistry modules as we did in 1st Yr. I’m fairly sure they had their own chemistry modules in 2nd yr (including labs etc). Still delivered by the Chemistry dept - perhaps that is what he meant by “leave it to them”, or things may have changed a lot. I’m not sure how easy it would be to leap from Chem to Chem Eng after 1st yr, I assume they actually did some Enginnering in 1st Yr and we didn’t (a small number of Chemists did do some Chem Eng modules in 3rd yr, along with the Brewers and Distillers, we didn’t get great marks!).
As for the pros and cons of campus versus in town. Most will move into town in 2nd and 3rd year, many return in 4th yr. that lets you experience both. It’s a fairly daunting leap to head off to a new city, with no friends, possibly studying a new subject, etc. There is something reassuring about bubble that is campus. Certainly nobody who moves back in 4th yr will miss the 30-40 minute bus ride in from the centre of town!
rockhpopper - this is from my son who is 3rd yr at heriot watt.
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Heriot Watt's course was originally called chemical process engineering, but they had a name change to fit with the other courses as part of that school. It's kept it's same values though, so does focus more on chemical engineering and chemistry that is applicable directly into industry, as well as giving design projects which are based on real life issues etc. You still study chemistry in years 1-3 with organic and inorganic coming into this equally, but the statement made about "leaving it to someone else" is purely a joke because we all go to the same chemistry lectures as the chemistry student do and get taught by chemistry professors rather than anyone from chemical engineering teaching us chemistry. If you want to ask any questions about the heriot watt course, I'm on the 3rd year of it and am happy to help if I can - just message this account and I'll send my email
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Chem Eng Grad from Leeds 22 years ago 😳😣
I hated the course - hours & hours of copying mathematical proofs from those big overlapping chalk boards. After the first year I knew it wasn’t for me - I was sponsored by the RAF anyway as a pilot, so was never going into the industry.
My year of 30, 25 were foreign students who kept themselves to themselves, and my only real mate committed suicide over a catholic girl.
Graduated from Cardiff Uni 2013 MChem Hons. (that's straight chemistry). I specialised in Biochemistry with my optional modules.
Was definitely a hard course, you really had to knuckle down and work to get good grades.
Most of my mates from my course stayed on to do PhDs and the like, but I went straight into industry. My experience has been that getting your first position is crucial, no matter what it is (obviously if it's something you're remotely interested in helps). Then you have to do a few years at this job and just take on as much as you can, learning all you can. Then you can start looking for jobs you actually want etc. Well that's what I have done so far.
They're both serious, respected degrees, excellent employability, but if the decision is close you should choose chemistry IMHO. Far, far broader, which mitigates the risk of going to uni and finding you just don't like the course.
I did have one guy who sat looking shell-shocked though the first tutorial of year one - basic diatomic molecular orbitals, didn't say a word, and then asked to speak to me afterwards. I think I've made a terrible mistake, I only chose chemistry because my parents made me, I want to be a physiotherapist! Poor lad. Generally though there is something for everyone to get inspired by because chemistry covers such a breadth of disciplines.
Rockhopper - I graduated HW 20 years ago with a Chemistry degree. Facilities were good at that time, not sure what updates/grades were made after I left but they seemed to have modern facilities compared to the US university that I did my PhD at!
Agree with Poly, 1st year make friends on campus the first year and lived off campus the 2nd and 3rd years in Dalry in Uni owned flats. 4th year I was a lot closer to campus and at that point had taken up mountain biking so was happy to have easy access to the Pentlands!
Overall I think the course gave a really strong basis to my future career and I was ahead of a lot of people with my graduate studies. At the time I graduated I think HW was one of the last Universities teaching some of the more complex and theoretical courses.
Depending on whether your daughter wants to be in industry or not I would heartily recommend obtaining a higher degree to ensure maximizing possible promotions in her future career.
STL - "I graduated HW 20 years ago with a Chemistry degree." -- do we know each other?
Gary - They’re both serious, respected degrees, excellent employability, but if the decision is close you should choose chemistry IMHO
Thats a somewhat one sided view. If the description above is correct then she probably wants to study materials science (or if HW still do it - Chemistry with Polymers and Advanced Materials [althought its not as materials heavy as the title suggests]); but earnings potential is typically higher for chemical engineers, and my gut feel was they tended to go off into some sort of engineering whereas only about 1/2 our class went on to do science.
If my child was keen on Chem Eng, I'd get them to look at Brewing and Distilling (a current boom area) as a possible alternative, they'll still do quite a bit of chemical engineering, but its a very niche course with excellent employability. (Although it only makes sense if they would be interested in it).
WRT to brewing and distilling I seem to remember taking that as my 'optional' class the first year of the Chemistry degree at HW, so no doubt if that interested your daughter she would be able to switch for years 2 and beyond. I really enjoyed that part of things, was a bit more application based than some of the things that we did. I originally started off as a Colour Chemistry student but boiling bits of material in water/dye for a 4 hour lab really didn't interest me enough, though the 4th year in Galashiels would appeal more now for the biking!
Poly - message sent, seems like we should know each other!
Thanks again all, I’d love to respond to each of you individually but I’m surprised how many have been down this subject, and even at Herriot watt.
Speaking to the course leaders at the open day, the brewing option was still available, I think actually a course.
They are, however, dropping the specific chem eng courses with specialities, such as energy, and making these selectable modules.
I did Chem eng and chemistry MEng but as we basically did 60-70% of both degrees we could graduate as MSc or MEng depending on why we did in the 4th year.
I think the straight engineering students only did the first semesters chemistry modules spread over a longer timeframe, TBH those only really covered à-levels + about the same again to level out everyone who had taken different syllabus and options in 6th form.
Chem Eng (in my old job at least) involves almost no chemistry beyond a basic understanding of how reactions happen and what they're called, its a bit more than a-level but not much.
I can see why they would rather a physics a-level than a chemistry a-level, its a degree based around maths equations not chemical ones for the most part. That said they're always moaning about courses being under subscribed so it has to be worth a shot asking the admissions tutors in person.
What does she think she wants to do as a job? A lot of it is well paid, but very cyclical. The salary surveys saying £60k by the time you're 30 don't say that probably a massive chunk of O&G Chem engineers are out of work at the moment (50% even?). Pharma, food etc pay less but have a bit more stability. I now work in TV fixing kit!
HWU chem eng graduate from over 20 years ago here. What I would say is that chem eng is considered to be a very flexible degree where you can work in a lot of different areas (from engineering through to finance). The UK demand for engineering in general is shrinking but I know an awful lot of people that have headed down other paths after uni. Chem Eng has been good to me; paid me well, travelled the world; worked with some cracking folk.
On the choice of unis though ... be careful. Employers tend to pick from their favourite unis first. From my experience, HWU, Edinburgh and Strathclyde are all well respected Chem Eng unis alongside UMIST and Newcastle. A step up from there in terms of prestige would be Imperial. Huddersfield? Not so much. Probably a rank down for HWU.
In terms of engineering, the quality of the course lies with how they help folk apply knowledge, not the theoretical stuff behind it. From memory, Chemistry (organic and inorganic) was a fairly major part of the first two years of the course at HWU. The next two years were more focused on application of knowledge and we're quite practical. Recent graduates I know we're similar.