Petroleum and Natural Gas Engineering

The B.S. program in Petroleum and Natural Gas Engineering is accredited by the Engineering Accreditation Commission of ABET, 111 Market Place, Suite 1050, Baltimore, MD 21202-4012; telephone: 410-347-7700.

The undergraduate curriculum in petroleum and natural gas engineering has been designed to equip the student with the fundamentals necessary to achieve lifelong professional growth. Graduates are prepared to enter both the private and public sectors as petroleum and natural gas engineers or to pursue further education at the graduate level.

The courses are structured to serve as a melting pot for theory, application to case studies and engineering project design. This enables the student to appreciate and understand that a successful engineering design project requires a sound theoretical foundation, experimentation and engineering judgment. The thrust of the program structure emphasizes the fundamentals of mathematics and earth and engineering sciences and integrates them in application to traditional petroleum and natural gas engineering topics. Design projects are required throughout the curriculum. Execution of these projects requires an amalgamation of problem formulation strategies, testing of alternative design methodologies, feasibility studies, and economic and environmental considerations. Graduates of the program are expected to perform in various facets of the petroleum industry including drilling, production, evaluation, transportation and storage. The petroleum and natural gas engineering faculty and staff are committed to an interactive teaching and learning environment to ensure that the student is an active participant in the learning process. General education opportunities are sufficiently broad and diverse in scope to enable the student to tailor the educational experience to particular interests, background and expected role in society.

Petroleum and Natural Gas Engineering Student Outcomes:

1. Our students, at the time of their graduation, will have a working knowledge of basic math, science skills and engineering skills.
2. Our students, at the time of their graduation, will be equipped with ability to design and conduct experiments as well as to analyze and interpret data.
3. Our students, at the time of their graduation, will be ready to design a system, component or process to meet desired needs within realistic constraints such as economic, environmental, social, political, ethical, health and safety, manufacturability and sustainability.
4. Our students, at the time of their graduation, will be able to function in multi-disciplinary teams.
5. Our students, at the time of their graduation, will be equipped with the necessary skills to identify, formulate and solve engineering problems.
6. Our students, at the time of their graduation, will have a thorough understanding of professional and ethical responsibilities.
7. Our students, at the time of their graduation, will be equipped with the necessary communication skills to communicate effectively.
8. Our students, at the time of their graduation, will have a broad education necessary to understand the impact of engineering solutions in a global, economic, environmental and societal context.
9. Our students, at the time of their graduation, will be instilled with the recognition of the need for, and an ability to engage in life-long learning.
10. Our students, at the time of their graduation, will attain knowledge on contemporary issues.
11. Our students, at the time of their graduation, will have an ability to use the techniques, skills and modern engineering tools that are necessary for engineering practice.

Petroleum and Natural Gas Engineering Program Educational Objectives:

1. Our graduates will integrate key science and engineering principles to address the technological challenges of the petroleum and natural gas industry.
2. Our graduates will practice in a broad range of petroleum engineering fields working on teams that create innovative solutions to the most pressing problems of the petroleum and natural gas industry by implementing the ideals of ethical behavior, professionalism, and environmental sensitivity and social awareness.
3. Our graduates will be recognized as critical and independent thinkers and will assume positions of leadership in defining the social, intellectual, business and technical dimensions of the professional organizations they belong to.
4. Our graduates will continue their life-long learning process and participate in graduate education to remain as effective professionals in the workplace of the future.

• Secondary School Records
• Post-Secondary School Records
• TOEFL: A minimum TOEFL score of 80 on the Internet-based TOEFL or 550 on the paper exam (code #2660)
• IELTS: A minimum IELTS score of 6.5 on the academic test
• Penn State requires first-year international students to submit an official score from the SAT or ACT examination.Please note: The writing component of standardized tests (SAT or ACT) is not required. The writing component will not be used as part of our evaluation. If your test scores include the writing component, by all means, have those scores sent to Penn State. Additionally, we do not require SAT Subject Tests.

Scholarships

• The Millenium Scholars Program